Survival of the Unfit

Chapter 27

April

I ignored Levi’s phone camera aimed at my face and focused on the screen, waiting for the perfect kiss to happen on the movie we were watching. I leaned forward. C’mon, do it Hans. C’mon.

“Oh Anna...”

Kiss her already. KISS HER.

“...If only there was someone who loved you.”

Everything went quiet. The entire room, my own heart even quit beating for a second and I squeezed the bag of popcorn in my hand to a powder. “No. That asshole. He did not.”

Levi cackled and kicked his feet as the rest of the scene played out in horror. “Oh, your face is priceless April.”

“But, but no! No!” I yelled at the screen, flinging popcorn as I frustratingly flailed my arms. “Stop, don’t put out the fire you fucking asshat! NO!”

Levi cracked up again and I glared into his phone camera before pushing it out of my face. “Is that all you have to say?” he asked.

I was about to just fire back some snarky comment, but Levi’s ecstatic smile made my blood boil as he continued filming my reaction. I narrowed my eyes at him. “You knew.”

He laughed once more and shook his head. “There was no way I was ruining the twist for your sanity.”

I slammed my bag of popcorn on the ground and attacked him, knocking the phone from his hands and wrestling him onto the ground “You knew the entire time!”

He laughed even harder as I tried to pin him down in an emotionally-induced fury, but within a few second I was flat on my stomach and he had both my arms pinned behind my back. “Of course I did.”

I tried to wriggle out from under him but he held tight. “I can’t believe you.”

He gasped dramatically, still pinning my arms down. “Honestly, I’m feeling rather attacked at the moment. And quite offended by your ignorance of understanding. Perhaps you should understand everything there is to understand about Nordic culture before you go on about it. Uncultured South swine.”

“DAMMIT, I’LL SKIN YOU ALIVE!” I yelled, still struggling.

He was laughing too hard to respond, except to say, “I love being an asshole.”

With a war cry I dislodged my arms and flipped him onto his back, whipping around and putting my knee on his stomach, hands keeping his arms out. I narrowed my eyes. “Bourgeoisie asshole.”

He smiled and looked up at me through messy, espresso-dark hair. His eyebrows wiggled. “Frisky, I see.”

“Whatever,” I said, pushing myself off of him, biting down on my bottom lip to keep from smiling. I grabbed the remote and collapsed back into the couch, rewinding to where I left off in the movie. Fucking Hans.

Levi sat up to grab his phone and then lay back on the ground, scrolling through it while I finished the last bit of the movie in frustrated silence. Class argument with indirect meme usage. Whatever. Whatever, he’s such a stupid dork.

He already had Frozen on when I came down from changing into pajamas. Julia was a little bigger than me so the shirt was baggy and the pants needed to be tied extra tight, but it was much more comfortable than jeans and a tighter fitting t-shirt to hang out in. He even had popcorn and everything going. He was already in his adorable, vertical striped pajama pants and plain maroon shirt when I came in sniffing and on the edge of an inevitable meltdown.

I cringed a little thinking back to how pathetically I just threw myself into him, and then felt a little more relieved at how he managed to make me feel not so embarrassed about it. Euh, that was so embarrassing. And then it ended up in agreeing to a sleepover later down in the conversation somehow. Of course I was certain the entire plan would sputter and die in our faces, but Hailey was cool with faking it and Mom texted me saying she was sorry and that a night at a friend’s would be good for both of us. I texted and okay back and said I’d come home to talk tomorrow, then shut my phone off for the night. I didn’t want to think about what I’d face once getting home.