6:59

by Nonye Acholonu

  When time was running out and I hadn’t come up with anything else, I just texted just the moon back to him. I was so witty, wasn’t I? I wanted to shoot myself.

  Even though barely a minute had passed, I began to get worried. What if the time had passed for me to answer him back! Was this the reason why he wasn’t texting back quickly enough? Maybe he was just a slow texter. Or maybe he’d already left!

  I crawled back over to my window like a baby rushing for a toy and peeked through the blinds once again. An overwhelming sense of relief washed over me when I realized he was still there, still leaning on the car roof lazily. I couldn’t stop myself from smiling — I had to.

  And my smile got wider when I heard my phone chime again. From across the room. Why did I leave it there? I jumped back across the room, picked up the phone and opened up the text.

  Don’t 4get the stars.

  Aw, he noticed the stars! I loved the stars.

  How could I forget? I texted back. Then I flung myself back over to the window, bruising my knees on the way, and peeked through again just in time to see his lips pull back from his teeth to show off a dazzling white smile.

  Then, from there, we texted back and forth.

  Whatcha up to?

  Not much. You?

  Tryna decide if I wanna do a mission or c u.

  My heart skipped a beat when I read this message. He wanted to see me? Really? Did I honestly make that great of an impression on him! I wanted so bad to text that I wanted to see him, too, but I remembered Hudson’s advice— don’t be too quick to agree. I texted back:

  Both seem like dangerous activities.

  I kno. If I do a mission, I could get hurt. But if I c u I might get hurt worse.

  I’d say do a mission.

  Naw, id lik a little more risk thn that.

  It’s your funeral.

  Where u liv?

  He was coming over. I knew I should’ve been excited but for a second I was confused — I mean, didn’t he know where I lived? But then I remembered that this was Cam I was talking to, not Cameron. He had no idea.

  Across the street. The house with the Slug Bug.

  I saw Cam look up from his phone when he got my text. He looked around and spotted the car, smiling broadly. Then his eyes traveled over to my house and his gaze ran its way up to my window. I quickly ducked away, praying that he hadn’t seen me.

  I remained sitting there with my back pressed against the wall next to the window, breathing heavily as my heart raced. How amazingly awkward would that be if he’d seen me staring at him this whole time. He’d probably say I was a stalker freak. Or maybe, he wouldn’t even bother to say anything to me. Maybe he would just take off and forget I ever—

  A knocking at my window had me jumping a mile into the air, bumping my head on my stupid desk.

  I didn’t want to look — but I did anyway. A part of me already knew what was behind the window, but I just wanted to see it for my own eyes. When I pulled the curtain away, Cam was crouched outside my window — gray eyes and all — staring at me with a grin on his deliciously tan skin.

  “Open up,” came his muffled voice from the other side of the window.

  “Right,” I said, climbing onto my knees and unlatching the window. He helped me slide the glass up and jumped into my room a second after.

  “Hey, Liv,” he said with a wink.

  “Uh, hi,” I said. Suddenly I was extremely infatuated with the window and its inner workings. I couldn’t bring myself to actually look at him, which was kind of ironic for me. I mean, it wasn’t even that long ago since I’d jumped into his car, saw him get shot at, watched my grandma yell at him, and then skipped out on my friend to help him with a mission. There was no reason for the sudden shyness.

  Perhaps it was just because he had now come to me.

  “Cute room,” he said from behind me. I imagined him looking around at all the colors and knick-knacks. “Are you some kind of artist or something?” he asked.

  “Kind of,” I said, locking the windows and turning around. I discreetly let my hair out of its restricting ponytail. “I’m just into colors and creativity, I guess.”

  “Hence the paint on the walls — and all the pictures and stuff.” He picked up my colorful monkey and smirked at it. “Your room reminds me of — hate to say it — a hippie.” When he saw me frown, he sat on my bed and said, “In a good way. I like how you painted music notes on the walls. The pictures of random things are pretty cool, too — they go with the rainbow-colored walls. Never seen anything like it.”

  “I like colors,” I said, pulling on a sweatshirt over my girly pajama tank top. “And the tie-dyed walls were a product of my grandmother’s.” I remembered how she and I had painted the walls like this when I was younger and completely into rainbows and tie-dye. It was like our little project.

  Cam shot a gray-eyed glance right at me. “Really? Your grandmother let you do this?” He seemed really shocked.

  I shrugged. “Yeah?” I said.

  He snorted and ran his hands on the blended colors of the wall. “It seems to me like she wouldn’t even want colors on her garden.” He plopped down on my orange bean-bag chair. “She still mad at me?” he asked.

  I remembered how she’d yelled the pants off of Cam, making sure to smack him around a few times. Of course she’d still be mad. “I don’t know. I think so.”

  “Man,” he sighed, rubbing his eyes. “Well, I don’t care actually.” He stared up at my ceiling and then chuckled. “Your room makes me feel high.”

  I laughed. “High? How?” I tucked my legs underneath me, glad I wasn’t wearing my pajama pants. It seemed like my sweatshirt and leggings were the most appropriate.

  “You ever been high before?” he asked, turning his gaze on me. When I shook my head, he grinned and shook his head. “It’s crazy. Like this room.”

  “You said you liked it!” I accused, pointing at him with wide eyes.

  He held up his hands in surrender. “Just because I like it, doesn’t mean it’s not crazy.”

  I shrugged. “Point made.”

  Cam nodded, pleased with himself as he looked around again. Silence clawed away at the room as both of us wondered what to say. I was freaking out. I wasn’t one to start conversations with, well, anyone. Did he forget that I was shy? For some reason, I was annoyed at him for not saying anything. Why wouldn’t he talk?

  “Point made,” I replied realizing only after I said it that I’d already spoken those exact two words, like, a second ago. How stupid was I?

  “I had no say in what I wanted to do to my room,” Cam said, thankfully not pointing out that I’d already spoken those words.

  “Really?” I asked him.

  He shook his head, staring at the floor pensively. “I’d always just had a room, you know? Whenever anything changed in it, I always thought Mila or Dad had gotten to it — but no. It was Cameron, wasn’t it?” he asked, as if I knew the answer to it.

  “You could still do something to it,” I offered, not knowing how to respond.

  He shrugged. “I could — if I had time, that is,” he said. Then he pulled out his phone and started texting.

  Horribly offended, I walked over to him, snatched his phone away, and tossed it on my bed — in my head, of course. In reality, I just watched him push his screen aimlessly, not caring that I was sitting across the room from him. If I’d been Hudson, he probably wouldn’t have done that. If I’d been Anjolie, he probably would be making out with me by now.

  Cam suddenly looked up as if he’d just heard my thoughts. Then he motioned to his phone. “Remember that mission I told you about?” he asked.

  I nodded, embarrassed at my previous thoughts. I wasn’t normally jealous — I was too shy to care. Where was this sudden mood swing coming from? And why was it geared towards Cam? I mean, Cameron’s already my boyfriend — why should I be worried?

  “Yeah, well, this mission was a biggie,” he said, sliding his phone back into his pocket.
“The others and I were supposed to be in Las Vegas right now, hustling the owner of the Psalms Hotel. Now Anjolie’s burning my phone with texts saying that they need me. I mean, come on. She has two other people to help her out. What would I do?” Cam rolled his eyes as if sick of the whole situation. “I just wish Anj would stop being so needy. It’s like she can’t do crap on her own. Isn’t she the boss? Jeez.”

  I stared at Cam, not knowing how to respond to his sudden anger towards Anjolie. And here I thought they liked each other.

  “I thought you liked her,” I pointed out, adjusting my legs underneath me.

  “I like her — somewhat,” Cam said. Then he pressed his lips together, squeezing his eyebrows together as if thinking about what he’d just said. “We were like this,” Cam said to me, twining two fingers together. “When I started doing missions two years ago — you know, when I got hot and stuff — Anjolie and I were inseparable. I hate to say it, but we kinda had a… a thing.” He chuckled, remembering the memory. “She was so cool — down to earth, chill, awesome. She knew how to have a great time. But ever since the previous boss died and the king assigned Anjolie the job, she’d just became super crazy.”

  Cam rubbed the back of his neck and adjusted his position on the beanbag. “Anyway, now it’s just ‘Cam, I need your help’ and ‘Cam, call an ambulance’ and ‘Cam, please don’t leave me — I’m scared.’” He mimicked her using an annoying girly voice for emphasis. “She’s always in trouble and she always needs my help. Well, screw that. She needs to grow up and help her own self out. She’s the boss for a reason!”

  I winced at his words. “What if she is in trouble, though?” I asked him, cocking my head to the side.

  Cam shot me a hard gaze for a few moments before sighing out a laugh. “She’s not. She’s just saying that crap because she’s in love with me.”

  The words hacked through me like a dull knife. Anjolie’s in love with Cam? But—but that’s not fair. Cam was my boyfriend. Well, technically no. Cameron was my boyfriend. That technically meant that Cam was single. But they were still the same person.

  No matter what anybody said, Cam and Cameron were the same person.

  Cam laughed, noticing my distress. “Yeah, I know, right?” he said, even though I hadn’t said anything. “I mean, I’ve been there — done that. It was fun during that time, but now I’m over it — I’m over her.” His eyes narrowed as he looked at the floor. Then he looked back up at me from behind his long lashes. “I’ve got my eye on someone new.”

  My heart raced as I stared at him, at his gray eyes. I stared as a slow grin spread over his lips. I stared as he flexed his neck and sat back into the chair. His eyes never left mine. That expression of mystery never erased from his beautiful face. He was challenging me — I could feel it. The ball was in my court now.

  Finally, I said something. “Out with the old, in with the new.”

  Okay, stupid phrase. But it seemed to work in this situation.

  Cam’s white teeth contrasted profoundly with his tan skin as he chuckled at my words. His eyes squinted and for once he looked genuinely happy. He looked genuinely happy because I made him genuinely happy. And, now, I couldn’t be any happier.

  Chapter Thirty Seven

  Olive

  Cam ended up staying with me until after midnight. We’d sat in my room in the exact same spots just talking about… well, stuff. I’d found out so much about him. For one thing, he was self-conscious about his long feet. When I’d said that long feet weren’t necessarily a bad thing, he’d just laughed and said he’d try to remember that when he was tripping over his feet for the millionth time.

  I’d also learned that he loved to dance — which surprised me because Cameron absolutely despised dancing. Cameron was so terrible at it, I think I would beat him in a dance competition. But Cam had said that every time he’d gone to a club or party, his skills were always challenged in a dance circle. He’d always win, of course.

  He hated playing the piano, too. Not that he was bad at it — in fact, he was rather good at it. It’s just that he hated sitting on the hard bench and staring at black and white keys instead of the audience. He despised not being fully seen by everyone.

  Cam had told me other stuff, too, like how he wished that he could actually meet Cameron. He wanted to be able to talk to him and figure out his life, even though he believed that Cameron was a little girl. I protested but couldn’t help laughing, too.

  Cam left when Abby knocked on my door. He’d bounded over to my window, slid it up, and leapt out into the darkness before I finally opened the door. Although she insisted that she’d heard voices, I just told her it was nothing and claimed that she was interrupting my sleep. She had no clue that Cam had almost stayed the night.

  ****

  At 7:05 am, I heard the front door from across the street shut again. It had to be Cameron.

  “Cameron?” I called after I’d pulled open my window. I stared down at him as he moved away from his car.

  “Hi, Olive,” he said with a gentle smile. “Good morning. Did you sleep well?” He was dressed but he looked so disheveled.

  “Yeah,” I said slowly as I checked him out. His shoes were untied, his shirt wasn’t straightened out and his belt wasn’t even buckled right. He looked like he was in a hurry or something. “What’s going on? Where are you rushing to?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.

  “I’m going to pick up Anjolie,” he said simply. “I don’t want to be late.”

  “School starts in half an hour,” I pointed out.

  “Yeah, I know,” he said. “Anjolie lives, like, ten minutes that way,” he pointed to the left, “and school’s, like, ten minutes that way.” He pointed to the right. “I have to hurry.”

  I just stared at him and he stared back at me patiently. Any other guy would have jumped into his car, blowing me off, but Cameron just waited in case I had something else to say. He was so sweet.

  I imagined him being sweet towards Anjolie and nearly gagged.

  “Can I come, too?” I asked, the idea springing into my head. No way did I want my boyfriend in a car with that needy girl. Knowing Cameron, he’d probably fall right into the palm of her greedy hands.

  Cameron nodded quickly. “Yeah,” he said with a cheery voice. “Of course! But you have to get down here quickly.” He discreetly checked his phone for the time.

  I nodded at him and shut my window, grateful that I’d already gotten ready for school and was just busy watching TV to pass the time. I grabbed my backpack and yellow sweatshirt and bounded out the front door in less than a minute.

  I trotted across the street and jumped into his arms. He stumbled backward but circled his arms around my waist, returning the hug. “You’re happy,” he said into my hair.

  I nodded, inhaling his scent deeply. He smelled like Cam. “Did you have time to shower?” I asked him, pulling away.

  Cameron shook his head. “Not today,” he sighed. “Someone — most likely Cam — got into my stuff and ruined half my closet. I had to waste time arranging things and finding something decent to wear.”

  As I climbed into the passenger seat, I said, “But it’s only been, like, five minutes. That’s not wasting time.”

  Cameron started the car and sped away from his house. “Five minutes is way too long for me. In the morning I could choose from one of three things to do, I could eat, shower, or dress.” He held up a finger for each activity. “If I eat, I’d have to go to school in my boxers or whatever Cam was wearing the night before. If I shower, I’d have only thirty seconds, like, a minute — tops — to get on some dry clothes and head out.” He turned the wheel sharply and pressed on the accelerator. “So I usually just wash my face and hair in the sink, throw on clothes, and jam a waffle into my mouth on the go.”

  “But now, since you take Anjolie to school, you have practically no time to do those things,” I said.

  “I just hop out of bed, pull on clothes, and run out of the house.
”

  I nodded and looked out of the window, anger welling up inside me. Doesn’t Anjolie know what she’s doing? Cameron’s not a normal person. Why was she making him suffer just so she didn’t have to walk the twenty-five minutes to school? She’s so selfish!

  Cameron noticed my hardened face and grabbed my hand, squeezing it tightly in his. “Your mad face is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” he said gently, smiling crookedly. “It always has been. But you don’t have to be mad about this. I choose to pick her up so my rushing in the morning doesn’t bother me.”

  “It bothers me,” I muttered, but smiled at him anyway.

  His smile widened, taking over his face as he kissed my fingers. He kept my fingers pressed to his lips, his smile still plastered on his face, until we finally reached Anjolie’s house.

  It was a normal-looking two-story, the color of sand with dark red trim. The grass was green and looked lived-in, unlike the grass in my neighborhood which looked as if it were sprayed with green-colored starch. There were chalk drawings on her driveway and a few toys were scattered in the bushes or around the lawn. A weathered basketball hoop hung loosely from above the dented garage and a tiny blow-up pool was flung onto the huge tree standing tall next to the house.

  “All this time I thought Anjolie would’ve lived in a fortress or castle,” I snorted, nodding at the house.

  Cameron didn’t respond — he was busy clearing the backseat of his music sheets and whatnot.

  When the door opened, Anjolie emerged wearing a white tank top and dark gray ripped jeans. Her wild white-blond hair was pulled back into a thick curly ponytail, blond ringlets framing her slender face.

  She trotted up to the car, smiling at Cameron. Cameron smiled back and motioned her to the backseat. That’s when I took the opportunity to lean forward in my seat and wave at her.

  Anjolie actually stopped, confusion in her eyes. But then she quickly snapped out of it and smiled at me. When she climbed into the backseat she immediately greeted me. “Hey, Olive, what’s up?”