Love Triangle

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Five

It's incredible how hard yet easy it is to settle one's self back to a routine. I woke up this morning, brushed my teeth, got a lift from Katy, attended my classes, and now I was sitting in the passenger seat of Cook's car.

Woah.

Back up.

Things did happen in that order, obviously, but not in such brief details.

What happened was that Cook ambushed me. I didn't think we'd be studying together that quickly after Sunday. Sure, we did not argue or jumped at each other's throat ever since. But that didn't mean that his presence wasn't irksome anymore and that sometimes I feared his intentions when he got that mischievous smile on his face.

Which is exactly how he ambushed me in the first place.

Maybe ambushed is too strong of a word.

Regardless, let's say he sort of ambushed me; he found me in the parking lot waiting by Katy's car and pulled up at the spot next to hers and asked me (politely actually) to hop in so that we can study at his. When I resisted; he said that he'd stay here and follow Katy's car all the way to wherever we were going until he got me to agree, and that he didn't 'bloody' care if Katy asked questions the entire way: a consequence I'd have to face. He knew that I was keeping this as much of a secret as he is. Which is questionable at the moment as the longer he stayed there, parked and arguing with me, could cause attention and blow our cover. I caved and climbed in quickly and Cook revved and steered the car away before Katy or anyone else could catch a glimpse of us.

I don't know why sneaking off gave me a little dose of adrenaline. I kind of felt guilty about it because in some weird way, I felt like I was betraying my best friend. I texted her that I had to leave urgently and caught a ride with someone else. I actually used the words someone else. As if I was cheating on her.

How does one lie without actually lying?

"Why do you strangely look like a lost a puppy?" said Cook, interrupting my guilt party.

"I do not," I reproached.

"Whatever you say love."

Cook turned his attention back on the road. He slide his sunglasses onto his face and whistled happily to himself as if he was having a road trip to sunny California. When really it was not that sunny outside and quite chilly too as fall weather settled in slowly but surely.

I made a show of looking out my window to not seem like I was creeping on him. (I'm not.)

I was mostly nerved and uncomfortable because I hated being driven by anyone other that my mom and Katy. Too many possibilities of a road accident. Car accidents seems always to befit our family especially when we enter a foreign car to us...

The houses in his area were much more majestic and it was easier to observe them, the view clearer inside his luxurious car as opposed to the city bus I took on Sunday.

"You know most people would compliment on what a beauty my car is," he told me, all of a sudden.

I ignored him. I wasn't going to tell him that I wasn't most people because

A) We both knew that already.

B) That line is way too cliché.

Cook pulled into his expansive yet empty driveway and I forced myself not to slam the door on my way out. Common, I wasn't childish either. Luckily, Cook had remained silent the rest of the trip.

We sat exactly where we sat on Sunday and it felt weird to be back so soon. Almost wrong? At least his father wasn't here to greet us. I thought my house was silent but boy was I wrong. The bigger the house, the greater the silence. At times all I could hear was our breathing as we put our heads together for a specific equation.

It felt off.

When I was leaving, two hours later, Cook was following me out the door. He wanted to drive me home. I insisted that I'd be fine taking the bus. I was accustomed to it and that wouldn't force him to make the necessary trip back home. He already gave me a ride to his house.

After another moment of imploring, Cook seemed to have got annoyed back to his old self. "Fine. Good night." And he went back inside into his house. It was so abrupt. I felt like I won my freedom but lost a fight for some odd reason. I walked confusingly to the bus stop. Why was he trying to be nice to me if he knew we'd study together anyways? We didn't have to be all of a sudden nice to each other. Just civil... Plus, he helped me today. I was completely useless in the face of mathematical skills... I didn't mean to offend him. But why did it matter anyway? After my math test and after he gets his mark back for his paper, none of this tutoring stuff will matter and we'll slip back into borderline hating each other. I simply couldn't comprehend the frenemy complex starting.

It felt even more strange an hour later when I got a message from Cook.

*Did you get home?*

I answered with:

*Yes*

But then felt so cheap that I texted a *thank you* a mere two seconds later.

He responded a minute later with a smiley face. A freaking smiley face.

The worst part was that I could imagine him smiling a ridiculous smirky and victorious smile.

What the actual heck?