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Kevin took my hand and bolted through the cafeteria, taking me with him. I looked back to see Ashton at his usual level of anger now. Melissa and Callie sat with their mouths agape.

He didn’t stop running until we were around the corridor and I didn’t have much of a choice but to follow.

After he finally decided to stop, he turned around with an excited grin on his face. I was panting at this point. This kind of exercise was not for me.

“Kevin!” I yelled when I managed to catch my breath. “I think you just made it worse. Did that book I hit you with remove all your rationality? You’re going to make Ashton mad at you again."

“Ashton was in a decent mood, so I decided to push his buttons a little,” Kevin laughed as I shook my head in disbelief. He grinned at me and then grimaced. “He’s yelling at me right now. He’s gonna kill me later.”

“How can you be so calm?” I asked incredulously. “And how can you even hear him from this far away?”

“I’ll tell you later, but for now, let’s just get to class.”

“I have English and Literature with Callie and Ashton,” I realized in horror.

“I have that with Mel now too. May the force be with you!” he called as he walked off to class.

Great, this was going to be a long hour.

Callie walked into class slowly, like a lioness hunting her prey. I buried my head even further into my copy of Romeo and Juliet. Ashton came in a bit later with his jaw clenched. I could feel his gaze on me. Way to go, Kevin.

Callie dropped her bag on the desk dramatically and slid into the chair beside me.

“What’s up, Elizabeth?” she asked as nonchalantly as she could while using my full first name.

“Haha, I’m doing good Cals,” I smiled at her nervously.

She turned to face me with a serious expression, but as we made eye contact, we both burst out laughing.

“Okay, I was trying to be serious, but that failed,” Callie laughed as the teacher came in. “But don’t think I’m going to drop the subject.”

We turned to the page where we had left off last class. We were at the part where Romeo had just met Juliet at the party, completely forgetting about his ‘love’ Rosaline. I guess it wasn’t love but just infatuation.

How could you get over someone you loved so quickly?

“Okay, class,” the teacher said after we finished reading the scene. “In groups of three, please spend your remaining time answering these essay questions.”

She erased the already clean board, then began writing the questions. The entire class groaned.

I looked over to my left to see that the person we usually worked with was not at school.

“We can do this together as a pair then,” Callie suggested and I nodded.

Somehow our teacher’s ultra hearing picked that up.

“No, no ladies. There should be an even amount to form groups of threes,” she announced.

I explained to her that our group member was missing. She fixed her glasses on the bridge of her nose and frowned before her sharp eyes caught someone at the back of the class.

“Mr. Rivera, you seem to be having a jolly time laughing down there. Very well then, join these young ladies up here.”

Me and Callie looked at each other in shock. Out of everybody in the class it just had to be him. I rolled my eyes.

Nicole spoke up. “He’s already in a group of three, so no thanks.”

“And I already gave instructions, thank you very much,” the teacher spat back. “Callie and Elizabeth are good English students, so you shouldn’t have any complaints.” She waited for him to protest.

“None here,” Ashton said, looking at me.

Nicole scoffed and narrowed her eyes at me as if it was my fault. Ashton just looked unbothered and idly made his way to where we were.

He sat in the empty chair beside me and I felt like this was karma for running away with Kevin like that.

Callie was beginning to drift into the Ashton daze and I had to tap her with my pen to break the spell that was Ashton.

We discussed the scene, and jotted down all the important points before starting to answer the first question. Well, it really was me and Callie discussing and Ashton contributing a point or two and a couple yawns.

“This book is so romantic,” Callie cooed.

“Hardly, it seems very illogical to me,” I sighed.

“Love is illogical,” she contemplated.

“That depends on how you look at it,” I mused and she shrugged.

“Hey, we didn’t finish our conversation earlier,” she said while answering the questions.

“What conversation?” I asked innocently.

“Don’t think I forgot,” she laughed. “Where were you today at lunch?”

“As opposed to yesterday at lunch?”

“Elizabeth!” she whisper-shouted.

“Okay, okay. I was with Kevin. I met up with him after his class.”

“Oh?” Callie questioned. “Did you find out why he was being such a colossal blockhead?”

“Not the term I’d use, but something along those lines. We had a really nice talk.”

I smiled to myself remembering the fun we had in the computer lab.

A smirk grew on Callie’s lips and she nudged me playfully with her elbow. “Hmm… you two seemed pretty suspicious running from the cafeteria like that, and your face was all red too.”

Well, that’s because I was flustered because I didn’t know how to even begin explaining to you guys what we talked about, I said in my head

“Hahaha,” I laughed nervously.

Callie nudged me again. “Liz, are you and Kevin secretly dating?”

“What?!” Me and Ashton shouted at her at the same time.

We looked over at Ashton, who blinked and cleared his throat.

“…What did you put for the second question?” he asked drily.

I slid my paper over to him so that he could see. His dark eyes never left mine as he took up the sheet of paper with so much force I swear it would have torn.

He was staring intently at the paper, but I doubt he was even reading anything.

Whatever, I thought to myself and turned back around to face Callie.

“Callie, you need to stop watching so many romance movies. That’s all you think about,” I laughed.

“But it’s really romantic isn’t it? Two best friends realizing that they are actually deeply in love with each other. That’s where you and Kevin come in,” she said happily.

A loud rip caused me to whirl around and face Ashton in horror. My paper was lying on the desk in two uneven pieces.

A shaky gasp escaped my throat. He didn’t even look at me. His gaze was directed at the ground and a muscle clenched in his jaw.

“Oops,” Callie giggled obliviously. “I have tape.”

She rummaged in her pencil case, while I stared at Ashton in shock. Not even an apology?

He finally looked over to me and tried to put on a neutral facial expression.

“My hand slipped.”

“Yeah, sure,” I answered disbelievingly as I gently picked up the pieces of paper and handed them to Callie.

In no time she put them together perfectly with a very thin piece of tape.

I glanced at Ashton’s hand. “You didn’t get a paper cut did you?”

He scoffed at me and rolled his eyes. Rude much? This was why we couldn’t get along. After that I did my best to ignore him.

Callie and I finished up the work quickly, while Ashton sulked in a dark mood beside me. It was beginning to feel suffocating and I was relieved when the bell rang. He was through the door in an instant.

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