Flutter

Chapter 4- Him

“Here,” I said, handing a piece of tape to Miles, who was on a ladder, taping decorations to the walls and ceilings.

He was having an end-of-school party which he decided had to be the shit, something people would definitely remember. Mariam and Nick were in the kitchen on food and drink duty. Cleo and Jasmin were in charge of invites, music and the countdown to the party. I was stuck helping Miles by having my arm in the air, holding things too low for him to grab and holding the ladder still. It sucked.

“Time check?” Mariam shouted from the kitchen over the sound of the oven beeping.

“T-minus 2 and a half hours. We gotta hurry if we want to get glammed up ourselves,” Cleo yelled back, making her way to the kitchen, Jasmin on her heels, MacBook Air in hand.

“Finished,” Miles stated proudly, looking around the spacious decorated ground floor. To be honest, even though I’d like to be mean, I had to admit he’d done a pretty good job.

Stretching my sore arms, I entered the kitchen and picked a nacho chip off the fresh platter Mariam and Nick had made just for our group of six to eat.

“Robs, you can use my room to get changed with me,” Miles joked teasingly. Mariam shot him a warning look.

My face reddened as I looked down at the floor, hearing others snicker at the comment.

Mariam cleared her throat. “Sorry for the disappointment Miles, but Robyn’s changing with us. C’mon Robbie.” She hooked a finger into the loop of my dark jeans and pulled me upstairs.

“I can’t believe he still does that. I thought he was done with that kind of behavior!!” Mariam raged as she shut the door to one of the guest bedrooms behind her.

“Mars, he just… I don’t know. But I’m over him. He’s over me. He was just joking,” I explained.

“No. You both always claim that, and you do get over each other sometimes, but you always end up crawling back to liking one another. Even if those feelings are there for a split moment. I know you both try, especially you, but he needs to try a lot more if he hopes to move on like he agreed to,” Mariam lectured, sitting me down on the bed.

Sitting down on the floor in front of me, she plugged in the curling iron and her make-up/hair kit, passing both to me.

I looked into her eyes through the mirror on the wall in front of us. “I know. He just slips up. We’re both trying. We HAVE moved on. But he’s my best friend. In fact, he acts like an older annoying brother sometimes,” I answered seriously.

Mariam scoffed as I ran a brush through her brown straight silky hair. “Older brother my ass. More like a protective boyfriend. A psychopath of a boyfriend.”

I laughed at her comment because it really was true.

“Marum! Help,” I grunted with my green dress half way down my body. My arms wouldn’t go in and wouldn’t come out. I was stuck.

I heard her chuckle as she tugged the dress gingerly off my torso. “There’s a zipper in the back, smart ass.”

I huffed as the dress came up and off, looking in the mirror as it did so. My loose hair was all over my face in a mess, my bra crooked.

“I knew that.”

I slid into the dress, fixing my bra in the process. Twisting my arm around, I pulled the zipper up until it couldn’t go up anymore, which was still exposing half my back. I left it, as I’d ask Mariam to zip the rest up later.