Illéa High

Aspen... and Lucy??

Most of the next day it's just me by myself. Cedar, Celeste, and Marlee have horrible hangovers and they were grumpy and sleepy.

This was probably the most relaxing day I've had in a while. I meet up with Maxon and Hunter for lunch at noon while the girls are still sleeping off their hangovers.

"The other girls have hangovers I'm guessing?" Maxon asks me as I make my way to the table Hunter and him sit at.

"Yeah, they partied hard last night!" I raise my eyebrows for effect.

The three of us have great conversations for a couple hours. Just talking about school, life, and other things we find important.

"-So then Mrs. Smith takes me out of the class and yells at me!" Hunter was telling a story that we have heard many times, but it was still stomach-achingly funny.

I look over Hunter's shoulders and see a familiar dark hair and clothes. I automatically stop listening to hunter's story and my eyes go as wide as saucers.

"America...America!" Maxon waves his hand in front of my face, bringing me out of my faze.

"Y-Yeah?" I ask not taking my eyes off of the familiar guy.

"Are you Okay? You just kind of looked scared, or, like, surprised," Maxon gives me a small smile and then looks over his shoulder to see what I was looking at. Too bad for him he doesn't know what Aspen looks like.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'll be right back though," I start to make my way towards the familiar hair and clothes and time seems to slow down. Almost like it's waiting for me to confront the guy.

I can feel the guys' stares on the back of my head like lasers. They were obviously wondering what I was talking about.

I walk up to the who I think is Aspen while he turns his head to face me a little. It's him.

"Aspen!" I call out and his head snaps in my direction, his eyes searching till they find mine.

"America! Funny seeing you here," Aspen breaks out his smile that always made my heart melt before. Now it just makes my body tingle. Improvement!

"It's not that funny, I mean, I go to school here now, what are you doing here?" I ask sitting in the empty chair next to his.

"I got chosen to go to a guard school, it teaches the students how to defend and fight. It's a school to help you become a guard at the Illéan High School," he explains. He smiles a little awkwardly.

"Aspen, remember that you were the one to break it off with me. Not the other way around. Let me be totally honest, I'm not over you, it's hard to be over someone you've dated for two years and that you've been friends with for, like, forever, and-" I didn't get to finish my little rant because Aspen holds up one of his hands.

"America, I'm not here for you! Ever think that I want to do this? That I want to be a guard and be at this school?"

"Sorry, I didn't think about that...you were the one who said they were happy back in Carolina, you are the last person I thought would be here," I say and look down. I was embarrassed, my face turned red and it heated up.

"Just next time don't think everything revolves around you!" He snapped at me. I flinch back a little like he physically punched me in the face.

"Am I interrupting something?" A sweet sounding voice sounded above and behind me.

I see Aspen turn his head up to look at the stranger that is behind me. I finally look behind me and see someone I thought I would never see outside of school. It was Lucy. She had two cups of slushees in hand, one pink and one blue.