System Nullification

Chapter 12

 I woke up the next day, nervously staring at a wall trying to contemplate about everything in my life. My mind was mostly on Zephyr, Cameron issues, and hopefully seeing if the tension within Reed would subside. Apparently it was mostly Zephyr though, due to the fact that my dream was about him pinning me against another wall and making out with me once again. I felt like an idiot. Once I tied up my hair as usual and got dressed for school, I grabbed my bag and made my way to the school building. "Hey Iris, can we talk?" Brianna asked. "I honestly have no idea what to do."

 "About Reed?" I asked. "Indeed, he was one of your many crushes back in middle school, but he seemed to be the last one in middle school and the one that lasted the longest. And yet, you weren't able to do anything..."

 "Well yesterday, at the park, when the rest of you guys left, we kind of had a moment," Brianna said.

 "Whoa whoa whoa, what happened?" I asked.

 "Alright, calm down, hold on!" Brianna said. "Gah, now I know how you feel when I bug you about Zephyr..."

~

 The park was a place near where Zephyr and I kissed after the Adam case. So when we were playing cops and robbers, Zephyr and I hid near that tree together. "Hey, Iris," Zephyr chuckled as he nudged me, gesturing his head towards the tree. "Remember that tree?"

 "Oh my gosh, Zephyr, shut up!" I groaned. "We don't want the cops to catch us!"

 Zephyr looked around, then cornered me into the tree (again, I know, I need to watch my surroundings). He kissed me for about a second before pulling back and whispering, "But Iris, I'm a smooth criminal."

 I stared at him, amazed but annoyed at the same time. "Oh, watch out, Jackson's coming," Zephyr pointed out.I stood up and ran off, trying to hopefully isolate myself from the others since I was blushing. Then I spotted William in the jail, which was at the picnic area. "Alright, I got this," I said to myself.

 I quickly ran towards the jail, only just looking to the left to see Brianna aiming her water gun at me. The rule in Brianna's version of cops and robbers was that water guns (now with water bullets) were used to tase the robbers, and the tases would last twenty seconds. Robbers had knives they could use to touch cops with so that they couldn't arrest anyone for twenty seconds, although the cops would still be able to move. Zephyr and I were ridiculously good at the game, but Brianna, Skylar, and William could aim really well. She shot me, and I flipped forward, taking a huge sprint to free William. "Thanks," Will said.

~

 "C'mon, details, details!" I said, remembering my own details of the cops and robbers game. Thanks a lot, Zephyr.

 "Oh, well... Reed and I awkwardly sat on the bench instead of leaving like we were going to," Brianna said.

 "Mhm, and?" I pried, grinning like an idiot.

 "Then he like... moved closer to me, and then he was like, 'Brianna, what's your opinion on me? Out of pure curiosity,'" Brianna said, slightly imitating Reed's polite tone. "So I asked him why he needed to know, and then he was like, 'I guess I could try testing it out...'"

 Apparently, Reed was a pretty smooth guy as well, in his own strange way. "Wait, so I'm assuming he kissed you," I smirked.

 "I feel like he went for the lips at one point, but then... for some reason, I flinched," Brianna frowned. "So he kissed my nose, and we were both blushing really hard because none of us knew what to do."

 "Did anything happen after that?" I asked.

 "He said, 'I honestly don't know what I just did, but please think about what I asked and did,' and then he stood up, said bye, and just kind of... ran away," Brianna said. "But lately... he's been getting along with Skylar pretty well..."