Why are you avoiding me? If it's because our "argument" I don't even knew was one? Please answer me. I'm worried about you. Don't shut me out, I'm here for you. I know I'm your teacher and this isn't appropriate but I do care about you Aria. Please call me.
~Ezra
This wasn't the first text that Ezra sent her. Aria read it and then deleted it. She couldn't take being in contact with him because she couldn't handle wanting to have the one she can't have. It was crazy for her to feel this way. She was raised better than that. But then again, what hadn't her father done? He had slept with one of his students, what a great role model he was.
"Aria, will you please talk to me" Ezra begged her.
"I can't" Aria said, not meeting his eyes.
She didn't want to look into them because she knew she could resist him looking right through her and seeing every feeling she was feeling. And she most certainly couldn't stand looking into them and knowing they didn't look at her the same way hers looked into his.
"Please" Ezra said.
"No" Aria said. "We can't do this. I can't see you…"
"Could you please come by the apartment so we can talk about it" Ezra asked pleadingly.
Aria took a deep breath "Fine"
The girl had studied for a while but Aria knew they all wanted to know what was going on behind the walls of her house. She closed her book and looked at them and sighed.
"I know you that you all want to know what's going on, so fine, I'll tell you" Aria spoke.
"Finally" Hanna mumbled.
"HANNA" Spencer said and gave her a glare.
"Well, sorry for being curios about her. I want to know" Hanna said and looked at Aria and waited for her to continue.
"Well, I caught my dad cheating on mom" Aria started to say.
"Do you know who it was" Emily asked.
"Meredith" Aria said in disgust.
"I've heard that she slept with a lot of professors because she couldn't pass the courses" Hanna said.
"That really doesn't help" Aria said.
"Sorry" Hanna said and looked down.
"And I told my mom about it and now they're fighting constantly and I feel so responsible for it" Aria said and felt tears stroll down her cheeks.
"Aria, you can't blame yourself for this. This is not your fault. He only has himself to blame for this. If he's too stupid to do such a mistake, he sure as hell deserves your mom being angry at him" Spencer said and Emily and Hanna nodded in agreement.
"Your right" Aria said.
She smiled at her friends; they really knew the right words to say. This was exactly what she needed, someone to tell her that her father was an ass to cheat on her mother and that he was to blame for them fighting. Not her, not mike, not her mother. He, her father, her mother's husband, Byron Montgomery was to blame for this.
The girls continued the night as every other study night, eating pizza, turn studying into talking and laughing and then falling asleep on the floor with their heads in their books and then wake up in the middle of the night, wake up each other so they could laugh about how they hadn't done anything and then sleep beside each other in the bed and be terrible late for school the next day even though Spencer set the alarm and got super stressed in the morning. This was exactly what she needed. She needed her best friends.
"Will you please tell me why you have been ignoring me now" Ezra asked as he gave her a cup of coffee. Their fingers touched and he tried to shrug it off him, just like every other time he had felt the spark when they touched. He hated that he felt this attraction towards her. He sat down beside her and took a sip of his coffee.
"No" Aria said.
"Why" Ezra asked.
"Because if I do, I will never be able to see or talk to you again" Aria said.
"You're already doing that" Ezra established.
Aria sighed and looked straight into his eyes as she started to speak.
"I can't tell you because: I don't want to tell you because you're my teacher and I'm your student. I don't want to tell you because we can never be more than that. I don't want to tell you because you make me weak. I don't want tell you because I can't look into your eyes and lie to you. I don't want to tell you how I feel because I'm scared. I'm scared because you know me better than my friends do. I'm scared of what I'm feeling. And most of all I hate that I can't have what I want" Aria said not knowing were the words came from. "And now I'm scared of your reaction" Aria confessed.
Arias looked down only to have Ezra put his finger under her chin and make her look into his eyes as he leaned in closer and pressed his lips against hers.
She was kissing her English teacher. What the hell was she thinking, Aria thought to herself as they deepen the kiss even more. Ezra's tongue traced over her bottom lip, asking for entrance. Aria opened her mouth and their tongues began wrestling for dominance. When they pulled apart they looked into each other's eyes and caught their breaths.
"You didn't have to be scared of my reaction" Ezra said and pulled a piece of hair, that was covering Arias face, behind her ear.
"So where does this leave us" Aria asked and looked into his eyes, looking for the answer so she could be prepared if the was an answer she didn't want coming.
"I have no idea" Ezra said honestly "All I know is that your absolutely more than my student now"
Aria smiled and leaned up to kiss him again, torturing herself with how great it felt to be kissing him and how much hurt she would feel if someone found out and tried to destroy whatever this was that was going on between them. She was not afraid that he knew her better than anyone else, now she was scared that he would lose everything he loved because of her. She didn't want him to risk that much for her, she wasn't worth the risk.
"What are you thinking about" Ezra asked.
He had felt her tense up and he had pulled away from the kiss, worried why she was tensing up. Was It something he did, he asked himself.
"If you're willing to risk everything because of me" Aria responded and moved herself away from him. "I'm not worth it"
"Yes you are Aria; you're worth risking everything for. When I saw you crying in the hallway, something inside of me broke, I didn't know what or why but when we started to speak it was as something was trying to tell me something, that I was the one to save you, I just didn't know from what. And every time I saw you sad I got that feeling inside me again. And every time we touched I felt that jolt of electricity going through my whole body, and I could tell you felt it too. And when you didn't want to speak to me I felt as If something was missing. And when I got to talk to you, even for a second and even though it wasn't anything important or just something about homework, I felt complete. You make me complete. You're worth risking everything for." Ezra said. "So don't say you're not"
Tears were streaming down Aria's face as Ezra spoke, his words were honest and he wasn't trying to hide anything, he was speaking right from his heart. She felt important for the first time in a very long time, and it felt good. She smiled through her tears and he smiled back. He grabbed her by her wrist and pulled her back to him. She winced in pain as he grabbed her by her wounds. Ezra looked at her curiously and pulled her shirtsleeve up and gasped in shock and looked at her. Aria quickly pulled her sleeve down and looked down ashamed, he wasn't supposed to find out, no one were.
"Aria" Ezra said and his voice was shaking.
She heard he was scared as to why she had done it. Had she been trying to kill herself, Aria knew what thoughts that ran through his head. She couldn't manage to look at him. Tears streamed down her face and she wiped them away, one by one.
"Will you please look at me" Ezra said worriedly.
"No" Aria squeezed out.
"Did you try to…" Ezra couldn't manage to say the word, nor think them. He was so scared of if she wanted to die, leave this world, he was scared that he just had gotten her and now would risk losing her because she was depressed, or whatever she was feeling.
"No, I didn't try to kill myself. Even though I wanted sometimes, I'm too scared to do it" Aria said quietly but she knew he could hear her.
"But why" Ezra asked and wiped away more tears that escaped her eyes.
"Because I was feeling like I didn't matter" Aria said and looked up at him for the first time.
"Is this because of your parents" Ezra was confused, why did she let them affect her so much. She was stronger than that.
Aria looked into his eyes as she thought about her options. Either she told him about her dad abusing her or she could make up some lie but he would see right through her and she would have to tell him or she just left him, never looking back, never talking to him again. No that hurt too much. She had just gotten him and couldn't lose him now.
"Not my parents, my dad" Aria said and lifted her shirt up to reveal her bruises.
DUNDUNDUN! So how do you think Ezra will react?
I actually liked this chapter, I don't know why but I did. Hope you like it too.
XX Isabella!
