by Trisha Lynn
Chapter Seventeen
The next morning Marissa never showed up to pick her up. She should have expected that, and she even may have deserved it, but it still stung like several paper cuts across her heart. She'd texted her last night saying it wasn't what she thought it was, and it wasn't what it may have looked like. No responses.
First period, the only class they shared, she sat next to her like usual and tried to talk to her. Marissa chatted away to Shawn Thibeault and completely ignored her. Adeila ground her teeth; she'd thought that their friendship was better than this. Shawn looked from one to the other, incredibly confused.
As they left class, Adeila cut her off. “Ugh! Marissa at least give me some credit! Let me explain.”
Marissa's eyes were narrowed, her hands on her hips. “Explain what? What you were doing with a boy I like at nine-something at night?”
Adeila ran a hand through her long hair. It did sound so bad, but it's not like they had done anything! “I know how it looked, but that's so far from the truth.”
“Okay, then, what is the truth?”
“I..Ah..We were just-”
“See! That's what I thought!”
Damn it! She probably should have come up with a real good lie and a smoother confrontation.
“We were talking. I was giving him a ride.”
Marissa just scoffed and turned away. Adeila didn't even have the energy to go after her; she just turned on her heel and stormed to her second period class. One she shared with the boy in question.
.~.
Lunch was incredibly awkward; even more so than the previous day. She didn't realize it could be more uncomfortable, but boy was she wrong.
Erik kept glancing from one girl to the other in complete confusion. Men, they just had no idea how to handle girls. She hadn't spoken to him since the previous day at lunch so she figured he must think her still mad over that situation, when she'd left the lunchroom. She'd just let him think that. He'd text her once throughout the night, but it had been about some plant botany question he knew she'd know. She had an affinity when it came to anything plant related.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t even asked her if she was okay from yesterday. She guessed that was just another problem to set on top of the other pile of non Fae related issues she'd have to address at some point.
“Everything okay?” He whispered. She just nodded, plastered a very thin smile on her face and gingerly touched his arm. She caught Marissa sending her a dirty look over the action. What the frick? It’s not like she'd cheated on Erik or anything, so Adeila returned the look with one of her own. Trying to show her friend that she had absolutely nothing to be guilty about. She'd technically done nothing wrong.
Marissa had no room to judge, she had slept with some random guy she barely even knew, when she supposedly liked Loki; but yet Marissa's dramatics flared with her innocent conversation with a guy.
She knew they had an impenetrable bond. Marissa may be mad at her at this moment, but she'd get over it. No matter how mad Marissa was at her she would never stoop to pulling Erik into this. She may harass her all she wanted but they had a better relationship then this catty drama. Adeila just hoped that Marissa snapped out of it soon. By the end of the week, she was going to another realm for goodness sake!
.~.
She looked forward to chemistry class that day just about as much as she looked forward to having a tooth pulled. She avoided Loki at all costs, but to her dismay he stood at her desk as she packed up, seconds before the bell rang.
He leaned in close and whispered. “I know you’re having a shitty time right now, but remember you need to figure out an excuse to be gone this weekend.” With that he left.
Ugh! Why couldn't he just leave her alone about it, she knew she had to do it. She knew even mad at her, Marissa would cover for her, but what would she say? She still had no ideas.
Why was all of this happening all of a sudden? As if it wasn't bad enough to learn she wasn't human, or at least be told that - she still wasn't entirely sure she believed it - but now she was having issues with her boyfriend and best friend. At least she hadn't made anything else weird happen, well, not since rendering her friend magically – and let's face it, blessedly - speechless. Maybe it was all a fluke. But deep inside her core she knew she was different.
.~.
That night she lay awake for a long time. Her mind was a mess. She had cried out all the tears she could handle. When she'd gotten home from school, no one else was home, so she'd taken that time to do a little searching.
She searched the entire house for her baby pictures, or any pictures of her infancy she could find. She did find a few baby pictures but none of her mom pregnant with her. She found a few in her siblings baby books of her mom pregnant with them. But her baby book consisted of pictures from when she was about a week old and beyond. No pictures of her at the hospital, like her siblings.
She was a smart girl, she thought of her birth certificate and social security card, which she had no idea where her mother kept. She'd still yet to give them to Adeila, even though she was almost eighteen and would need them soon. Adeila wanted them even more now.
None of this was concrete evidence of one way or another, but it made the suspicions rise. What if she really was adopted and she had parents in another realm? Or elsewhere, at least? Maybe they would be the loving and attentive parents she'd always imagined she'd have. Maybe ones that she could actually build a relationship with instead of just living under the same roof, and passing in the halls now and again.