HOW TO MAKE DIAMONDS

6

It's been a couple of weeks and every day Kyle and Carter would watch Jade sit four chairs away from them at lunch, put her earphones on, and now and then pull out her sketchbook. That is until today when she weirdly sat only two chairs away. "Don't ask. But if Amber, Chase, or Ricky say something, tell them I'm being friendly." Jade quickly explained as she chose a random song on her phone.

"Or you could just be friendly," Carter suggested even though he knew she wasn't listening.

Well, she was. The volume wasn't that loud.

"Dude just leave her be. I don't get why you're so determined into becoming friends with someone like her."

"Kyle I caught you digging through her ig yesterday." Carter quietly deadpanned. "Why do you keep pretending you don't like her?"

"Because I don't. I'm just curious, she's hiding something and I want to make sure it won't hurt Ricky or Chase."

Carter squinted his eyes analyzing his friend. He felt as if there was something more to it. More to the answer. "You're intrigued by her, aren't you?"

"I'm just playing safe. The last time we had someone transfer here was when Layla's family came to town and everyone knows all the damage they did. I can't handle losing anyone else."

"She's not Layla."

"You don't know that. We know nothing about her other than she's Amber's sister, and Amber herself isn't that open about her life either."

"Because she doesn't have to," Jade spoke up, surprising both boys. She took a deep breath, removed her earphones, and turned on her chair to face both at the same time. "I don't know who that Layla is or what happened to you but we're not here to hurt you. Amber is insanely in love with Ricky and after everything we've been through, she deserves to be happy. Yes, I am hiding things from my life but clearly so are you so just leave it alone because if you start digging into my past I'll dig into yours, okay? I care about my sister and if Ricky is part of her life then I care about him too." She grabbed her things and food to get up. "And Chase is a nice guy, I would never intentionally hurt him." With that, Jade left the cafeteria. She lost her appetite.

"You messed up dude." Carter's comment made him receive a glare from Kyle but he wasn't stopping. "I think the main reason you're so intrigued about Jade is that she reminds you of you. You both need to work on your issues. I mean, she's Maya's niece after all, isn't she? Maya has a soft spot for you and she's friends with your parents; I think she would have warned us to stay away if Jade was bad news."

That got Kyle thinking. Carter had a good point; and Maya did the opposite, she asked him to give Jade time and patience, to give her a try. She said the same thing Carter did, that they had both been through a lot and had issues that they need to work through. But that probably didn't have the effect it was supposed to since it just made Kyle decide to get closer to Jade so he could find more about her, not to be her friend.

He trusted someone before and ended up with the worst heartbreak ever. One caused by the loss of two people, one he thought he loved and the other who he now wished he had been closer to and enjoyed their time together. By the end of his relationship, he was furious and grieving. He vowed to himself never to make the same mistake, never to let people in, close, ever again. You can trust no one near those you love.

Kyle got up and ran the same way Jade had just left with the intent of finding her, which luckily for him didn't take long. She was sitting by herself on the bleachers of the inside gym as the dance club practiced for their next competition. She looked focused on their choreography and, judging by her moves on the barbecue and the artistic abilities Kyle had already picked up on her, he started to ask himself if she used to dance at her old school or was in any of their clubs. But then again she's not the most social person he knows so she probably just kept to herself and avoid group activities.

"I'm sorry." Those aren't words he just goes throwing around lightly but he thought Jade would probably feel like she deserved to hear them.

"No, you're not." Her eyes did not leave the girls but she did scrunch her nose and hissed when one of them missed her step and tripped.

"No, I'm not." He signed and sat beside her. "I bet you were just as protective of your sister as I am with my friends when she started dating Ricky." At that, she snorted remembering how Amber took four months to finally tell her.

There was a comfortable silence between them as they watched the practice. As if a common agreement and understanding had just formed. An almost palpable turning point in the way they treat each other.

Quiet time, even if with others, is not as appreciated as it should be.

"I like your drawings." Kyle eventually said.

"Yeah, I know, you got one tattooed on you." She lazily pointed to his arm not daring to divert her eyes from the girl that kept getting her moves wrong. But that made Kyle confused so he immediately removed his hoodie and then raise his shirt's sleeve to look at his tattoos, trying to figure out if she was being serious or not.

Jade took a deep breath - she felt like her patience was being tested today, first her family and now her failed attempt at solitude -, turned her body towards him folding one of her legs over the bleacher, and took his arm to get a closer look at the tattoo she meant.

"You got it done with Ricky right?" It was kinda rhetorical but Kyle hummed in agreement either way. "He asked if he could display some of my drawings at his shop, said it would look cool tattooed on someone. He wasn't wrong." She let go of his arm and went back to watching the practice. "But it was supposed to be done with red ink."

"I get all my tattoos in black," Kyle mumbled still looking dumbfounded at his bicep, trying to figure out when she saw it first and why no one told him sooner.