Summary: A new girl comes to Eden Hall, befriending Adam. He's able to tell her anything he wants to. Except for one thing. She's falling in love with the guy he's falling in love with. *SLASH*
Author's Note: This is my first shot at MD slash so please bear with me here.
This is slash so if you don't like it…DON'T READ IT!
Disclaimer: I only own Kori, Shane, and Jordan. I probably own Fulton's girl too, but she's not really featured in this story.
NOTE: I realize now that there are no mountains in Minnesota. Oh well, just go with it…
Charlie
***
The morning that we were all going to go snowboarding, I woke-up before anyone else on the team. It was 5:45 AM when I looked at my clock and Kori had told us to meet her down in the cafeteria at seven so we would get up to the mountains in time. Jumping out of bed, I threw my covers off of me and walked over to Guy's bed.
"Guy, wake-up!" I said in a normal voice, shaking Guy firmly. After a few shakes, Guy woke with a start.
"What? What happened?" he asked breathlessly, sitting straight up.
"Nothing, it's time to get up."
"Why didn't my alarm ring?"
"What time did you set it for?"
"6:30…"
"Oh, it's almost six now. Get up, we'll be late!" I told him excitedly. Guy rolled his eyes and obliged, probably too tired to argue.
"I'm going to make sure everyone else is up now," I told Guy before running out the door, still clad in my boxers and t-shirt. I went across the hall and knocked furiously on Averman and Goldberg's door. I heard a loud thump, cringing at the sound. After a few moments of shuffling and arguing the door opened, revealing a sleepy Averman.
"What the hell do you want? Do you realize what time it is?" he asked groggily.
"Time to get up!" I announced cheerfully. Averman muttered something before nodding and telling Goldberg that he was using the bathroom first. I smiled and went back across the hall to the room next door to mine: Luis and Dwayne's room. I knocked on the door furiously.
"What is it?" Luis and Dwayne both answered the door without argument, but sleepily all the same.
"Get ready for snowboarding guys!" I exclaimed in a loud whisper so I wouldn't wake the whole hall up. They nodded, giving me a strange look and closed the door. I had a feeling they were both going back to sleep though. Shrugging it off, I ran over next door and knocked on Fulton, Ken, and Russ's door. This time I heard a, "What the fuck?" and, "Just get the damn door!!" I smiled amusedly as Fulton grudgingly opened the door.
"What? Charlie…what the hell?" he opened the door a crack so he could see who it was.
"GET READY!" I pushed the door open to make sure all three of them got the message. They all stared at me like I had six heads. Sheepishly, I shrugged. What can I say? I was excited. The girls, however, beat me to it. When I knocked on their door, they weren't there. Later, I found out that they had gone to Kori's room fifteen minutes before I got up to get ready with her. I shrugged and made my way to Adam and Portman's room, a little farther down the hall than everyone else's since they were re-located in the middle of the year (or located for the first time in Portman's case). I knocked on their door for a few minutes straight before I heard any sign of movement from the other side. There was mumbling, but I couldn't exactly hear what they were saying. Finally, Adam opened the door still half-asleep.
"Morning, Banksie!" I crowed cheerfully just like I had done all the other times. Adam rubbed his eyes a few times, which was pretty cute. I don't mean it that way. He looked like a sleepy baby, which is cute. Get off my case, okay?
"Charlie…" he croaked, trailing off.
"Yes?" I asked innocently. He opened his mouth to respond, but thought better of it and shook his head, yawning. I heard Portman ask him who it was and Adam told him it was me. Portman got up and joined Adam at the door, "Do you realize what time it is?"
"I'm pretty aware of it, yes. Get ready and meet everyone…" I was cut off by both Adam and Portman saying simultaneously,
"In the cafeteria at seven sharp. Don't be late."
"Yeah."
"Okay, we'll see you then," Portman told me. I nodded and said good-bye. Adam scratched his stomach, revealing some stomach muscle, as he closed the door. He had a nice body. I had to ask him how he did that some time. Stopping in the middle of the hallway, I wondered what the hell I was doing thinking about that kind of stuff. Shrugging, I shook it off as jealously. Why was Adam always the one to get the nice body and attract all the girls on campus? Even Kori seemed attracted to him and that wasn't fair! It wasn't like it was his fault; I'll admit that he's good-looking, more so everyday, but I wanted that too! 'Charlie, stop thinking about stupid stuff like that. Besides, Adam doesn't like Kori as anything more than a friend.' I told myself. Finally able to convince myself that it was true, I happily went back to my room.
At seven sharp, we were all in the cafeteria just like planned. Kori ran in at the last second, breathless beyond belief. It was pretty cute, actually. She explained in between breaths that we had to take the bus up to the mountains and that it would take about 2 hours.
"We'll get there at around 9:15 if we make this next bus. It opens at 9 so we should be fine. As soon as we get there, you guys just get in line for the rentals, I got the lift tickets under control. Got that?" she asked while we walked to the bus stop in front of the school. We all nodded, me and the girls the only ones who were fully awake. At 7:15, the bus stopped in front of Eden Hall and all fourteen of us boarded. I dropped into a seat next to Adam, who tensed up noticeablely when I sat down. That bothered me a bit. What was it about me that got him so nervous?
"Hey cake-eater, what's up?" I asked him, trying to loosen up the atmosphere between us. Adam grinned weakly at me.
"Hey Spazway. I see you're excited," he commented, "I've never seen anyone so…attentative at this hour of the morning. Especially right after hockey season's over."
"What can I say? I like to be punctual." He laughed for the first time in awhile, a sound that I found I liked a lot. In all the years that I'd known Adam, he never laughed much. But when he did, it was a beautiful sound. Oh god. Did I just say the word beautiful to describe a man's laugh? What was I doing? Shaking my head, I told myself I really didn't get enough sleep the night before. For the next half hour, it was particularly silent on the bus. A few times I looked over to Kori who was staring out the window much like Adam was doing, I caught her glancing back at me. Sure, the pink hair was a little out there and sure, not many of the girls at school liked her much. But I thought she was beautiful.
"You like her, don't you?" Adam turned to catch me staring at Kori about forty-five minutes into the bus ride. I jumped, startled. The entire bus had been pretty silent. The only people actually awake were Kori, Adam, and I. Smiling sheepishly, I nodded.
"Is it that obvious?"
"I'm sorry to say that it is. Even Dwayne noticed it," he struggled to smile at me and there was a shaky tone in his voice. What was wrong with him?
"Are you okay, Banks?" I asked with concern. He sighed in return.
"I wish everyone would stop asking me that."
"We care, is that a crime?"
"Sometimes I think it is," he responded with no sign of joking anywhere. He was looking out the window now and I just stared at him. What was he talking about? He turned and met my eyes, holding my gaze for what seemed like hours. The electric that flowed in between us was unbelievable; I couldn't describe what it felt like. All I knew was that I've never felt anything quite like that before. Just as suddenly as he turned to look at me straight in the eye Adam turned away, ending the electric. Blinking a few times and looking at what was now the back of Adam's head, I questioned what the hell it was I just felt right then. I noticed that I was sweating and my breathing had become shallow. What was wrong with me? Shaking my head, I faced front and stared at the patterns in the seat. My head started getting heavy and my eyelids droopy. Soon, I was sleeping like a baby on Adam's shoulder.
"Charlie, get up!" Adam shook me gently as he moved to stand up without dropping my head onto the chair he was just sitting in. I opened my eyes and blinked a few times. Looking out the window, I only saw white snow and bright jackets in the distance.
"We're here, sleeping beauty!" Kori teased, winking at Adam and sharing a look with him that only they knew the meaning of. I got up and grabbed my jacket, pulling a hat on over my messy hair. We all got in line for the equipment rentals like Kori told us to while she disappeared somewhere to get us lift tickets. Twenty minutes later, we moved up quite a few feet in line and Kori came back with the tickets. She showed us how to clip them onto our jackets and by the time we figured it out correctly, it was our turn in line.
"Hey, Kori!" a tall brown-haired guy called out to Kori as we approached. He had green tips; bright green tips on his spiky brown hair.
"Hey Jordan," she greeted him, "These are my friends from the new boarding school," she named all of us individually.
"Hey," Jordan nodded at us, "I'm Jordan from Kori's old school."
"Wait. You lived in Minnesota all your life?" Russ asked her. This was news to me, I always thought she was from out of town.
"No, but my parents divorced a six months ago and I started going to public school here in September after I moved in with my dad in June. I met our friend Shane there, but I've known Jordan for a long time. He used to go to my school in New York when we were really little. Shane, Jordan, and I hang-out all the time. Or we used to anyway. We all got jobs up here in the mountains; all three of us snowboard," Kori explained.
"And I've been meaning to ask you, Korienna Julie Smith, where have you been?" Jordan pretended to be mad. Kori shrugged him off, "Just get us the boards Jordan." Jordan rolled his eyes and set Kori up quickly since he knew her settings. From there, it was a hectic process renting the stuff. Kori helped each of us decide whether we rode goofy or regular. After another half hour, we were on our way. We thanked Jordan and headed out to the slopes. Kori taught us how to strap our back foot onto the board and told us it always had to be there.
After half a day of continuous falling on our asses and snow in our face, all of us mastered how to ride and stop. Well, most of us anyway. After lunch and hot chocolate, Kori asked if we wanted to try going down the small beginner's hill. Everyone except Adam was excited to go, but Kori begged and pleaded with Adam promising that she'd be with him. Finally, he accepted. I rode with Kori on the chairlift.
"So are you having fun so far?" she asked me breathlessly once we were safely on the lift.
"Yeah, this is a lot of fun!" I told her truthfully.
"That's good. I was worried you guys would hate the sport. Adam doesn't seem to be having a great time, which is weird because he's really good at snowboarding. Are you sure it's his first time?"
"I'm pretty sure. But Adam's good at everything he does." She looked at me, tilting her head up to meet my eyes.
"I know he has some faults; they're hard to catch, but they're there."
"What do you mean?" That was confusing.
"He needs someone to talk to, that's all I'm saying. His problem is he's not being able to find someone to talk to when he needs to."
"Isn't that what you've been doing though? Talking to him?"
"No, this time's different. He can't talk to me about this."
"How come?"
"Never mind, I never said anything," She waved it off and turned to look behind us where Adam was sitting nervously with Luis. She waved and smiled at him. He nodded back at her then glanced at me, smiling slightly at her. She shook her head and turned back to me, "He's going to be a nervous wreck going down that mountain.
"Hey Kori?" I asked suddenly.
"Yeah?" I took in a breath; it was now or never.
"Would you maybe…want to…um…go to the winter formal at school or something?" I asked quickly. There was silence as she thought this over. She bit her lip and seemed relatively unsure.
"I don't know, Charlie. Adam-" she cut herself off there. What? What did Adam say? What the hell did he tell her?
"What about Adam?" I asked her harshly, more harshly than I'd meant to.
"Nothing," she replied hastily, "Nothing. I just can't go to the dance with you, that's all." I figured it out. It was true; he had been lying to me that night. Adam did like Kori! He lied to me! The little bastard! I thought I was supposed to be one of his best friends; how could do this? Adam led me on to believe that he didn't like Kori when in truth he did! I can't say that I didn't feel a little betrayed that my own best friend would do that to me and I can't say that I didn't feel heartbreak, though for what I had no idea. It wasn't the fact that Kori had turned me down because I could take that. Yes I admit she was beautiful, but what I felt for her wasn't love and I knew it. It was a crush. So why did I feel heartbroken. Angry at myself and frustrated with Adam, I tripped over Kori getting off the chairlift. Quickly, she got up and moved out of the way, yelling for me to do the same. But I couldn't move with as much ease as she could. Before I knew what hit me, Adam and Luis had stumbled over me and the three of us landed in a heap. Kori had un-strapped herself fully from her board now and swiftly dragged Luis and Adam out of harm's way and then came back for me. Pulling me out of there not a second too early, I got out of the way just as Fulton and Portman came sliding down the little hill.
As we strapped our other foot into our boards, I decided to ask Adam why he didn't tell me he had feelings for Kori before. I plopped down next to him and carefully picked out my words. I would not get irritated with him.
"Hey Banksie?" I started.
"Yeah?" he kept looking down at his board even though he was already all strapped in.
"How come you didn't tell me you liked Kori?"
"What? I don't like her!" he protested loudly.
"Yes you do, admit Adam! Stop lying to me!"
"I do not! Where the hell did you get that idea?"
"When we were on the lift, I asked Kori to the dance."
"So what did she say?"
"She said, 'I don't know Charlie. Adam…' and she never finished her sentence. When I asked her what, she claimed that it was nothing. But I know you Banks and I know that you like her and somehow told her! I honestly wouldn't have minded!" I watched his expression carefully and soon knew that I'd said something wrong. Rage swept through his usually cool blue eyes turning them an awful shade of gray. He was mad. Without saying a word to me, he awkwardly got up and started down the mountain to meet Kori where she was sitting, waiting for the rest of us.
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