My Life In Pieces (Book #1)

Chapter 22

The next few weeks went by in a blur. Ari and I started eating lunch in the Cafe to avoid Tyler and Brenna at Chew Chews. It was strange to me being in such a crowded space. The food wasn't awful but it wasn't Chew Chew's. I began bringing my lunch so that I could at least eat what I wanted. Ari and I talked about small moments in our lives sitting together in the corner of the Cafe away from the rest of the craziness. Everyone else seemed to have figured out their own tables to eat at with their own cliques. This one little corner of the world somehow hadn't been claimed so we took it as our own piece of sanity.

In English, Jake took Tyler's seat. Max, Reece, and Aaron sat on my other side, in front of and behind me creating a little force field of sorts around me. Tyler started sitting on the other side of the room, clearly taking the hint. As we had free time to work (talk) in each class I started getting to know small details about all the kids I had classes with from the Families. Miri wanted to join the Peace Corps one day. Danny wanted to own his own garage and be a lead mechanic. Aaron liked to read mystery novels. Elle hated K-Pop with a passion but Ryan loved it. Reese wanted to write a best selling novel before he was thirty. Max and Jake wanted to room together at Toronto University next fall and both had a scout looking at them for Hockey. Neither wanted to play professionally though. Jake currently had a crush on a girl in his Calculus class.

Ari though, I loved learning about the most. His birthday was February second. His middle name was Elijah. He loved that mine was Elizabeth which meant we had two initials in common. Ari started with photography as a form of therapy. His therapist got him into it after his mom passed away. I still hadn't asked how she died and I wasn't sure that I wanted to know. We discovered that we both loved Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and hated Twix. He loved the Maple Leafs and I was still a diehard Stars fan. We planned on going to the game the Stars were playing Toronto in February for Ari's birthday. I liked that we were planning that far in advance.

Ari loved 80s hair bands, the color green, and his Dad's Poutine. He hated anything to do with reality television, any kid of diet soda, or pop as he called it, and would only drink homo milk. I found out that's what Canadians called homogenized milk. He misguidedly loved Batman over the actual Superhero, Super Man.

All these little things made up the very sweet Ari I was falling for more and more.

I looked back at the blue eyes that had become so familiar to me and couldn't help but smile.

"What?"

"Nothing, I'm just happy."

"Yeah? You excited for this weekend?"

Ughhh that I could do without. Aunt Claire was insisting that I have a Sweet Sixteen. I wasn't really in the mood for celebrating my first birthday where I couldn't have Elyse and Jordan and Patrick there with me.

What made it worse was that I was supposed to invite all the Families, but couldn't invite my own.

Elle and Ari had been trying to keep my spirits up about it. Laura suggested we go shopping Saturday morning so that I could get a nice party dress for that nice. It was Friday now and I still wasn't excited.

Ari had asked me what I wanted and I told him nothing. That apparently was not an acceptable answer.

I told him anything with owls or giraffes were great, nothing with squirrels. I then had to explain to him the time a squirrel hit me in the head with an acorn, laughed and ran away.

I just wasn't in the present mood. All I wanted was my sister and I knew I wouldn't have that until Christmas.

The end of lunch bell brought me back to reality and out of my thoughts.