"Bye, Rae!" Ryker's voice jerks me from my dreams and I open one eye to see him standing in my doorway, a backpack slung over one shoulder and an apple in the other hand.
"Bye," I mumble and yawn before stretching. He leaves to go to school and I prepare for the day. I'm not sick anymore, other than the occasionally sneeze, but The Reader's Repository isn't open on Mondays.
I pull on a pair of skinny jeans and a teal off the shoulder knit top, before bounding down the stairs to eat breakfast.
As usual, no one's home. Mom and Dad left for work, so I'm all alone. I cut up some strawberries and dump some granola into a bowl. As I'm pouring the milk, I jab the radio on and music pours out. Let Her Go by Passenger plays in the room as I throw the strawberries into the bowl.
When I was little, I would make faces at the Cheerio’s box, because there was fruit in with the cereal. I used to think it was the most disgusting thing in the world… and now that’s the only way I’ll eat cereal. It’s strange, how things you never tried because you were terrified of them, sometimes turn out to be our favorite things.
I finish my cereal and then assess the situation. I eventually settle on doing homework while blasting music. At about 3 in the afternoon I put away my school, and then get online for a moment to see what’s going on.
I scroll down my newsfeed and see tons of completely random stuff. I mean, who talks about arctic puffins in the middle of Spanish class? I roll my eyes and keep scrolling.
My eye twitches involuntarily as it sees a post from Katie not thirty minutes ago.
“Katie Lord: Can’t wait to hang out with my bf after skool! Love you baby!”
Right, first things first. Learn how to spell “school”. Isn’t that the reason you’re going there? I mean, that’s some serious irony. Secondly, gag. Who wants to know? Just, ew.
I roll my eyes, (again) and log out of my account when I hear Ryker come in the room.
“How was school, bro?” I ask, while spinning around in the desk chair.
All I receive is a grunt in response. I quit spinning to stare him down.
“Did you just grunt at me?” I ask, narrowing my eyes. He nods, and I smirk. “Always knew you were part pig.”
He just glares at me, and I chuckle. “Okay, what’s up?” I ask, for real this time.
He shrugs. “I dunno. School is stupid. Grades are stupid. Teachers are stupid.”
I put my hands on my hips. “What class? Quiz, or test? Bad grade, or failed?”
Ryker shoves his hands in his pockets. “Anatomy. It was a quiz. Almost failed. Barely redeemed itself.”
I wince, “Sorry.”
He just shrugs again. “It’s whatever.”
I pull on my sympathy face. “Wanna order pizza and play video games?”
His face lights up automatically. See, here’s the thing: I don’t like video games. And I would way rather have a homemade dinner than pizza.
But my brother is way more important to me than food or a night spent the way I want to spend it.
And let’s be honest here: If I spend tonight doing things I want to do, by myself will I remember it? Probably not. But if I spend the night playing video games with my twin brother? This might be a night I remember for a while.
And that’s worth some greasy pizza and overly violent video games to me.
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“I killed you. Again,” I grin and open another bottle of coke up.
He throws his controller at my head, me only ducking just in time. “You’re a dork,” is the only thing he can come up with.
I nod, “Uh-Huh. And you’re a sore loser.”
He rolls his eyes, and goes to respond, right when the doorbell rings. I cock an eyebrow at him, “Expecting company?”
He shakes his head, and we get up together to go investigate. Ryker opens the front door, and I peer around him to view the weird stranger on our front porch at 6 on a Monday night.
Knox. It’s Knox.
I look between Ryker and Knox, and notice Ryker looks just as confused as I feel.
I’m the first to break the really weird silence. “Hey, Knox… What brings you here?”
Knox looks at me, as if noticing me for the first time. His eyes turn gold briefly, but I tell myself I either imagined it, or it’s because he just came from Katie’s. Yeah, that’s probably it. He just came from Katie’s and he’s thinking about her.
He clears his throat. “Oh, well, I knew you lived close by me, and I was wondering if Ryker could give me a copy of tomorrow’s Anatomy assignment?”
Ryker nods slowly. “Um, sure. But where’s yours?”
Knox purses his lips. “Katie’s house.”
My eyes flicker to his, which are now clearly pink with disgust. Okay… “Then why can’t you go get it?” I ask, quizzically.
He takes a deep breath. “Because I don’t think I’m going back over there anytime soon.”
I narrow my eyes, trying to work this out, as Ryker turns around to grab and make a copy of the assignment.
“Come in, it’s cold out there,” I say and hold the door farther open. He smiles and walks in. I perch on the end of the sofa, and he sits on the other end. My eyes flicker to our paused video game on the screen.
Apparently Knox’s did too, because he asks, “Who’s winning?”
I grin, “That would be me.”
His eyebrows shoot up. “Really? I find that hard to believe.”
Ryker walks back into the room with Knox’s paper, and he stands to leave.
I walk him to the door before saying, “Just because you don’t believe it, doesn’t mean it’s not true, Knox Parker.”
He gulps for some reason. “Yeah,” he mutters, and basically sprints out to his car.
I shut the front door behind him, before sharing a confused look with Ryker.
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Well, here's the deal, guys. I planned to write a lot more than this to put on here. But then I got like really sick, and felt miserable. In fact, I still feel miserable. But tonight I was guilted into writing by a few people who really wanted the next chapter, so here it is.
I know it isn't long. And I'm sorry about that guys. But, anyway.
Who thinks they know what the thing at the end is about?? Like, what's going on with Knox/Katie and what was the whole thing between Rae and Knox about at the end??
I would love to know what's going through y'all's mind right now!
Oh, and the song at the side is Let Her Go by Passenger. It doesn't really have any relevance to the story, or anything; I just love the song.
Alrighty, so vote and comment, please?? :)
Love y'all! Thanks for reading! :)
~Juliana
YOU ARE READING
Irised
Teen Fiction"That's Knox Parker, Rae." "Thank you Captain Obvious. I know who he is," I roll my eyes and buckle up. "What's wrong?" "That's the biggest jerk at school. He's popular and he knows it, he's good looking and he knows it, he's funny and he knows it...
