Romance Collision ✔

ღChapter Four: Upstairs-Outsidies

ღ

Eve was sitting across from Aaron in the cafeteria during their lunch period. She'd placed her backpack beside her so he wouldn't be able to sit right next to her like he did almost all the time. Instead, Aaron was seated between Bea and Charlie.

All three girls watched the teenage boy inhale his lunch. Pieces of the corndog coating fell off when he bit into it and at the same time was already scooping up a spoonful of spaghetti. Not once had Aaron taken a moment to breathe, let alone sip from his chocolate milk carton.

Each of the girls remained silent; horrified, yet fascinated by the carnivore. Bea's blue eyes widened the more food was being shoved into the boy's mouth. Charlie was on the opposite side with her nose scrunched and scooted away to the very edge of the bench. She made a small grunt and eyed the tiny splatter of spaghetti sauce that almost landed on her purse had she not removed it in time. For Eve, she was slowly shaking her head, scrunching her nose. Eve glanced at her own food that had barely been touched then opted to pushing her tray away from her.

Shaking her head, Eve frowned at Charlie who had been telling her something on the way into the cafeteria but then stopped because of Aaron having shoved his way to sit himself directly across from Eve. Charlie whined for him to be careful with her new cashmere sweater but that fell on deaf ears.

"I'm sorry..." Eve got Charlie's attention after the girl elbowed Aaron to scoot over to make room for her purse between them. "You want me to go with you guys... where?"

A huge slurp from Aaron made Charlie scoff, scrunching her nose. Bea was in the middle of putting a small carrot onto Aaron's plate and eyed him carefully when his hand reached down to his tray to grab more food and picked up the carrot; tossing it into his mouth.

Charlie had to lower her chin so she could reach up to adjust the bow she had tied around her ponytail but lifted her eyes to Eve. The bow was a requirement whenever the uniform was being worn so Charlie had to constantly be fixing it back into place. She figured it had a lot to do with her flipping her hair off her shoulder when flirting with Gabriel.

Once her bow was back in place, Charlie settled her arms in front of her on the table. She gave a quick side-eye glance to Aaron in case the spaghetti sauce splattered her way then smiled at her frowning friend.

"Well where else would be better than the McNeill place!" Her smile widened as she imagined how this weekend could play out. Charlie explained about the invitation Greg gave the girls after Eve had scurried off to class this morning.

It was expected to see the nose scrunched look on Eve's face but what was not expected was the firm, "No." that came out of her mouth. Charlie really thought maybe Eve wouldn't be difficult about this miraculous opportunity given to Charlie and Bea. But that was hoping for too much apparently.

The oldest of the girls sulked, groaning as she threw herself forward across the table---startling Eve to go wide-eyed---and Charlie latched her hands around Eve's.

"Oh, c'mon, Eve! Please? Pretty, pretty, pretty please?!"

Again, Eve grumbled, "No." while trying to tug her hands away.

Charlie whined, "Why nooooot?" frowning when Eve managed to pull her hands away. She was still leaning over the table while mentioning that it was just for a little while and there was no reason not to go visit the boys.

"I can give you very good reasons," her younger friend snapped back.

Charlie sulked, groaning at the stubbornness of her friend. "Oh, come ooooon, Eve! Please? For me? It's not like you have anything to do this weekend anyway!"