She didn’t appreciate the position he’d put her in. She didn’t like what he was doing to her—making her pace around her bedroom like a madwoman, wringing her hands together like she was her own lifeline because the one thing she truly depended on was in his hands. In Asa’s hands. A boy who she’d watched and ached to draw, but also a stranger to her.
Carmen might have given into him, wanting to get back her journal irrespective of the cost, but that didn’t mean she was going to let him take his sweet time with it. She would just have to speed up the process of Asa and Willa hitting it off together, leaving no room for him to have her journal any longer than necessary.
She could feel her senses buzzing with anticipation of lunch period today. Once it was over, she’d be that much closer to getting back the only thing capable of calming the storm that was causing havoc inside her.
•••
Before Carmen knew it, lunch had rolled around.
“Everything okay?” Lottie asked as they waited in the queue.
“Perfect.” Carmen beamed at her. “Why do you ask, Lottie?”
“Because you—you look…” Lottie furrowed her eyebrows and scrunched up her nose as she looked hard at Carmen, trying to put into words how she exactly looked right then. “I don’t know. It’s your cheeks, I think? They’re flushed? Something like that. I don’t know. Just—they just look alive. Like you’re pleased about something.”
A beat of silence passed, and something dawned on Lottie’s face. Like it only just occurred to her what she had just said.
“What?!” Lottie muttered to herself, looking absolutely flabbergasted. And then her accusatory eyes snapped to Carmen’s. “How do you keep doing that?”
Carmen blinked, taken aback. “Doing what?”
“That—that thing!” Lottie gestured wildly. “Always getting people to say the silliest things around you. Like saying stuff that literally runs through their head. It’s crazy.”
Carmen blushed right then. “I don’t know.” She tugged at her chain. There was another pause, and she decided to answer Lottie’s previous question. “I’m pleased because things feel like they’re falling into place today.”
“What things?” Lottie inquired.
The boy in front of Carmen finished paying for his lunch, and she stepped up to the front of the line. She offered a warm smile at the lunch lady to which the grumpy woman didn’t return.
“What do you want?” the lunch lady asked in a flat tone.
Carmen placed her order, the smile still on her face, unfazed by the woman’s hostility.
“Just things, Lottie,” she eventually said, after collecting her tray of food. “Just things.”
14.
Petty Best Friends
As soon as Asa stepped into his history class, his eyes automatically landed on the seats at the rightmost corner of the room, where he and Isla usually sat together. But Isla, being the petty little shit that she was, had some other girl sitting next to her.
In Asa’s chair.
Rolling his eyes at the inevitable scene his best friend was going to create, and bracing himself for it, he moved towards her. He knew she was aware that he’d approached their desk by the way her shoulders straightened, as if daring him to say anything.
“Hey, Isles.” He grinned, knowing it’d only infuriate her further. “I might be wrong, but you seem to be avoiding me as of late.”
“Joyce,” Isla said rather loudly, keeping her eyes fixed on a healthy eating magazine in her hand while she addressed the girl seated next to her. “Can you turn that down, please? That cawing sound is getting on my nerves.”
Asa spared a glance at who he concluded was Joyce—a girl with a purple streak on her dark hair —sitting uncomfortably next to Isla. The poor girl looked like she wanted the ground to swallow her whole.
For a fleeting second, he was reminded of Carmen when Willa had dragged her into one their arguments right after that AP Lit period. Despite her initial surprise, Carmen had remained calm and undisturbed by it. But this girl, Joyce, seemed to be scared out of her wits.
Asa guessed it wasn’t just guys that Isla intimidated.
“Hey, Joyce.” Asa flashed her one of his charming smiles and watched her cheeks grow a slight shade of pink. He knew what he was blessed with, and he wasn’t shy about using it to his advantage. “Do you mind taking your usual seat?” He cocked his head to the side for further effect, feeling a pathetic but undeniable flash of confidence when it seemed to be doing the trick. “Isla’s kind of my best pal. I usually sit with her.”
There was a huge snort from next to Joyce.
“Oh yeah, totally,” Isla said sarcastically, whipping her head towards Joyce. “Best pal, indeed. That is, if your definition of best pal is someone you are unnecessarily rude to without bothering to apologise to them for, like, forever.”
“Shut up, drama queen.” Asa snorted. “It literally happened just yesterday.”
“And apparently being a best pal also means having the liberty to belittle your uncalled-for behaviour on the basis that, in this so-called best pal’s words, it only happened yesterday,” she went on, still looking at Joyce.
Joyce looked like she was ready to cry.
“Isla, you’re scaring the girl.” He sighed.
Isla’s eyes narrowed, and she shoved her face into Joyce’s. “Is he right?” she demanded. “Am I scaring you?”
Joyce began to nod—to which Isla glared—and quickly began shaking her head instead.
“Joyce, why don’t you find another seat?” Asa suggested.
“You keep your ass glued to that chair, Missy.”
Joyce swallowed, eyes dashing between Isla and Asa like she was about to faint, and then, without any warning, she shot out of her chair and hurried away while clutching
