Author's Note
That first chapter? Nonsense! Pure setup. This is the chapter I really wanted to write.
Thank you all for the reviews, follows and favorites! I think you'll like this one! :)
21 Credits
Chapter 2
or
"She's Just Not That Into You"
"Hi."
She looks up at his face and Jack is temporarily struck by how pretty she is up close. She looks him up and down quickly. She sniffs and turns away.
"'M spoken for."
"I'm sorry?" He could hear a slight slur to her words. Maybe she was lost? He should offer to help her look for her friends.
"I said I have a boyfriend." A sneer on her lips. "So whatever line you were planning on using on me, you can just put it right back in your pocket. Or go use it on some other girl."
Oh.
"No, no," he tells her. "I merely wanted to see if you were okay."
Her expression radiates with what he could only assume was annoyance. "Do I look like some sort of damsel in distress?" She takes a long sip of her beer. "Beat it."
"That's not what I was thinking at all. I just—"
"You're still here? Fine, I'll go."
She pushes off the wall and makes her way across the room. He sees her stumble slightly, narrowly avoiding another group that had crossed her path. He follows her and almost reaches out to steady her but thinks better of it and lets his arms drop.
"'Nother beer, please," she says as she reaches the 'bartender'. Actually, it's just another student who happened to be standing near the cooler. But, he imagines, the tone in her voice is so authoritative that the student bends over and gets her one without a word.
"Perhaps you've had enough?" he suggests.
"Oh, I get it. You won't listen to me when I tell you to back off but you expect me to listen to you."
He lets out an exasperated sigh. She did have a point.
"Very well. May I accompany you?"
Her eyes roll. "Whatever."
She darts towards a rare empty spot on the couch and flops down on the corner. He cautiously takes a seat next to her. He's not quite sure what to talk about. Everything he'd said just appeared to irritate her. It's been established that Jack's not exactly a master of conversation, himself. Normally when he spoke it was to answer a question. He finds himself attracting outgoing people, who made speaking for himself quite easy.
She leans back into the couch and props her feet on the edge of the coffee table. Her red painted toes wiggle in her tanned flip flops. She sighs heavily. He opens his mouth to speak.
"Um." Great start, genius. "What year are you in?"
She looks at him through half-lidded eyes, beer bottle tipped up toward her lips. "Fourth."
"Me, too."
She grunts, obviously uncaring, and takes another sip. She looks to her right, away from him, disregarding him completely. He feels like an idiot. Say something else!
"What are you studying?"
"Conservational sciences."
His brows furrow. "I was not aware that was a major here."
"It isn't."
"Oh."
He's not sure why but he feels increasingly nervous around her. Like he wants to keep talking to her, but one wrong word could send her over the edge. A ticking time bomb.
"Uh, then how—"
"Oh my god," she exclaims. Apparently he had been right. "Why are you here anyway? Can't you take a fucking hint? I don't want to talk to anyone!"
She was right. He wasn't taking the hint. He's just sitting on a friend's couch at an almost too-loud party next to a drunk girl who wants absolutely nothing to do with him. He asks himself why he's sticking around. Stupidity and curiosity forces his mouth open again.
"If you did not wish to speak to anyone, why attend the party?"
He can feel the chill of sweat break out on his neck and she stares him down for a long, long time. He thinks of leaving.
Eventually, she shrugs. "I dunno. I haven't been to a party in months. Thought it'd be different than what I remembered."
"And… is it?"
"No, it's worse." He narrowly avoids her arm as she wildly gestures to the other party goers. "Everyone here is so… unfocused. All they care about is drinking and hooking up with each other. I can't identify with any of these people."
A small smile touches his lips. "Have you tried?"
The look in her eye cuts through him like a knife.
He surprises himself when he laughs. He sees her eyebrows lift. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It's just, I know a lot of these people. They are good. But alcohol makes people act… silly."
"Silly?" she says. She laughs without humor. "What are you, five?"
He laughs again, louder this time. He feels a small swelling of pride as he sees her lips curl into a small smile.
"On the contrary, most people say I have an old soul."
"You're really lame, you know that?"
"That I have heard before." They exchange a look, both smiling.
"I'm Ashi."
"Ashi," he repeats. It is a pretty name. "I'm—"
"Hi, Jack," he hear a chorus sound behind him. He turns his head and sees two young women from one of his classes. He smiles and greets them. They were very nice ladies.
He can see in his peripheral vision that Ashi was rolling her eyes again and looking away. No! He had just gotten her to open up! Well, she had smiled. She told him her name. Progress is progress!
He excuses himself as politely as he can from his conversation with his classmates and turns back to his... couch mate? She seems, impossibly so, even more standoffish than before.
"I apologize," he says. "What were we saying before?"
"I wasn't saying anything. You were the one doing all the talking."
"Heh. Yes." He swallows the forming lump in his throat. "May I ask how you came to know of this event? Do you have friends here?"
Her expression, made of unreadable stone, doesn't even falter. "Nope. Don't know anyone here."
"What about your boyfriend?"
"My what?"
"Your... boyfriend? Does he know anyone here?"
"What are you talking about? I don't have a boyfriend."
His eyes squint slightly. His head tilts subconsciously. "What?"
"What?"
"That was the first thing you said to me. That you were, um, spoken for?"
"Oh. Well, I lied." She takes a long swig of her beer. He lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding. He feels relieved.
All of a sudden, Ashi lets out a loud, frustrated groan. She leans forward and places her beer on the table in front of her, head in her hands.
"Fuck, I think I'm drunk."
"Are you feeling okay? I could walk you home."
Jack watches her head lift and her expression screw into one of astonishment. Then abject rage.
"Is that what this is about? You pretend to be interested in the shit I have to say just so I'll bang you?"
She stands up in righteous fury and glares down at him. "I can't believe you! You're just like the rest of them!"
She turns away and he can't help himself but dart his hand out to catch hers.
"No! It's not like that!"
Her hand snatches back with a sneer.
"I'm being honest! I just want to make sure you get home safely. Ask anyone!"
He watches her eyebrows lift at the challenge. She moved to grab the hand of another girl walking by. "Hey!" The girl is taken aback but smiles back anyway. "You know this guy?" The girl angles her head around to look at him.
"Oh, Jack! Yeah! How've ya been, buddy?"
He smiles back sheepishly.
"Well this guy, this buddy," Ashi says, "offered to take me home. What do you think? That's a total creep move, right?"
"Ordinarily, I might agree with you, but not about him. It's kinda what he does."
"What do you mean it's 'what he does?'" She lifts her hands to her hair in frustration. "Where the fuck am I?"
"Seriously! Almost every party I've been to, he's offered to escort girls home, to make sure they get home safe!" The girl winks at him. "It's actually very sweet."
"Then you take him home!" she snarls and stomps away. Jack and the other girl exchange confused, well, his is more worried, looks and he excuses himself.
Ashi slams the door behind her and shivers slightly at the cool air of the night. What a bunch of idiots. She should have never come here tonight.
She barely makes it to the sidewalk when she hears her name being called out. She keeps walking. She doesn't need to turn around to see who it is.
"Ashi, please," he says. He touches her shoulder gently. She shrugs it off and furiously digs around in her small pouch and pulls out her keys, dangling them in front of his face. She points to a small canister on the ring.
"You see this? This is pepper spray. I will not hesitate to use it if I have to."
"I understand."
She grumbles, stuffing her keys back in her purse.
She continues walking.
He continues to follow.
Author's Note
Watch yourself, Ashi. Your night is only gonna get weirder from here.
Did I mention this story is ridiculously fun to write?
R&R if you like it! Love you all! 3