Covered Edges

Chapter 23

The next few weeks passed by smoothly with little to no interruptions to my routine. I hung out daily with Anna and Olivia at our usual spot in the student lounge, and then ran around the campus—not literally—with a spirited Quentin, doing various activities and meeting in our usual spot: the corner park bench at the edge of the center pond. We sat and accomplished our people watching and gossiping for the day, and then usually we would return to our room to watch a random movie on Netflix. I also went to my Art class at the same time once a week, and I continued to shrug off Levi's persistent attempts to reconcile. It's quite creepy actually; he sits the entire period watching me, and later asks me out for coffee after class. Then, we enter our usual argument:

"You want to grab some coffee sometime?"

"No, Levi."

"Why not?"

"We have too much bad history to remotely try to be friends."

"But I said I'm sorry."

"I know you are, and I said I forgive you, but that's where it's staying at."

"For now."

Each time he says that ending phrase I internally cringe. I don't know what it is, but the signals he puts off make me feel unsteady. He never says anything else. He just states that "fact" and walks away. I can tell he's trying so hard to control his temper and not loose control in response to not having control over the situation, which is all the more reason I continually try to steer clear of him.

Today, though, I plan on doing nothing. I've been constantly busy and this is my first day to just relax by myself and think about things. I find a good book and plop down onto my bed. I snuggle into my thousand pillows that take up most of my bed, and pop the story open to the reserved page. After ten minutes, I realize I've only gotten through two pages, and I had just struggled through my fifth time rereading a paragraph. I give up, my mind is elsewhere, and reading is hopeless. The hero of the story has dark hair and wears a green tunic, and that just drifted into other things that are green and soft like the material, but at the same time sharp and pierce through you as if you were snow. One would think it'd be like black lace traveling delicately through the cold white, but it feels more like an arrow to me.

My phone starts to buzz beside me. I see Quentin's cheeky face pop up and answer the call.

"Hello?"

"Scarlett! SOS, I need help!"

I have to pull the phone away from my now ringing ear, "What's wrong?"

"I'm in dire need of your fashion approval!"

Laughing and rolling my eyes, I respond with, "For what?"

"I have a date tonight and I didn't know what to wear so I thought I'd just go buy something new, but the problem is I have no clue what to buy! I need something that says 'I took time to create this outfit, but not too much time because I'm not creepy, don't worry'."

I can hear him panting over the phone, trying to catch his breathe. I giggle and tell him that I'm on my way, so much for a day to relax.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

I meet Quentin up at the closest shopping center and begin creating the "perfect look". While I'm flipping through a rack of shirts, he walks up to me with a few pants in hand.

"So how have you been since the last time we talked?" he asks.

"You mean like four hours ago?"

"Yep, how have your past four hours been?"