The Fear List (The Fear Series, #1) ON HOLD

Chapter 2 - Pros & Cons

Chapter 2 - Molly POV

*Tuesday Evening 11/05/14*

I'm still thinking about Ethan when I realise that my bedside clock reads 5.45pm. My mom is going to be home soon and I haven't even started cleaning the house. It's not like she'd start an argument, no its more like an eye roll or disapproving look before trotting off her her room. She wouldn't dare interact with me more than that. I still clean though because in someways it's only fair that I contribute as she is paying the bills by working long hours. Or maybe I do it so she hasn't got to strain herself to interact with me instead just go straight to ignoring me, something she does best.

I get up from my bed and start collecting the dirty clothes from this morning that are lying on my floor. I carry them to my mom's room and look if she has any clothes that need to be washed. Her room is similar to mine but a lot messier. How she expects me to know what is clean or dirty when they are all on the floor or her bed I'll never know. I don't understand how it can get this messy considering that she's not here most of the time. I grab the clothes that look the most rumpled, guessing they are dirty.

I walk downstairs into our small kitchen and shove the whites in the machine and turn the dial around to set the timer. I look around the kitchen that has worn grey surfaces and old style beige wood cabinets. Dishes from this morning lay in the sink so I run the hot tap, squirt some soap into the water and pull on some yellow washing up gloves so my fingers don't turn to prunes.

I start washing the dishes absentmindedly as my thoughts drift back to Ethan.

......

My crush on Ethan started when I was around fourteen and his family moved to Phoenix. It was in the richer part of town close to where Elle lived which was where I was heading on the day I saw him. When my eyes latched onto Ethan bare chested and carrying boxes from a van with his t-shirt tucked in his back pocket I knew I was hooked. It was a giddy school girl crush and I couldn't stop it from happening. So once Ethan had settled in I decided to take notice of how he acted at school to see if we had anything in common.

Back then I was not nearly as bad as I am now. I still spoke somewhat to fellow students although barely and I still with a little stutter. For some unbelievable reason I thought it was a good idea to approach Ethan. I got it in my mind that all I had to do was act confident and I'd be fine. Only I was delusional because it didn't turn out like I'd hope it would.

I went to make my move about a month after he had moved here, finally having built up enough courage to talk to him. My label of 'mute' or 'nerd' hadn't really been slapped on me yet as I was a freshman and there were new students from others schools that didn't know me yet. I didn't really notice how bad my issues were until after I went after Ethan though.

I had been psychologically getting my head in the right frame of mind the night before to gather the confidence to talk to him but one of the most important reasons why I had to work fast was because I had seen Ashley Morrison lurking around trying to get close to him. Of course the most popular girl at school would go after the new hot jock, that's just standard procedure.

On the day that I went to him I had tried to make an effort but as usual my hair wasn't looking very attractive so I tried to wet it to have some sort of control over the curls but that didn't help much. I'd also planned to wear something girly but all I owned were jeans or shorts. So I 'd tried to find a nice pair of jeans instead and had hoped that it was still girly enough.

After I had finished getting ready for this all-important meeting with Ethan I'd made my way out of my house feeling somewhat sick. I'd wobbled down my garden path, breathing harshly, counting in my head to try and suppress my nerves. I'd carried on walking over to his street trying to look sexy and confident, as much as a fourteen year old can. Spotting him coming out of his house walking alongside his bike I'd thought I was never going to keep pace if he was riding but luckily I'd reached him before he could get up onto the seat. His head had turned towards me as he'd produced a smile.