Intrepid » n.h. au

Chapter 38

The sigh I let out as I enter my apartment, is loud and exasperated enough to make my mum lecture me about being lazy and irresponsible, if she were here that is. I can't quite wrap my head around it either, for someone who generally likes learning and going to school, I'm a little too happy about the fact that it's Friday and the first week is finally over. I can finally just sit and watch my sitcoms all day. Get three pounds worth of Slurpees. And hope it snows enough so I can use that as an excuse not to go to school on Monday.

Yep, my mum would definitely sit me at a table for an hour or two to give me life lessons.

I chuck my backpack against a wall, kicking it a couple times so it doesn't topple over before opening the door to the living room. I don't smile, but I can feel my face lighting up when I notice Freya on the couch, her knees against her chest while she stares at her phone. I decide to ignore the frown she has on her face at least until I find out if there's a problem or she's just deep in thought or something.

I clear my throat and fall onto the sofa next to her, watching the side of her face while she's barely even turned her head in my direction. "Hey," I mumble, leaning over to kiss the corner of her mouth, which makes her lift her head and look at me with a blank expression, seemingly surprised to see me here.

"Hi," She greets me back quickly, in a light tone, and tilts her head to the side to peck my lips, her expression brightening just the slightest. "How was school?"

"You know... school," I grin, using the fact that our faces are still really close to kiss her while I can. She pulls away a few seconds later, scratching the back of her neck and looking back at her phone again – and I happen to notice her expression go back to how it was when I first walked in. I wish I hadn't noticed.

I dart my eyes from her to her phone, pushing down the urge to look at what she's looking, and just sigh in the end. "Alright, what happened?"

"What?" My question makes her look up at me again, "What do you mean?"

"Come on, I know that face. I should have a PhD in that face," I tell her, nodding more to myself than her, wanting to cut down the tension among other things. Freya just rolls her eyes – it must be bad since she's not smiling at all. Usually she at least smiles at all of my jokes, no matter how bad they are. That's one of the things I love her for.

"Seriously, tell me," I keep nagging, when she goes back to staring at the screen, clearly with no intention of speaking about what's going on. "Did I do something?"

"No- what? Why'd you even ask that?" She furrows her eyebrows at me, as if my question is out of line – I'm figuring out that she'll only talk to me if I say something bizarre or downright stupid.

"It's usually me," I say casually, nodding again. "You have a gift of finding something wrong with just about everything I say. Doesn't matter if it's good or bad."

I'm not even kidding. I've had her go apeshit over compliments more than anything else.

"Well, I..." Her hand awkwardly goes to the back of her neck again as she trails off, but at least she's started speaking if nothing. "I... talked to Harry today. First time since the birthday party last week."

I nod, feeling better about the situation already, "Okay. What'd you talk about?"

"Uh, well, I asked him if he was serious about moving to Amsterdam or if he was just talking nonsense because he was drunk or high or whatever, and... yeah, things got a little out of hand."

"What do you mean?"

Freya sighs, reluctantly starting to scroll up her messages. "'Yeah, I was serious, don't act like you don't know my reasons for it.' 'Okay, but do you have any other reasons except Kirsten and her safety? If you're gonna move across the world you have to be doing it for yourself too.' 'I do, the economy is better, I'd learn a new language and about their cultures, and it's closer to home. Those are all the reasons I need.' 'What home Harry? This is our home.' 'Don't bullshit me like you don't know where we came from, Freya.' 'It doesn't matter where we came from, home is where the people we love are.' 'I can hear your fake American accent across the city.' 'I'm serious, you have a family here and you're in university, you can't just drop all of that and leave.' 'Shut the fuck up, you ran away from home, haven't contacted your precious fucking family since and you never went to college, you don't get to lecture me about that shit.'"