[Story]Kiss – A Prediction in Story Form

Kiss – A Prediction in Story Form

Part Two~Friends Only Beyond This Point

I felt my face pull into an expression of disgust as the smell of alcohol and the bass of some underground techno song grew stronger with every step.

Stupid Aiden.

I swung the door to the frat house open, the force of the noise and chaos nearly knocking me down as I fought my way in. It must have been some sort of a fire hazard; there was hardly a square foot of floor space that wasn’t occupied by an inebriated college student.

I scoured the crowd for Aiden, looking for his untidy dark hair and infectious laughter. I ignored the offers for drinks, grimacing whenever someone got too close with beer breath.

“River! What brings you here?”

I spun around at the hearty voice calling out over the blaring music. (It was a miracle I was able to hear him – even more of a miracle that he was able to shout a coherent sentence.)

“Henry, hey, I was just looking for Aiden…”

The normally shy boy slung an easy arm around my shoulders, pointing the neck of the beer in his hand in the vague direction of the second floor. “Saw him go up with some broad. You better go get your man, girl!” he said, adopting his best worst impression of my roommate.

“He’s not my man,” I stated before I shrugged his arm off and stalked off to get my ridiculously wasted friend.

Stupid Aiden.

I darted through a maze of college students, opening every door to reveal various pairings of people in varying states of undress (and varying levels of drunkenness so some were absolutely scandalized while others were completely oblivious). I eventually opened the correct door, seeing a cheaply-dressed underclassman draped over Aiden’s open-shirted chest.

I strode into the room soundlessly, grabbing a giggling Aiden by the wrist while the girl on top flopped uselessly to the floor, passed out before she hit with a thump. Aiden opened his mouth to say something, paused, then laughed his full belly laugh.

Finding my way out of the house was easier than getting in as the party was now at the point where everyone was either passing out or puking into the nearest wastebin. Aiden was shouting strands of gibberish into my ear, punctuated by deep chuckles.

I ignored the way his laugh made my hair stand on end, instead attributing my goosebumps to the rank stench of beer on his tongue.

As I dumped him unceremoniously into the passenger seat of my car, he grabbed my wrist suddenly and looked at me with an eerily straight face. I looked at him warily.

“Aiden?”

He continued to stare at me, as if he were seeing me for the first time.

He sighed and let my wrist go, a dopey smile set on his face as he collapsed into the seat.

I drove with half my mind on the road, the other half locked in Aiden’s inexplicably intense gaze. We rode in silence until Aiden murmured sleepily,

“River, why do you do the things you do?”

I didn’t respond, instead just pulled to a smooth stop at a red light at an empty intersection.

Aiden sighed. “You’ve been coming to get me ever since I was legal to drink and the only repayment I’ve ever given you is the occasional trash bag of vomit.”

I laught at that. “You repay me with your drunken tirades for my amusement. Like this one.”

Aiden huffed indignantly and pouted. “No! I need to repay you properly!”

I laughed more as I pulled away at the green light. “Shut up and start sleeping off your Coronas, Aiden.”

We continued the ride, him being silent for the most part, occasionally humming tunelessly. I kept my eyes on the road.

I pulled into the parking lot of our apartment complex, shutting off the engine and looking at my companion. I was met with shining eyes and an excited expression.

“I know how I can repay you!”

Before I could answer, the taste of alcohol, peppermint, and female lip gloss was at the tip of my tongue.

The kiss lasted all of five seconds. Closed-lipped and chaste as it was, I felt my body hum with electricity, like a dam was broken and a flood of hormones all invaded all at once.

And all at once, the touch of his lips was gone.

I stared blankly at him for a few moments.

Soon, I carried up a passed-out Aiden to his apartment.

Stupid Aiden.

Waiting to Exhale

What is this feeling? The world around me spins as the whiteboard marker I was holding falls to the ground. Cotton muffles my ears and I don’t hear the gasps from my classmates and the carpet rushes up to meet me. The definite integral on the board lays unsolved and we’ll never know the total distance the martian spaceship traveled towards the sun.

Sleep. It’s eluded me for days. I feel each of the muscles in my body relax as I sink into the inner parts of my mind. Grayscale images of my hopes and fears flash as the wrong audio tracks do a horrible job of dubbing the video that plays over and over again…

***

I’m thrown back in time. In the basement of a building I’ve never been in before, it’s the basement of a shady diner in the 1920’s. Revealed by dim lights, the simple and well-kept furniture is draped with the bodies of people dressed lavishly enough to be regulars at the Ritz. And here I am, in my brother’s pants and vest and shirtsleeves. My hair is slicked back, the only thing giving away my true gender being the rather large bun on the back of my head. But otherwise, no one would ever know.

“Caroliena, do you want to sit in the front seat?”

What?

Someone sidles up to me, dressed to the nines. “He’s a manwhore!” the person says as they look me straight in the eye.

I’m sorry?

Someone sits at a piano, the wrong lyrics matching up with the wrong melody.

[Story]Kiss – A Prediction in Story Form

Part One: Too Much Free Time

“The library? Again?”

I nodded, triple checking my bag and staring at my three other class binders, contemplating whether or not I should take them.

“Girl, you are such a stereotypical Asian, always studying. You already have straight A’s, what’s the rush?”

I shrugged.

“Is it because of your parents? In my Sociology class, we got into this discussion about how Asian families are heavily honor based – “

I rolled my eyes. “Diane, you know my parents aren’t like that. They named me River for goodness sakes.”

“I know, but still, it’s unnatural. It’s your freshmen year! It’s easy now, so why are you stressin’?”

I shrugged again.

“Maybe you have too much free time. You know, Tyler has been coming by here a lot. To copy my notes, apparently, but whenver he’s here – “

“Diane, you know that’s because he’s hoping you’d dump your boyfriend for him, right? Or that he just wants to get in your pants, whatever happens first.”

“Well, you didn’t have to say it out loud.”

I slung my messenger bag over my shoulder. “I have my cell phone on me, if you need anything.”

And I was out.

One of the benefits of going to a rather prestigious university is that they always have an extensive library. Any book I could possibly want to read or need for research they have. All coupled with the hushed atmosphere that’s ideal for studying.

I made a beeline for the window seats, one in particular. The one in the corner with windows on two sides and the big oak tree in front, my favorite and my normal seat.

And damn. It was taken.

I settled for the other corner window seat. The one facing the main road. It still had a good view; the road was lined with Mom-and-Pop cafes filled with univeristy students. But still, not as good as the oak tree. Especially in late fall.

The library was unusually quiet for a Saturday afternoon. The window seats were normally filled with students, the main foyer filled with the quiet rustling of study groups and tutors. But today was different. It was nice.

As I passed my usual seat to go to the seat on the far end, I glanced at my seat’s occupant. I didn’t get much from the hunched figure, except that it was a guy who had dark hair and wore glasses. And he was studying organic chemistry, judging by the diagrams in his book.

Which reminds me. I have a quiz in that course Monday on Chapter 4.

I came across a term I didn’t know about halfway through reading the chapter again. I skimmed my notes, finding a bullet point of information on the subject.

Time to peruse the shelves.

I glanced at the guy in my seat. He didn’t seem like the type to steal, plus he was so engrossed in his reading that he probably didn’t even notice that I came in. But still, I took my notebook with me anyway. I had already forgotten what I needed to look up.

I ran my fingers across the spines of the books, pausing on a title that looked promising. I was startled as another hand made to take the same book as I started to take it out.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t see you.”

I looked up at the other person.

It was the guy who was in my seat. He had the same color hair and glasses.

He looked at me with a curious expression, his eyes full of confusion.

We spoke at the same time.

“You took my window seat.”

“Aren’t you in my organic chem class?”

I blinked. He blinked. We spoke at the same time again.

“Downing’s 10:15?”

“The oak tree one?”

Again, synchronization.

“Yeah.”

He stared at me, his expression still curious.

I picked the book off the shelf, breaking his gaze. “Did you need this?”

He looked at it.

“Oh. Yeah. Unless you need it?”

“No, I can find another book.”

He took the book from me, and I went back to perusing the shelves.

His footsteps were muffled, I heard them now since I wasn’t as engrossed in picking out a book. The slow cadence suddenly stopped as he turned back to face me.

“My name’s Aiden, by the way.”

I picked two promising looking books off the shelf and didn’t answer.