Friday Night Tutor

Chapter 11

Chapter 11
Mom grills me at the dinner table, and sure enough, I get a lecture on swearing. Yes, I know swearing isn't a good thing, but sometimes you just need that little extra oomph to emphasise what you're saying. I tell mom I apologised, but don't go into detail. Plus, I really have no idea how to explain what happened at Daniel's house. How had we gone from whatever the hell we were before to friends? I try not to dwell on it during dinner, but the image of me lying against Daniel as he eased my pain keeps me occupied while Lissa recounts the day's events- this time leaving out the ending.
After dinner I sit in Eden, finishing up a piece of homework I had forgotten to do for Mr Thompson's class. It takes me a good hour to actually get myself to do any work, and eventually my eyelids feel as if they're being dragged down by weights as I read over my work one final time. I check my phone and am shocked when I see the time- 01:39 am! How did I not realise that it had gotten so late?
I walk around the corner of my room into the main area and throw my phone onto the bed. Walking to my closet, I grab a fresh set of pyjamas- which really just consists of a really comfy tee and a pair of Cookie Monster boxers which I found for really cheap at TJ Maxx. I always prefer buying men's boxers or shorts as the female options are always either embellished with tacky rhinestones or itchy lace. To be perfectly honest, I don't feel need the word 'juicy' printed across my very un-juicy ass.
As I lie in bed, I think about the events of the night, a thousand questions racing through my mind.
Can Daniel and I really be friends?
He seems like a nice guy, but there's something missing, something I don't know.
Does he have an agenda I don't know of?
Worry flares in my gut as scenarios fill my mind.
Was he dared to flirt with me to embarrass me? Am I some kind of game to him?
I shake my head, dispelling all the bad thoughts, Daniel isn't a bad guy- moody? Yes. But bad? I don't know.
But does he really just want to be friends?
To be honest, I really hope so because there's a reason I haven't ever pursued a relationship before. Many actually.
Mainly, I'm scared. I see couples every day, I've spent the last few years of my life as Audrey and Adam's third wheel- not that I mind, but, the level of dependency, and feeling, and, well... love that those two have for one another scares me. The concept of being the reason for someone's happiness, why they smile, yeah it sounds cute, but it's also a lot of pressure. Audrey and Adam do it so well because they are good people; funny, sweet, both handsome and beautiful. I, on the other hand, not so much; my brain is more than lacking, I carry enough anxiety for ten people and I'm not pretty. I don't think I'm ugly, but I don't consider myself pretty either; I'm that girl that girl that your eyes skim over in group pictures, the friend whose face only emphasises the beauty of those around her.
The thought of imminent disappointment hangs over me like a dark grey rain cloud- ready to burst.
That thought sticks with me as I fall asleep, and as I wake the next morning I mentally curse my alarm clock to hell. I had woken up every hour last night with a start. I has been having a nightmare, but I couldn't remember what it was.
I waste over half an hour watching YouTube videos before I force myself out of bed; completely throwing off my morning schedule. I run for the bathroom when I realise that Audrey will pull up in about five minutes- why did my mother not wake me? I look at my hair in the bathroom mirror and cringe at my reflection. Heavy, dark circles sit under my eyes as a result of my late night and restless sleep. My hair falls dead and limp around my shoulders, and my skin looks pale. So, to sum up, I look like Samara from the ring; every girls dream.
I don't have time for a shower, so I brush my teeth and splash my face with cold water. As I tie my hair up into a messy bun, I rush into my closet, grabbing the first few things I can find and throwing them on.
In record time, I'm dressed and in the kitchen.
"Lexi, how comes you're not in school yet?" Lissa asks as I skid into the kitchen.
"I'm late, Liss," I reply, making beeline for the fridge. "Where's mom?"
"She and dad are sick. They have the sniffles. Mary came this morning to wake me up," only then do I actually see Mary standing at the far end of the kitchen, packing Lissa's school bag. I'm about to ask Lissa to clarify what the sniffles are when I hear Audrey's car horn go off outside- one unrelentingly long horn. I wince at the noise as I pull open the heavy fridge door, taking out a carton of green grapes and a carton of princess juice- I guess the grocery store has no princess-witch juice.
I quickly wave goodbye to Mary and Lissa, and shout up to mom and dad, telling them to feel better.
I quickly send them both a text, looking up the stairs as it sends, feeling bad for not going to check on them.
That thought is kicked out of my mind by the sound of Audrey's car horn.
As I get into Audrey's car, I say, "I need to remove your car horn."
Audrey gasps. "That would be like taking away the voice of a song bird- plain evil," she dramatically says as she drives around and out my drive way.
I'm about to open my carton of grapes when Audrey bursts out laughing. I look at her as if she's grown another head, "What?"
She points at me, still laughing, "Your jeans are on backwards," she manages to get out.
I look down at my lap and mentally slap myself. "No wonder I couldn't find the damn zip and clasp when I was getting ready," I think aloud.
Audrey gives me a confused look, "So you just gave up?" she asks.
I shrug my shoulders, "I was in a rush."
I put my carton of grapes and princess juice on the centre console and begin to shimmy out of my jeans.
Audrey whistles, "Early morning strip tease. You're not Adam, but you'll do."
She winks at me and I slap her arm in response, "Eyes on the road, pervert."
I quickly put my jeans back on and finally pull the zip up and close the clasp at the top, all the while being choked by my seatbelt.
Audrey parks up in a free spot next to Adam's van. I'm surprised to see Adam as he steps out of van, he's usually in school a good hour before us. As we get out, I spot the twins and Claire on the other side of the van, and walk over to them. Audrey jumps at Adam and he catches her, planting a kiss on her forehead.
"How comes you guys rode with Adam?" I ask Jax.
"Cars in the shop again, radiator busted and-"
I hold up my hand to stop Jax from saying anymore, "Anything else that comes out of your mouth will make absolutely no sense to me at all."
Jax flicks my hand, "Fair enough."
I look around Jax's body and see Eli and Claire deep in conversation.
"What's up with them?" I ask Jax, seeing the worried expression on Eli's face.
Jax shrugs, "Teddy's mom bought another asshole home yesterday night. Eli and I were over when they got there," he says, and instantly worry fills me.
"Did anything happen to Teddy?" I ask, using Claire's nickname that Eli had started- because she's as small and cute as a teddy bear- not his exact words, he had sad it in a 'manlier' way, obviously.
Jax smiles and shakes his head, "Naa, but you know Eli- especially when it comes to Teddy."
A mischievous glint enters Jax's eyes and I playfully slap him on the arm, knowing exactly what he's talking about, "Anyway, Eli's panties got all twisted and he made Teddy stay the night at ours."
"And her mom didn't say anything?" I whisper, cautious that Teddy may hear me.
Jax's expression grows cold, "Like that woman gives a shit about anything but herself."
I sigh and turn to Teddy. How had such a lovely girl been dealt such a crappy hand in life?
Three years ago her father had left her mother, devastating the whole family. Her mother entered a deep depression and soon after, her older sister- Kate- left; or 'escaped' as she referred to it as, leaving Teddy to care for her ungrateful, sad excuse of a mother on her own. A mother who slept around with the towns sleaze bags and didn't hesitate to bring them back into her home, not ever thinking about Teddy or her safety.
As I look at her now, standing next to Eli, I can't help but smile at the sight. Eli's six foot five frame dwarfs Teddy as he stands over her. I watch as Eli furrows his brow and Teddy laughs, tugging one of his dreads and causing him to smile.
Although Eli is a giant compared to Adam, he hasn't quite had the same courage Adam had when it came to Audrey yet. Eli and Teddy are the best of friends; have been since the day in the cafeteria when bitch Claire knocked Teddy's lunch out of her hands. It just so happened that Eli was standing behind Teddy in the lunch line. I still remember that day- Eli had made bitch Claire pick up all of Teddy's food and throw it in the trash, then apologise to her. Although the twins were yet to hit puberty, they were still a daunting pair, and as I watched Eli order Claire that day, even I was scared. Poor Teddy has stood there silent, and beet red through the whole thing, blushing even deeper when Eli bought her another lunch and led her with his hand on her back over to out lunch table.
The cafeteria is the schools main source of drama- if it's gonna happen, it's going to take place in the cafeteria.
"Hey, Teddy," I call as I walk over to the two, "You okay?"
Teddy nods and smiles at me. "I'm fine, but you know Eli," she says, smiling fondly at the dam of a boy standing behind her.
Eli rolls his eyes, "Let's get inside, bells about to go off."
Right on time, as if on cue, the bell goes off and the all the students milling around the parking lot make their way into the building.
I'm walking alongside Teddy when my carton of grapes is snatched from my hands.
"Hey!" I shout around a mouth of grapes, "That's my breakfast!"
I turn to see Daniel, smiling as he releases a grape from its stem and plops it into his mouth. He's wearing a bottle green jumper and dark blue jeans today, his usual leather jacket absent.
"Morning, friend."
I sigh and grab my grapes from out of his hands, "You know, this whole friend thing isn't going to work out if you steal my food."
"I'll keep that in mind," he says as he takes another grape.
I give him the stink eye and carry on walking.
The sound of someone clearing their throat gets my attention and I turn to Audrey, surprise colouring her face. She nods her head towards Daniel, "I thought you hate him and think he's a useless tutor and lousy neighbour?"
I choke on the grape I had been chewing on and stop walking. A hand comes down on my back, patting it lightly. The coughing stops and I turn to thank the person; when I see its Daniel I smile guiltily and thank him for the help.
"So, useless tutor and lousy neighbour? That doesn't seem fair?"
"She also said-"
"Shut up, Audrey!" I say, before she can embarrass me further.
"Oookay, I think it's time we get you to class," Adam says as he begins to drag Audrey away.
Audrey sticks her tongue out at me childishly, so obviously I retort by doing the same.
I turn back to Daniel and smile, laughing awkwardly.
He raises his eye brows, "I must say, I've never received such bad reviews before."
I roll my eyes at what he's implying, "Dude, the fact that you even get reviews means you are waaay too frequently visit."
Daniel puts his first to the right side of his chest, "I'm wounded." He says, and I roll my eyes at him again. "No, seriously, you're breaking my heart."
"For a smart person, you're quite dumb," I say, and he looks at me confused. I point to his chest, "Your hearts on the other side."
Daniel looks down to his chest, his fist still resting on the right side and crinkles his nose, "I guess it's a good thing that I'm teaching you math, right?"
I shake my head and ma about to turn to go to class when Daniel asks, "Was the tutoring really bad? I thought you understood everything?"
I wince yet again at the memory of the damned sheet sitting at the bottom of my school bag. "No, erm... your tutoring was fine. It was just... you know what, never mind. It was fine, thank you, by the way." I say hurriedly and turn to leave again.
"Lexi," I hear Daniel call behind me and stop in my tracks. I'm not quite used to him calling me by my nickname, so my pulse jumps a little every time he says it. Stupid, hormonal pulse.
I turn and face Daniel, "Yeah?"
He walks up to me, but I don't look him in the eye; I'm too embarrassed. "Hey," he says, ducking his head so that he can be level with my eyes, "You can tell me if something went wrong, you know."
When I don't reply he raises his hand and taps the underside of my chin with his finger. I look into his blue eyes, searching for any signs that he may be making fun of me. When I find nothing I take a deep breath, swallow my anxiety and quickly say, "The sheet. I did the first few questions, but the ones after that. On the second page," I look away, not wanting to see his reaction, "I.. I couldn't answer any on the second page, and.." the words rush out of my mouth, and when I stop, I take a deep breath and hesitantly look up at Daniel.
He smiles at me, but not in a condescending way. "Hey, that's completely fine. This stuff isn't easy."
I nod, but can't help but cringe.
"Did you bring the booklet and notebook with you?"
"Yeah, it's in my bag."
"How about we go through the questions together at lunch? That way you won't get in trouble with Westfield."
I furrow my brow in confusion and look at Daniel, "Are you sure?"
He shrugs his shoulders and smiles, "Of course."
"You two!" I turn and see Coach Gennari coming down the hall, "To class, now!"
I mutter a quick apology to Coach and say bye to Daniel, making my way to my first class.
"See you at lunch, friend." I smile as I make my way to history.
As I sit down next to Audrey, she asks where I was and I tell her I was with Daniel.
"So, what happened between this morning and last night's phone call?" Audrey asks.
Thankfully Mr Thompson is late to class too, so I get time to settle down.
"Lissa told mom that Daniel and I had a fight, and that I called him a dick. Obviously mom went ballistic and send me to Daniel's house to apologise."
Audrey's eyes go wide in excitement, "Ooh, please tell me he answered the door and led you up to his room where you both apologized and he proceeded to make passionate love to you!"
I scoff and slap Audrey's arm, "Filter! Remember, filter your thoughts."
She puts her hands up in a surrender, "That was filtered. I was going to ask if he fucked you senseless, but I thought that would be too much for your virgin ears."
I gasp and Audrey winks at me just as Thompson walks into class.
"The good think about being a teacher; I can be late without the threat of detention," he says as he puts his briefcase down and gets ready to teach. "I have your papers from last Monday, and I must say I am disappointed. Many of you are in this class because you need the extra credits," as he says it, his gaze land on me and I drop my eyes to my desk. I ignore the rest of his lecture in favour of drawing little tornados all over my paper.
Later on in the class, Mr Thompson sets us work in pairs and I take the opportunity to relay last night to Audrey. Her eyes nearly bulge out of her head as I tell her about the 'massage' Daniel gave me.
"Wait, so you're telling me, you were sat on Daniel Kepler's lap as he gave you a massage, and the night didn't end with him on top of you?"
"I swear, he thinks with his penis, and you think with your vagina."
Audrey shrugs and laughs, "Yeah, pretty much."
"We're just friends," I tell Audrey.
"Yeah, like Teddy and Eli are 'just friends'," she says, using her fingers as quotation marks.
"No, not like Teddy and Eli. Like me and Eli. He is just my friend," I say, "and my tutor. And my neighbour," I add.
"So more than friends?" Audrey says, smirking.
I let out a deep breath and turn back to my work, "You're hopeless."
-
At lunch time I'm sitting between Jax and Eli, sipping on my princess juice as Teddy and I talk about all the new books being released this month. I smile and play along as she talks about how bummed she is that she'll have to wait a few months before the libraries bring them in; she usually borrows my books, but I told her I was on a buying band until I finished whatever books I already owned- total lie. What I don't tell her is that I ordered her a whole crate of books from the Book Outlet for her birthday, which is in a few days. I find it funny that Teddy is the smallest, but oldest out of all of us.
Teddy and I are gushing over a male book character, much to the twins' dismay when I feel someone tap my shoulder.
I turn to find Daniel's broad figure standing behind me, and all of a sudden remember that I was supposed to meet him to do homework at lunch.
"Crap, I'm so sorry I forgot," I say, quickly standing.
"It's alright," he says. "Do you want to work here, or in the library?"
I turn back to the table. Eli stands, "I'll go sit next to Teddy, take a seat New Meat."
"I'm glad that only you guys call me that," Daniel says as he sits beside George.
George gives him an annoyed look, but Daniel doesn't see it. I give George a questioning look, but he ignores me, turning back to his lunch.
I introduce Daniel to the guys at the table. The twins and Daniel launch into a conversation about the gym, workout programmes and protein supplement- topics completely foreign to me. The look of excitement on their faces is so cute when Daniel mentions that he boxes; they're impressed.
Daniel then turns to me as I pick up my bag and get my booklet and notebook out.
He's about to explain one of the questions to me when Bitch Claire stomps up to our table in incredibly high heels and an even higher skirtt- this an example of one of the few times I'm disappointed in our school's relaxed attitude towards the dress code; I can practically see the girls ass cheeks. "Daniel, what are you doing here? Our tables over there, silly."
"I'm busy, Claire," he says without looking away from me.
Claire scoffs, "Doing what, exactly?"
"I said, I am busy. Now walk away," Daniel says slowly, his nonchalant tone making Claire visibly seethe.
If it was any other girl, I would have felt bad for them, but its Claire, its nice to see her get back from a guy what she dishes out to the girls.
Claire turns on her heel as Eli, Jax and even George burst out into laughter.
"We definitely like you," Eli says. Claire giggles and hits Eli lightly on the arm.
We spend the rest of lunch going through the booklet. I breathe out a giant sigh of relief when we finish the last question.
I turn to Daniel and thank him. He replies with his killer smile and then picks up my juice and takes a sip.
"Hey! That's my princess juice!" I complain, and the whole table burst into laughter when we realise how ridiculous that sounded.
Daniel gives my juice back. "You have work today, right?"
I nod, "I'm surprised that you remember."
"I'm bringing the princess-witches over today, remember?"
"Oh yeah, I had forgotten about that." I had called Miss Cecelia- my boss- and asked her if the girls could come over on a slow day to do some baking. Bless the lady, she was more than happy to have the girls come over. "How did you become the princess-witch chauffeur?"
"Hold up, what and who is a princess-witch?" Eli asks across the table.
"A witch that's a princess, duh," Jax replies, his face serious.
The whole table looks at Jax, and then we all simultaneously burst into laughter.
"What?" he asks, annoyed. "It wasn't hard rocket science, what the hell else could a princess-witch be?"
-
Hey Guys!
So this is one of my shorter chapters, but I've cut this chapter and Chapter 12 in half because I didn't want it to be too long. Next chapter will be up (hopefully) soon! I'm slolwy trying to introduce the other characters and their stories without bombarding you guys with a ton of infromation. What do you guys think of the pace of the story so far, and of the 'supposrting characters'? The pace will eventaully speed up, but for now, I'm just laying ground work.
(A little Daniel montage to the side. There was never one picture I saw and thought 'Thats Daniel', its always been more of a general 'look' that I've based him on. Hope you guys like it, tell me what you think in the comments!)
Also, I kind of have no idea how Alexa looks, I'm yet to find a picture of someone who matches the image in my mind. So if you know of anyone, send their name of picture my way, please!
Thank You!
EE xo