Without You: Book 1 of the Changing Hearts Series

by Yesenia Vargas

  “Tell me who you are,” her dad said. “Where are your parents from?”

  Ariana saw Lucas take a deep breath. He began speaking in Spanish.

  ###

  Over an hour later, her parents were finally done talking with, or rather interrogating, Lucas. They had asked about his family, his grades, his job, his goals for the future. Ariana was surprised they hadn’t asked if he had a retirement account or something. Then they’d gone over all the rules of their relationship and what would happen if he didn’t follow them. Lucas had looked terrified and even sweaty nervous at one point, but he had survived, and now she was walking him to his car. As they went out the front door, Jimmy followed them for a bit, and Ariana hugged him.

  Lucas walked ahead of them. “I can tell he’s a good person,” Jimmy whispered.

  “He is. He really is,” she replied, letting go. Jimmy closed the front door as he went back in while Ariana followed Lucas to his car. It was dark out already. They conveniently went around to the other side of his car, where it would be hard for someone inside her house to watch them.

  “What’d you think?” Ariana said with a smile.

  “A little scary, but I think they liked me. Right?”

  “Not completely sure either. It’s hard to tell with them, mostly my dad, but I think they did.” She looked up at him. He pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. She leaned her head on his chest and closed her eyes. Lucas breathed deep and began stroking her back. She shivered a little. She didn’t know if it was from the chill outside or from Lucas’s hands on her.

  “Are you cold?” he asked.

  “A little,” she said. Any excuse to get closer to him. Instead, he took off his jacket and put it on her.

  She looked at him while gripping the super soft edges of the sleeves. “Thanks.”

  Lucas put his arms back around her. “Do you want to go out with me this Friday?”

  She nodded and whispered. “I’d love to.”

  “I should probably go now. Don’t want to make your dad mad,” he said. She squeezed him harder. “I’ll text you when I get home, and we’ll see each other in school tomorrow.”

  “What do you think everyone’s going to say?” She looked up at him with a smile.

  He smiled back. “That it’s been a long time coming.”

  She laughed. “Really?”

  “Yeah. My friends could tell I really liked you.”

  “You should have heard Mayra.”

  He laughed. “Yeah, she definitely helped me realize maybe you felt the same way about me.”

  Ariana shook her head. They pulled apart, and Ariana waited for a kiss from Lucas, but, again, it didn’t come. He kissed her forehead instead and walked her back to the front door.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

  “Yeah.” She hugged herself from the chill.

  He walked back down and got in his car and drove away. It was then that she realized his jacket was still on her.

  Ariana watched his car go around the corner, and then she went inside. Her parents were in the dining room, about to have dinner.

  “Come and eat,” her mom said, eyeing Lucas’s jacket on her.

  “I’ll go get Jimmy.” She went the opposite way to his room and knocked before going in.

  He had just gotten out of the shower and was putting on a shirt.

  “Hey, you have a six pack,” she said. It was weird seeing her little brother all muscular.

  “Pssh. I’ve had a six pack,” Jimmy said as he pulled his head through his shirt.

  “Impressive.”

  “Does Lucas have one?” he said with a smile.

  “I wouldn’t know.” She rubbed the sleeves of Lucas’s jacket, wondering if he did.

  “Sure.”

  “Anyway, Mom and Dad said it’s time to eat.”

  He followed her to the dinner table, and they had dinner as a family. Ariana couldn’t stop smiling. She couldn’t believe how well everything had gone with Lucas and her parents. Then she wondered what it would take for Lucas to kiss her on the lips.

  ###

  The next morning, Ariana and Jimmy pulled into Mayra’s driveway to pick her up on their way to school. She realized she hadn’t even told her the news about Lucas. She had been busy texting Lucas until midnight last night. She was kind of tired but way too excited to even yawn.

  Mayra came out of her house and got into the front passenger seat. Jimmy was in the back.

  “Guess who has a boyfriend?” Jimmy said before Mayra had even shut her door.

  She stared at Ariana, and Ariana shook her head, smiling.

  “You and Lucas?”

  She nodded. “Yep. Last night. He came and talked to my parents and everything.”

  “Aw. Congratulations.” She leaned over and gave her a hug as best as she could. “You two deserve each other.”

  “Thanks, Mayra.”

  “So your parents were cool with it and everything?”

  Ariana nodded and smiled.

  “Wow. They’ve really come a long way.”

  “Uh huh,” said Jimmy from the back.

  They began the drive to school. Fifteen minutes later, they were in the parking lot, getting out of the car and walking towards the cafeteria for breakfast.

  Ariana wondered where Lucas was. She didn’t normally see him in the morning, but maybe that would change now that they were going out.

  They each grabbed a chicken biscuit and an orange juice and sat down. She looked at Jimmy and Mayra. They were sitting next to each other opposite from her, but she hadn’t heard anything lately from Mayra about them. She supposed they really were taking things slow.

  Her phone buzzed, and she looked around for teachers before taking it out. It was Lucas.

  Good morning, princess.

  “What are you smiling about?” Jimmy asked. He was on his third chicken biscuit.

  “Nothing.”

  “You better tell me about nothing later,” Mayra said with a wink.

  Ariana laughed and replied to Lucas’s text.

  Good morning, handsome.

  Her day was already getting off to a great start.

  As she and Mayra walked to their first period class, she saw Lucas waiting for her at her locker. He had a different jacket on today since she still had his other one at home. She’d slept in it, breathing in his scent the entire night and waking up super cozy.

  She walked up to Lucas, and they hugged.

  “I missed you,” he said. She opened her locker and took out some things.

  “Me too.” She looked up at him.

  “Where’s your first class?” Lucas watched as she put a notebook inside her bag.

  “I have AP Lit with Harrison.”

  “That’s on my way. Can I walk you?” She shut her locker and took his hand.

  “Let’s go.”

  They said bye to Mayra, and Jimmy had already gone off to his first class. They had a few minutes before classes started for the day, so they took their time walking to the English wing. She loved the feel of Lucas’s hand in hers. She squeezed his hand, and he squeezed back, harder.

  Then they were in front of Mr. Harrison’s room. They turned to look at each other.

  They stepped out of the way as a couple of girls walked into class. She noticed one of them glance at Lucas, but she ignored it.

  “See you in Spanish?” he asked, taking her hands in his.

  She nodded. There was hardly anyone left in the hallway now. “The bell’s about to ring. You don’t want to be late.”

  He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and took off. So forehead and cheek but still not on the mouth. It had to a matter of time before they kissed for real.

  She walked into class and took her seat. She opened her notebook to a fresh piece of paper to do the warm up on the board. She tried to focus as some girls talked behind her. She didn’t really know them, but they were starting to become annoying with their laughter and whispering. She look
ed around for Mr. Harrison as the bell rang. He wasn’t in the room. One last person came running, realized the teacher wasn’t even there, and slowed to a walk as he reached his desk.

  Then Ariana heard her name mentioned behind her.

  She turned around. One of the girls had said it. They tried to look away and stop laughing as she stared at them.

  “I’m just sayin’. I wouldn’t want to go out with the ex-girlfriend of someone who went all psycho. Not to mention if she was drunk and half naked and everyone got it on video.” The girl who was talking had her back to her. Her friends were kicking her and shushing her. “What? I’m not afraid to say what I think.” She turned around and stared back at Ariana with a smirk.

  It was Wendy, a girl in her class who loved to talk smack.

  Ariana stared back, not knowing if she should do something about what Wendy was saying. She was frozen in the moment, not believing what was happening, and then Mr. Harrison walked in and closed the door.

  “Good morning, everyone. I apologize for my being late. I forgot your graded essays in my car. When I call out your name, please come up here and retrieve your paper.”

  “Wendy.” He held out her paper and looked down at the rest of the essays. Wendy got out of her seat and strutted to the front of the room. Mr. Harrison continued as Ariana grinded her teeth, trying to calm her beating heart.

  “Ariana.”

  She got up and walked towards the front of the room. Wendy stared at her as she walked back to her desk, as if daring her to do something.

  As they passed each other, Wendy hit her shoulder, hard. The room was silent, as just about everyone realized what had happened. Ariana turned around, and so did Wendy. She didn’t apologize.

  Before she knew she was moving, Ariana had pushed her on the shoulders, knocking Wendy down onto a desk. Wendy managed to catch herself, but got up lightning fast to come at Ariana. Ariana moved out of the way.

  Then Mr. Harrison was in between them. “Stop now! Both of you to the front office. I will not have this in my classroom.” He pointed to the front door, everyone’s essays on the floor.

  Wendy seethed, staring at Ariana. Ariana stared right back, not realizing she was biting the inside of her mouth.

  “Now.” Mr. Harrison was louder this time. Everyone else had started talking and whispering. Ariana decided she wasn’t going to give them any more reason to keep talking about her. She walked out and straight to the principal’s office, leaving Wendy behind.

  chapter eight

  Ariana was sitting in the lobby of the front office. Wendy was across from her, still staring at her. And probably imagining herself getting Ariana back for knocking her down.

  Ariana wondered how such a perfect morning had turned into this mess.

  She’d never gotten in trouble in school in her life. Not even for chewing gum. That wasn’t her. But she had gotten so angry so quickly. For a split second, she admitted to herself that her reaction scared her.

  Was she turning into Carlos? Was this how he had turned into the person who had been responsible for what had happened last year?

  Then she looked at the paintings on the wall, listened to the secretary talking on the phone, anything to get her mind off the thought that had just crossed her mind and the crazy nut who was in front of her.

  A door to her left opened and the assistant principal, Mr. Sandhill, stepped out of his office. He signaled to the both of them with his finger, beckoning them. “In my office, please.”

  He didn’t sound happy. Ariana got up first and went right in. Wendy trudged behind her. They each took a seat, and so did Mr. Sandhill.

  “Mr. Harrison has just informed me of what happened in his classroom this morning. One of you pushed the other?” He looked from Ariana to Wendy and back.

  “Yeah. She pushed me,” Wendy said, looking Ariana up and down like she was scum.

  “Why don’t you tell him why?” she said, glancing at Wendy.

  “For no reason. I didn’t do anything to you.”

  Ariana scoffed.

  “You two young ladies need to tell me the truth,” Mr. Sandhill said, looking from one girl to the other.

  “She was talking about me with a bunch of other girls. They were laughing at me. I hardly even know her, so it beats me why she was even doing it.”

  Wendy just rolled her eyes.

  “Then, when she was walking back to her desk and I was going up to get my essay from the teacher, she pushed me on purpose. So I pushed her back.” She glared at Wendy. “I don’t even talk to her.” Ariana felt hot again.

  “I did not touch you.”

  “Oh my God. At least have the…the decency to admit it.”

  Balls, she wanted to say, but not in front of Mr. Sandhill. She leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. Then she began thinking about how all of this might affect her getting into college. What if she got suspended? What if they wouldn’t accept her because of her behavior?

  “Since we can’t seem to settle this, I’ll just have to find out myself what happened.” Mr. Sandhill told them.

  “I just want to say that I am telling the truth. And you can check my record. I’ve never gotten in trouble before. Never. I have excellent grades. I wouldn’t have done anything like this except for being provoked. Which I was. And even then, I regret my actions and want to apologize.”

  “Let’s see what Mr. Harrison has to say first.” He picked up his phone, looked at a laminated sheet taped to his desk, and dialed a number, putting the phone to his ear.

  It was a few seconds before Mr. Harrison picked up. Mr. Sandhill spoke into the phone, nodding often. He went on like that for a couple of minutes.

  Wendy sighed next to her.

  Finally, Mr. Sandhill hung up and looked at Ariana with a stern glare.

  Then he turned to Wendy.

  “Ariana, please step out of my office.”

  She looked at Wendy and Mr. Sandhill, then slowly got up and left, closing the door behind her.

  She took a seat right by the door, trying to listen to what was going on, but the secretary was on to her. She gave Ariana a stern stare and waited for her to sit back in her seat.

  A few minutes later, Wendy came out of the office. She stormed into the hallway. Mr. Sandhill came out of his office and motioned for Ariana to come back in.

  She took a seat, wondering what was about to happen.

  Mr. Sandhill just stared at her with his chin on his knuckles. “I hate to do this, Ariana, but you’re the one who pushed Wendy down.”

  “Wh—” She almost fell out of her seat, but Mr. Sandhill put up his hand.

  “Mr. Harrison said a couple of students told him what happened. I know Wendy was verbally bullying you and then ran into you on purpose. Thank you for being honest with me. However, I can’t let this slide even though you do have no history of misbehavior.”

  Ariana’s mouth was slightly open as she tried to process what Mr. Sandhill was saying.

  “You’ll have one day of in-school suspension. Wendy has the same for what she did. If you two can’t get along, then I don’t want you saying a word to each other. Because if this happens again, you can rest assured that both of you will be suspended outside of school.”

  It was quiet in Mr. Sandhill’s office for a few seconds. Tears entered Ariana’s eyes. “Is this going to affect my college applications?”

  Mr. Sandhill sighed. “It depends. I’ll remove this incident from your record if there’s no more trouble from you two. An out-of-school suspension definitely will affect your applications, so I’d watch it if I were you.”

  Mr. Sandhill finished writing something on a pink slip of paper. Then he slid it towards Ariana. “I need you to sign this. You’ll have ISS next week.”

  She signed her name on the bottom of the paper. She could hardly see the line where she was supposed to sign because her eyes were so full of tears. She willed them not to overflow. She slid the paper back to Mr. Sandhill.

  He tor
e off her copy. “You may go back to class. We are in second period now.”

  Ariana got up and left without a word. The tears had silently splashed onto her face.

  ###

  “My parents are going to kill me,” Ariana told Mayra at lunch. She looked down at her tray. Today it was peanut butter and jelly sandwich with some soup. She made herself take a bite of the sandwich, knowing later she’d be starving otherwise. Meanwhile, Lucas was still getting his lunch. She hadn’t told him yet.

  “Wendy is such a bitch. So she got one day of ISS too?”

  Ariana nodded and looked down at her tray. “They just gave me permission to go out with Lucas, now this.”

  “Well, I bet when you explain to your parents what happened, they’ll understand.”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never been in trouble before in school. This is bad. I basically started a physical fight. It would have gotten worse, but Mr. Harrison stepped in.” She looked at Mayra. “Believe me, Wendy was getting ready to throw punches.”

  Mayra shook her head as she bit into her sandwich.

  “I don’t even talk to her.”

  “She’s just one of those people who love to talk shit about other people. They thrive on it. She was in one of my classes last year. I let her know early on she wasn’t about to do that around me. I think she just loves the attention.”

  Ariana rolled her eyes and stared off into space. This day was not supposed to have turned out like this.

  Lucas sat down next to her with a tray of chicken pasta. He kissed her on the forehead and looked at her. They hadn’t really had the chance to talk since Lucas been late to Spanish class and the teacher had put them in different groups for an activity.

  “Hey,” he said with a smile. He dug into his food.

  She gave a small smile.

  “What’s wrong?”

  She sighed and looked at him. “Haven’t you heard?”

  “Heard what?” he said as he lifted his drink to his mouth.

  “I got a day of ISS.”

  He almost choked. “What for? I thought you never got in trouble.”

  “She doesn’t,” said Mayra.