by Ali Merci
It didn’t matter though; Asa knew her grunt was more out of affection than discomfort.
“So, what’s up?” Asa asked instead.
“I…” Isla’s voice trailed away as her eyes focused on something else in the distance, past Asa’s shoulders. And then Isla’s posture stiffened. “Donoghue incoming,” she muttered under her breath, her icy blue eyes narrowing the slightest bit. As much as Isla didn’t get into touchy-feely topics, she was quite protective of Asa.
Hunter approached, and Asa didn’t need to turn his head around to know it was him. He could detect that cold, hateful aura radiating off Hunter anywhere, any time.
Asa held his breath, waiting for another snide comment that would send him spiralling down a road in search of self-validation. Down a road where he gave in to his impulsive nature far too easily just so that he could feel better. Feel assured.
To his surprise, nothing came.
No gibe, no bitter remark, not even a deliberate shove of the shoulder.
“Maybe hell finally froze over,” Isla suggested once Hunter was out of earshot. Apparently, she’d been thinking the same thing as Asa.
“Nah, I think it’s you,” he said instead. “I have a feeling you intimidate him.”
“I intimidate all the guys,” she muttered bitterly, looking away and into nothingness.
Asa shut his locker and turned to face his friend. “Shut up,” he said. “If they can’t accept your being unafraid to voice your opinions, then that’s their problem.” He threw an arm around Isla’s shoulders and began steering them towards the school doors. “You’ll meet someone who’s man enough to appreciate you, until then—”
“—keep slaying,” she grinned, bumping her hips with his in a nonverbal I-love-you.
“Atta girl.” He smiled back, because even if Asa’s insides were in a constant state of turmoil, there was nothing he wouldn’t do to give those he loved a sense of peace.
After all, Asa had an abundance of quiet in his head, and he didn’t mind sharing it with those who disliked the noise.
10.
Muse To Her Artist
Carmen sat down next to Lottie, an old acquaintance, during lunch that day. The chatter in the canteen was loud, but for once she didn’t mind. Instead, she found herself revelling in the noise—it helped curb the intensity of the loudness inside her. It was only when her surroundings were silent that it became too profound; unbearable. And without her art journal, without her means to scream, this was the only way. Making sure she was surrounded by noise.
“So I’m guessing that’s the popular table?” Willa asked, her eyes focused on a table somewhere past Carmen’s shoulders.
“Totally,” Lottie nodded her head vigorously. “Hunter’s one of the linebackers on the football team and—”
“Hunter’s the brunet with the blue eyes, right?” Willa asked, taking a bite of what looked like a Nutella sandwich.
“Yup,” another girl, with a single purple streak in her brown hair (who Carmen knew was called Joyce and had always wanted to interact more with), chimed in. “He’s so drool-worthy.” She sighed dreamily.
“He’s a bully,” Carmen spoke, her eyes fixed on Joyce, and ignoring the bitter taste those unplanned words left in her mouth.
Joyce blushed, feeling embarrassed, and shifted in her seat uncomfortably. “Well, yeah, I know that,” she mumbled. “I was just saying…”
“Aren’t they all bullies though?” Willa snorted, eyeing the large group of boys at the table with her nose wrinkled in mild disgust. “With inflated egos just because they have all the girls in this school falling at their feet?”
“You have a very disturbing perspective of the female population.” Carmen frowned, narrowing her eyes at Willa. “How can you think so low of your own gender? It’s been just a few days since you’ve joined, how would you know all the girls at this school have no shred of dignity?”
Willa laughed as if she couldn’t believe Carmen was asking her that.
“Really.” She scoffed. “Look at those guys! Hunter and Asa, and all the other athletes and popular ones.” Willa gestured at them. “They’ve got the looks and the influence on the students. You can just tell by the way they walk that they’re players, thinking they’re too good to settle down on just one girl.”
Carmen wanted to say something. Something vehement. Something sharp enough to pierce through the new girl’s mind and remain there. Instead, she chose to take a few seconds to breathe. To remind herself that the world was a better place when she gave away a part of her heart rather than a piece of her mind.
“Warren’s the quarterback and is actually having a steady relationship,” Carmen said calmly, keeping her tone light and pleasant. “And Grady, captain of the basketball team, has been eyeing this girl from my Art class for a while now; I’m positive he genuinely likes her.” She took a bite of her grilled cheese sandwich, swallowed and spoke to Willa again. “I don’t know about the other guys, but I think it’s safe to say not all of them play around.”
Willa stared at her long and hard, but Carmen only lifted her chin into the air, with an unwavering smile on her face.
“Not all of them are players, then?” Willa asked, her tone suddenly taking a cautious tone.
Carmen smiled. “No, Asa isn’t like that,” she said.
Willa’s cheeks grew pink. “I didn’t ask about Asa!” she retorted, glaring at Carmen.
“You didn’t have to.” Joyce giggled. “The way you rant about him ever since your first day here is pretty obvious.”
“That’s because he pisses me off!”
“Why though?” Carmen tilted her head to the side, searching Willa’s eyes with curiosity.
“I don’t know!” she groaned, exasperated. “He just does. His stupid smirk and his stupid face. Ugh.”
“Asa has a very nice face.” Joyce smiled, letting out a sigh of longing.
“Amen to that, sister.” Lottie grinned.
Carmen didn’t say anything. What was there for her to say? Could she agree with them, when all they could say about Asa’s face was nice?
To her, Asa’s face was more than nice. More than pretty. More than…
Just more.
His cheekbones and jawline were something artists would spill blood over to sketch. Asa himself was a thousand shades of brown and gold. The boy with coffee eyes and rich, dark cinnamon hair that made Carmen’s hands shake with the aching need to draw him.
Asa wasn’t something as ordinary and simple as nice, no. He was the muse to the artist in Carmen. And she could sketch his face an infinite amount of times, but would never learn to perfect it.
11.
A Frozen Sun & A Broken Moon
Asa emerged out of the school’s pool, his palms pressed flat against the floor of the swimming complex to haul himself up.
He loved it here. The building was cut off from the main school building, housing the huge indoor pool of Reichenbach High which meant a lot of privacy from the other students.
The water dripped down from his body, his swimming trunk clinging to him like a second layer of skin, as he grabbed a towel from a seat in the bleachers nearby.
Someone whistled from behind him.
“Sure you don’t want to just walk out of here like that?” Isla’s familiar voice said. “I’m pretty sure a lot of students would appreciate the sight.”
“Don’t you have anywhere better to be, Isla?” Asa asked, drying his face and hair with the towel to hide his smile.
“A million places, actually,” she countered. “But you know how it is. When you’re the queen, you’ve got to spare some of your precious time for the peasants too.”
“Ha, ha, ha,” Asa dragged out dryly, opening his drawstring sports bag and grabbing his set of dry clothes to take with him inside the locker room. “Seriously though,” he said, meeting her eyes, “everything okay?”
She smiled, soft and warm, a rare sight. “I’m fine, relax. Just wanted to borrow your
history book. Lord knows I don’t pay the slightest attention in that class.”
Asa chuckled, then nodded towards his backpack sitting next to his sports one. “You’ll find it in there. It’s the blue notebook.”
Isla zipped open his bag, her hands slipping inside as she searched book after book.
“Hmm,” she said, sounding curious. “What’s this?” And then she pulled out a familiar-looking hardcover spiral book.
Carmen’s art journal.
All humour drained away from Asa’s face.
“Put that back.” It came out sounding like an order, abrupt and firm.
Which was obviously the wrong way to address Isla because she only raised an eyebrow in defiance. “Was that an order?” She smirked. “You’re telling me what to do, Ace?”
Asa pinched the bridge of his nose before staring at her right in the eye. “Isla. Seriously. Put that back. Right now.”
Her eyes only gleamed in response, and her fingers flipped open the book, watching him challengingly. Her eyes dropped down to the journal. “Carmen West,” she read, before looking up at him. “What is this?”
“For god’s sake, put it back!” Asa snapped at her, his heart racing in fear of the tiny possibility of her going through it and his inability to snatch it away from her in case he tore any of the pages.
He may have taken it from Carmen and, he did hate himself for doing it, but he was not going to invade her privacy by actually going through the contents of her journal.
Isla flinched, clearly taken aback at his tone. Something like hurt flickered in her eyes before she masked it with anger.
“Fine, whatever.” She scoffed, throwing the book onto the bleachers. It landed on Asa’s towel. “What the heck do I care, anyway?” She turned around, storming away with her head high and her eyes narrowed into slits.
Asa sighed deeply, wanting to go after her and offer some sort of explanation. Maybe apologise even. But he’d been around Isla long enough to know that she wasn’t the type of person who wanted someone to chase after her when she was mad.
Deciding to just go and take the shower he’d been planning to before he was interrupted, he absentmindedly pulled at his towel. He felt something heavy slide along with it and realised too late that the journal was on top of it, the book falling to the floor with a slight thud and opening to a random page.
He bent down, hand outstretched in front of him, his fingers almost brushing the edge of the pages. Then his eyes caught the wild splash of colours inside and there was no longer looking away.
The page seemed to be separated into two by entirely different settings. The left half of the page was painted in thick strokes of black like the night sky, a bright moon . The moon was drawn with a crack right down its centre as if it was broken and hanging there in the dark sky, ready to fall down any second. No stars were there.
The right half of the page looked like it was supposed to represent the day time. Except it couldn’t be. Because the sun wasn’t yellow—no, it was an icy blue, with white smudges around the edges of the sun as if frost was slowly spreading over its surface. The sky and everything around it was blank, just white. And the flowers at the bottom were wilted, their petals all shrivelled up in their dying state.
But right in the centre of the page was a drawing of a girl. She had no eyes, no nose, and no mouth. Just a body, an empty face and long, endless black hair flowing to the side and blending into the night sky and the other contrasting against the bland white of the daytime.
One girl drawn against two settings, each half of her belonging to a different time. Scribbled in the bottom corner, in silver ink and in thin, cursive writing were the words:
And, like the moon,
she had a side of her
so dark, even the stars
couldn’t shine on it.
She had a side of her
so cold, that even the sun
couldn’t burn on it.
– A quote by Abigail J.
Asa was vaguely aware that his lips were ajar, if the slight dryness in his mouth was any indication.
The drawing was…
It was… It just was.
And it pulled on his heartstrings that he thought they were going to snap painfully.
Swallowing, he quickly reached that extra distance and grabbed the journal, snapping it shut like he never wanted to lay his eyes on it ever again. He felt…guilty. There was a prickling sensation along his arms and neck as if he’d just stumbled across something so profoundly intimate. Something he could never un-see. Something that wasn’t meant for his eyes.
It was more than guilt, whatever this was that was twisting the insides of his stomach into a tight coil. He felt like he’d just dived into a pool with unbelievable depth. A depth he wasn’t prepared for. And if he, Asa, was finding it difficult to swim above it and breathe again, he didn’t even know if he could begin to understand the intensity of the person behind the painting, the person who was actually drowning.
That person being Carmen West.
12.
Queen Bee
Asa walked into school the next day, with Carmen’s art journal tucked into his backpack as usual, and felt like he was carrying boulders on his back instead of books.
When he saw her down the hallway, standing in front of her locker and smiling to herself, he had to turn around and walk the other way.
He felt wrong. He felt like he’d walked in on her stripping off every single piece of clothing. Felt like he walked in on her shedding off her outer skin and flesh. That he’d stolen a glance at something sacred. He didn’t know why he felt that way, but he just did.
Someone bumped into his shoulder as the person walked past him, and he immediately recognised the familiar blonde head of his best friend.
“Isla, come on—”
But she’d already turned into a corridor and was out of earshot.
“What’d you do?” Willa’s voice reached his ears as she stopped in her tracks and stood next to him. “Told her that her eyeliner wasn’t on point?” She snickered.
Asa furrowed his eyebrows, looking at Willa questioningly.
She rolled that pair of amazing hazel eyes. “Oh, come on.” She grinned, and Asa would be an idiot to not acknowledge how goddamn attractive this girl was. “I know the type. Head cheerleader, queen bee of the school, and also an alpha bitch.”
Asa nodded, his fondness for her softening his eyes. Not that Willa seemed to notice. “That’s Isla Martin for you.” He grinned. Because, God, yes, was Isla the queen bee. And an alpha bitch, too. But Asa wouldn’t have her any other way. She put him in his place when he got out of hand and gave him a good piece of her mind when he needed to hear it.
And he knew how much she worked her ass off to maintain her position as head cheerleader and how she poured into every practice session with her squad. In Isla’s eyes, cheerleading was just as prominent a sport as any other, and no one could convince her otherwise. The girl had a true passion for it.
“See? What’d I tell you?” Willa shook her head. “I’ve read enough of chick-lit to know how the whole social hierarchy thing works.”
“I’m still not following,” Asa said.
Willa sighed, glancing at him with an air of long-suffering patience. “The littlest thing about her appearance can set her off. She and then her posse—”
“Posse?” Asa cocked his head to the side.
Willa nodded, seeming utterly sure of herself. “Her little group of minions, you know? The self-deprecating girls that hang on the queen bee’s every word and do whatever she says, following her around like lost puppies? Yeah, them. Tell one of them their eyebrows look out of shape and see them take off running faster than me when Nutella is around.” She shuddered in disgust at the very thought. “So pathetic if you ask me.”
Except I didn’t ask you, Asa wanted to say but held his tongue. Something about the way Willa spoke of those girls rubbed him the wrong way. He didn’t feel okay with it.
Wasn’t she being a little too judgemental? Especially for someone who joined the school only recently?
“Isla takes pride in how she looks,” he said instead. “She likes to always appear at the top of her game.”
“Yeah? What game is that?” Willa scoffed. “How many guys she can score as another notch on her belt?”
Asa didn’t really know what to say to that, because, yes, Willa was right. Isla liked the casual flings, the whole no-strings-attached ordeal. He couldn’t see what the problem was with that.
“It’s her life,” he eventually said, for the first time wanting to get away rather than grasp at the chance to have a conversation with Willa. “And her body too, by the way.”
She didn’t respond to that and just eyed Asa carefully like she was trying to figure something out.
But he was no longer interested in continuing that particular conversation with her and found himself walking away without blinking an eye.
•••
“Asa.”
Asa’s head jerked up at the unexpected voice, his startled eyes landing on grey ones.
No. Wait. Not grey. They were more silvery now that he looked at them properly.
Silvery. Was that even possible? He didn’t know.
“Yeah, Car—?” he paused abruptly before he said her name, feeling weird for some reason, “—men?”
Her forehead crinkled ever so slightly as if trying to understand the subtle break in her name. She must be painting a hundred different theories in her head already.
“I was wondering whether you’d decided on how you want me to help you get the girl,” she said, voice as smooth as her straight black hair. Or was it the darkest shade of indigo?
“Get the girl?” he repeated, like an idiot. Carmen always made him look like an idiot, he realised.