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Trashed and Scattered

Chapter Eight: Walk With Me

“It smells like mold in here,” he told her with a hand fanning at his crumpled face.
She rolled her eyes, “Can you not?”
“Do you have a forgotten sandwich in her or something?” he asked, bounding over to the bed to expertly peer beneath it.
It was riddled with dust bunnies but not much else. He forced himself upright, neglecting the hint of vertigo tugging at his ears.
“Stop making that face,” she whined, rummaging through her schoolwork for the desired due assignment.
“No,” he replied flatly.
She smiled, glancing over her shoulder quickly at him, “You know what I’m going to say.”
“That you think I look like a coyote,” he groaned. “I got it. But if we’re being serious, I think I look more like a cat than anything.”
As much as she would have loved to delve into the dynamics of deconstructing his human face and reinventing it as something that couldn’t talk, she pulled her four paged paper from a pile and held it into the air like Simba.
“Okay, we can go now,” she told him simply, stuffing it into her binder in her bag and then throwing that onto her back.
He followed her to the doorway but stopped in his tracks. Fear pounded through the young girl, terrified that her friend had heard something. She wasn’t supposed to have friends over. She’d snuck him in a few times anyway, but it was always a risky game. But that morning she’d left her homework tucked away in her bedroom—he’d insisted on coming to “help look for it”.
They walked to school together each morning and he’d typically wait along the sidewalk for her. For whatever reason, she’d let him tag along back into the dangers of her foreboding him. Her mother was at an appointment, her father at work. She had assumed it would be safe enough.
But as he stopped so abruptly, she all but panicked.
“What?” she asked quietly but sternly.
A devious grin spread across his smug face, “I just think we should find that sandwich. In case we get hungry on the walk.”
She blinked away the stun; at times unable to comprehend just how stupid he could be. It wasn’t that he lacked intellect, he had it in spades; but he was so unwilling to mold himself to appropriate situations. He was eternally stubborn, absolutely to a fault.
“You’re an idiot,” she smiled. “Let’s go.”
As they walked the first two blocks to school, a comfortable silence had swallowed them up. It was often that way; they could be together, unspeaking, and still feel unbelievably connected. She imagined that he might be her soul mate, but had never worked up the courage to let him in on her youthful revelation.
“If you could get a piercing,” he thought aloud, “what would it be?”
“A piercing?” she asked with her face crumpled in distaste. “None.”
He scoffed loudly, “Yeah, right.”
“Why are you thinking about that?” she laughed softly, glancing at her strange best friend.
“I want to get my nose done,” he told her seriously.
Her face betrayed her as it twisted into amusement, “Because you think the other girls might make fun of you?”
He stared at her blankly, a hint of a seething scowl lingering just behind his flatness.
She burst into a fit of giggles, “You said…Like…” she paused to laugh harder. “Like a nose job? Jesus, Wiley! You’re slow today!”
“I’m not slow,” he defended cautiously. “You’re just not funny.”
Her laughs stopped in a hurry as her jaw dropped to the cement passing beneath her feet, “What was that?”
“You heard me!” he grinned. “You’re not funny!”
Lexi fancied herself to be quite the comedic genius. While she partly understood that he was joking—ironically enough, she didn’t find it funny. Typical to her age, she gathered up her offence and took off up ahead. She left her friend in her dust and didn’t look back; not even when he heard his distinct laugh trailing the wind in her wake.
She’d unofficially declared their friendship over for the rest of the school day. She ignored him when he’d try to ask her for help and she’d disappeared during their lunch hour so that he couldn’t possibly badger her into forgiveness. She decided she’d let him stew on his harsh words for a while.
But when the final bell rang and she strolled outside with an armful of books, she was expectant to find him waiting for her. He always waited for her. She’d walked out from the school just in time to see him disappearing down the sidewalk with his friend…his friend that wasn’t her.
With a bit of a sniffle and an embarrassed glance around her own aura, she lingered back for a while before setting off home. Alone.
“We’re not going to wait for Peyton?” his friend asked confusedly, glancing back at the brunette standing all by her lonesome.
“Nah,” Wiley waved. “She’s trying to teach me a lesson. So, I’m teaching her one instead.”
His friend laughed, “You guys are so weird.”
“She started it,” he argued playfully.
“But now she has to walk home alone,” his friend noted. “That’s kind of sad, man.”
“I’ll make it up to her,” he assured his hazel-eyed buddy.
His friends gaze fell a tad as the two boys walked, “Can I ask you something? You don’t have to answer me or anything but I’m just really curious.”
“Sure,” he shrugged. “What’s up?”
“Peyton…”
“No, she’s not my girlfriend,” Wiley smirked.
His friend laughed nervously, “No, not that. I know you guys would never date. That would be way too weird.”
“Yeah…” Wiley hid his disagreement. “Totally weird.”
“I was actually wondering, uh…what was with all the bruises and stuff,” he said slowly. “Her eye is all messed up today.”
“Yeah, so?” Wiley replied quickly, suddenly regretting leaving Lexi behind.
He shrugged, “Is something going on?”
He wanted to confess the truth. He desperately wanted someone else to carry the burden of Lexi’s pain. Maybe it would be lighter if someone would simply help to shelter the load.
But he’d made a promise to never tell. He’d been a good guardian for the years that he’d known her; only slipping up once but quickly recovering.
“She’s clumsy,” he replied finally. “It’s ridiculous how clumsy.”
His friend did not look convinced, “You sure?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he waved. “I’ve been trying to convince her to take balancing lessons…she just doesn’t listen to me.”
“No one listens to you,” his friend teased.
Wiley laughed, “I know! That’s what I’m saying!”
He knew that Lexi was somewhere behind him—he peered over his shoulder every so often, just to make sure that she hadn’t lost herself. As he and his friend separated ways, Wiley held back on the corner. Lexi didn’t notice him up until the very second before their souls collided.
“Hi!” he grinned.
She scathed, glaring up at him dramatically.
“Are you done being mad at me yet?” he asked impatiently.
“No,” she muttered under her breath, annoyed as he joined her pace and walked by her side.
“Fine,” he shrugged. “Be that way.”
She nodded, “I will.”
For the second time that day, he abandoned her. She knew that she’d started it but he was always besting her at everything. She couldn’t even be irritated with him without him somehow surpassing that too.
He turned up the short walkway to his house and didn’t glance back as he disappeared through the door. Her mother’s car was parked out on the street, so Lexi knew she was somewhere inside.
She braced herself for impact, nothing short of her daily life.
Even though he was annoyed, she knew that she could count on Wiley later to help her smooth out the fractured pieces. He’d never denied her tapping at his window. He’d never purposefully left her in the cold.
With the safety of his neighboring existence, Lexi went home.

Notes

Short and sweet.

Well, not sweet...but short.

xx

Comments

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RamonaFoREVer RamonaFoREVer
6/18/19

@fyction
It is one of my favourite things. I melt every time!!

kiss my sas kiss my sas
6/11/19

@kiss my sas
I know! Isn’t it sweet?! Guh. Pellivan <3

fyction fyction
6/11/19

@fyction
BUT PELLIVAN IS TRUE LOVE!!!
I still get giddy when Peyton says 'I love you' to Jimmy... urgh! Such a long time coming!

kiss my sas kiss my sas
6/11/19

@kiss my sas
I mean.... Breyton could be revived... never say never ;)

fyction fyction
6/11/19