After the whole Taylor and Edward drama we stood up with our trays and proceeded to the trashcan. "He's looking at you." Taylor nudged my arm and my tray slipped.
I quickly recovered myself causally, so no one would notice. "Don't do that when I'm walking with a potential stain causing object in my hands." I said through my teeth. I didn't want anyone to see me make a fool of myself in front of everyone.
"Sorry. He's looking at you. I was right!" It was her turn to squeal now.
I had to get a look for myself. I wasn't going to be eager and say "Where? Where?" I would subtly, inconspicuously, look behind me.
Hmph. Always. Why me? Why did Taylor have to be right? Why did Seth look like that? Two seconds ago he was the waffle-yielding child who apparently had an innocent crush on me. Now he looked…older, still gangly and a little awkward, but older. His brown eyes scolded into my scanning face. I made it a quick glance, probably less than a second spent on any one person, but my eyes remembered every inch of him.
His black hair was cropped short to his head and spiked up in the front. His usual look, but different. New gel? It wasn't especially spiky today. What was it? His face was clear, a plus for guys our age. Our age? His and my age. His cheekbones, from his heritage, were prominent and the fluorescent light glinted off of them, giving the slightest sheen. Not sweat, health. Seth's lips were pressed into a hard line, focusing. On me? His soccer tee and shorts seemed different, too. Cleaner? Dry cleaning. Must be dry cleaning.
"So."
"I told you!" Taylor scream-whispered.
"Would you like a prize?" I sarcastically offered.
"Yes, I would like a big, shiny trophy with the engraving "Taylor-the-amazing, the most right person in the world was right about Seth and Misty and had Edward Cullen ask her to be partners in science class all in one day. She succeeded a task most people think gargantuan. "
"I'll get right on that."
Taylor stared back to the cafeteria.
"Ahem." I coughed. "Were you trying to be any more obvious, Edward's gone."
She spoke, trance-like. "You know, I never really noticed, I knew he had potential, but I never thought it out thoroughly, Seth's pretty hot. Not as hot as Edward, he has him beat by a mile, but he's not bad."
"What?!" I screamed, defensively. I didn't even think about it. It was a reaction.
"He is. What, lock me up for saying someone's pretty hot." She held up her hands so I could put handcuffs on her.
"No, I just didn't expect to hear that from you, Mrs. Edward Cullen."
"Shh. People could hear us." She ushered me back to our table.
"Didn't stop you before."
"He just asked to be partners. He doesn't even like me."
I turned my whole body toward her so I could give her the full-fledged, Don't-give-me-that look.
"What? We're just partners." Taylor hung her head down.
I jerked it up. "Now, Best Buddy, now you're 'partners.'" I put the quotation marks over her words so maybe she could realize how ridiculous she sounded. "But, soon, it'll be more. 'Taylor, I have been waiting my entire life for someone like you. Now I have found you. Will you go out with me?'" I said with my begging slash longing voice.
"Make fun of my situation now, but you'll see. Karma."
"Karma?"
"Karma."
"Okay…."
"You don't believe me?" She disbelievingly said. Her mouth dropped and both of her eyebrows raised. She could never get the one eyebrow to go up, she looked a little challenged if she tried. I had to give it to her, she was persistent, kept trying and trying, annoying and annoying me….
"No!" I knew what she was thinking. She wanted to prove me wrong.
"Yes." She smiled at the fear in my eyes. I didn't want her to open her trap to Seth. She would twist my word into a morphed reality that I liked him and wanted him with everything I had. Taylor would definitely make me out to be the desperate one. I wasn't desperate. I could get a guy. I think?
"NO!" I firmly but calmly said. Taylor said I was scariest not when I yelled, but when I was firm and quiet. I think I sounded a little crazed personally.
"Okay. I wasn't going to anyway, don't go all ape on me alright."
"I wasn't. And I knew you wouldn't. You think he's hot so you'd be putty in his monstrous hands."
"Monstrous hands? You pay attention to his hands? Hmm…."
"No. Keep your fictitious assumptions to yourself please." I begged.
She grinned ear to ear. "Oh, I will."
I wanted badly to get off the subject. I don't like lies. She made up her own world with whomever she wanted, where she wanted. I was a pawn in her world. I didn't care. "So…don't you have science next?" I wondered.
Her eyes widened. "No…"
"Yes…" I mocked.
"What do I do?"
"I don't know, apparently I don't know who I like. Why don't you tell me, master?" I joked.
"This isn't a time for joking. I need you."
"Oh, you need me now? What about 'karma?'"
Her expression turned to pleading. "Who said that? I don't remember that, do you?"
"I distinctly…" Taylor's shoulders slumped and her head hung again. "Do not remember that." I finished.
"Seriously? I wouldn't do that to you. Thanks. So what do I do?"
"My advice? Talk. Don't hyperventilate. Make conversation. Laugh at his corny, good-for-nothing jokes, but not too much, he might think you're having an episode."
"His jokes are great." Taylor said, mesmerized.
"His jokes are great." I mocked with a cheesy, childish impression.
"They are."
"Whatever you like." I dismissed. It wasn't worth it to fight 'til the death over if Edward's jokes were good or not.
"That's right."
Seth weaved through the crowd and made his way to our table. I wasn't especially looking for him, I just noticed.
"Hey, I have a joke." He eagerly bobbed up and down beside us.
I raised my eyebrows and smiled. Here we go, probably a joke we won't understand, but can't find it in us to not laugh.
"Alright, you ready?" Seth looked nervously or giddily at Taylor and I. I couldn't tell which.
I nodded, so did Taylor.
Seth laughed. "Are you sure?"
We nodded again.
"Can't you talk?" He asked to both of us, but looked at me particularly.
Taylor noticed and I felt her eyes bore flirtatious holes in my face.
"Yes I can talk. Was that your joke?" I flatly said, not wanting any emphasis on any word. I didn't want to hear about it later.
He ignored my question. "Good. Now, for my joke, well not really a joke, more like an observation, or a random thought that I felt to be quite funny." He talked with his hands. I never noticed. I seemed to notice a lot today.
"Get on with it, please." I requested. The students in the cafeteria started to file out and go to class. I wasn't in to mood for a lecture because I was late.
"Anger? Not good. Okay, now what if cannon-blown waffles that, on occasion, flirted with disaster ran the world? An Evil Knievel, so to speak?"
Silence.
"Imagine a waffle what was blown from a cannon landed on a motorcycle with a red, white, and blue cape, rode over the Grand Canyon?"
Taylor was the one to laugh. Her imagination was better than mine.
She was getting a kick out of this. Her face became red again. She lost breath. "Why. Is. This. So. Funny?" She gasped.
I started laughing. Not only at the observation, it was a compilation of Taylor's face, Seth's amazement, and the waffle.
"See, I told you it was funny." Seth stood, proud.
"Guess. So." She gasped some more.
After a few seconds all three of us regained composure. "Taylor, you have to go to class now." I pointed out.
She immediately stopped. "No, I'm not ready!"
Seth was puzzled. He stared at our faces, searching for answers. "Am I missing something?"
"You walked in to the wrong part of this conversation." I laughed.
"It just started." He pointed out, and laughed.
"My point exactly."
"So, I'm not supposed to walk in the beginning of a conversation?" He continued as we walked down the hall. "Wouldn't that just be rude?" He followed us to our lockers.
I had to laugh. "Guess so." I didn't want Taylor, who was listening, to get the wrong impression, or any impression for that matter.
"I'm going to go to class now." Taylor said. While Seth's back was turned, she made kissy faces.
"Have fun with Edward." I shot back.
"Oh, crap." She pressed her lips together then looked confidently at me. No, I will." She widened her eyes and took her hand and slid it across the front of her neck, and disappeared into the classroom.
"She'll have fun." I said under my breath.
Seth felt left out. "Yeah, I'm not getting any of this, so I'm going to go now."
"Okay. Bye."
He looked after me and I think he expected a little more. Sorry. When there are spies everywhere, you cannot afford to be nice.
