Love Storm (39 page)

I sighed softly to myself as I strolled into Ms. Cooper's room for English, sliding out my notebook.
Other
people had things in life that they were passionate about. I shook my head to myself and got started on the day's work, humming a tuneless song softly until Rebecca poked me in the back to get me to stop.

xxxxx

April 15th
Dear Zack,
Life is still a never-ending stretch of schooldays and work. I'm getting bored – even my teachers have noticed, and I thought teachers weren't supposed to notice that kind of stuff – they've started to offer me extra credit work. Extra credit? Yeah, right. I don't even need it to keep my grade.
You asked for updates on Tristan and Katherine, and since it seemed to amuse you to no end last time, I'll oblige to your request. Morp is coming up – I don't know if you went last year, but it's that spring formal dance we had in the beginning of May; a kind of pre-Prom thing. (Spell Morp backwards, you'll see what I mean – one of those lame leadership class inventions.) Eva and I are trying to come up with a plan to get Tris and Katherine together, but I've re-learned something: Tristan can be quite stubborn when you force him to be. He doesn't want us meddling around in his love life, which, I guess, is sort of understandable if you take into account The Eliza Burns Incident, which he refuses to forgive and forget even though it happened two years ago – more about that later if you want to hear it; it's a long and gruesome story, though Eva and I really put forth so much effort and went through countless pains to ensure our success…but I'm rambling again. Anyway, somehow we will figure out a way to get Tristan and Katherine to go to Morp together. We'll lock them in a closet together or something, if we get desperate.
Have I told you about Eva and Martin? They're
officially
a couple now. It certainly took them long enough. So much unnecessary beating around the bush. I'm glad they're finally together – he's absolutely crazy about her, and I can tell she feels the same way. I'm always getting calls from Eva that consist mainly of her gushing about his wonderful attributes and how good a kisser he is and how sweet and caring and completely
perfect
he is…You can probably see me rolling my eyes right now in good nature. It's cute, anyway. I think they're going to Morp together.
As for little old uninteresting me, I guess nothing's changed that much, if you're wondering. I don't think
I
'm going to Morp; there's really no valid reason for me to go except for some mindless partying. Eva's trying to convince me to let her doll me up and make all the guys see what they've been missing (yeah, right). Hmm…maybe I'll go after all. We'll see. Any thoughts on that? If I go I'll take a picture and send it to you, if you like, so you can see just how much cornier Branner's dances have gotten since you've left.
How's everything with you? Has Leo finally gotten Belinda-Caterina to come 'round and see what a gorgeously handsome and gentlemanly guy he is? That's some hilarious stuff; I loved your stories about how desperate he's getting. Give him some advice from me, will you? Remind him about that old adage, "Absence makes the heart grow fonder." Maybe if he stops trying so hard, she'll finally see what a great guy he is (I'm really pushing it here, seeing as I've never met Leo, but from what you say he sounds like a decent guy).
Are you still taking daily morning runs with Andy? Now he sounds like a person I'd love to meet. Your descriptions of your school campus sound beautiful, and I almost wish I could be there with you in Italy, if only to get one day to tour your campus…and, I guess, I'd get to see you too, huh? :o)
I forgot to ask last time: how was your spring break? Did you stay at school or did you go somewhere? I might have already mentioned it, but my dad
finally
decided to dish out the money to let us go to Hawaii. It was
awesome
. We stayed on the island of Oahu, and I swear to you, I am
not
lying, but there is an ABC store on
every single
block. They're convenience stores. The weather was beautiful, and my mom, our resident amateur photographer, went crazy with the camera. She went through a roll a day, and we were there for seven days – count it up. It's about one hundred eighty something pictures, half of which are landscapes, and the other half are of me, much to my chagrin. She got them developed last week, and even I have to admit that all of them are really great.
Other than all that, nothing new has happened here in Branner City. I guess I could always write more about something else…it will sound completely random, but you've told me you like reading about random little snippets of my life. Unfortunately I don't feel like doing it right now (sorry), but I promise next time I'll tell you some random thing about me or some incident that occurred a while ago.
You always write such long letters, I always feel bad when I send you back a letter that's only a fifth of what you've written to me. Expect a longer one from me next time, for sure. How do you find the time to do all that writing anyway? Your teachers must not be working you hard enough…or you don't like doing the work. Get to it! Eva always says, "Motivation is the key," but she is the most motivated person I have ever met in my whole life, so you might want to reconsider before taking some of her advice – don't turn into a psycho-over-achiever on me, please, I don't think I could stand to have more than one in my life right now. Don't tell her I said that.
Write soon, yeah? Until next time –
--Winter

-Zack-

I smiled a little, folding the letter back up and glancing down at the paper.

"Not another effing letter?"

I turned to face my friend, grinning a little. "But of course."

Leo shook his head, smirking. "Man, that girl must really be something. She's got you wrapped around her little finger like you wouldn't believe." He was lounging on his bed, flipping through some random magazine.

I shrugged, carefully putting the pieces of paper back in their envelope and slipping it into the back of my binder. I would put it away later, away from Leo's prying eyes. I always hid them at the bottom of my suitcase, underneath all the clothes I had packed that I would never wear.

"You like it that way, don't you?" Leo asked absently.

"Huh?" I hadn't been paying attention.

He raised his eyebrows, dark blue eyes gazing at me thoughtfully, and muttered something under his breath that I couldn't make out.

"What was that?" I asked, yawning a little and getting up from my chair to stretch.

"Nothing," Leo murmured quickly, immersed in his magazine.

"No, what'd you say?" I insisted.

"Nothing," he said again.

"Leo."

No response.

"Leo."

Silence.

"Come on Leo. Please?"

He sighed and glanced at me again. "It was nothing," he said emphatically. "Be a nice person and let me finish my mag."

"Whatever you want," I said casually, sitting back down and resting my head in my arms on my desk. "Man I'm tired."

"I'm sure it doesn't help that you get two fucking hours of sleep a night." He scowled at me disapprovingly. This was a topic he liked nagging me about – he was always concerned with my health.

I groaned. "Shut up, Leo."

"You should go see a doctor. I'm not joking. Insomnia's pretty damn serious. I don't want to be taking a jog with you and Andy one day and have you collapse on us and get sent to the hospital."

"I'll be fine," I said, closing my eyes and wondering if he was right. "God I hate this."

"I would too, if I were you. Try the melatonin pills again."

"I already did," I muttered. "Remember? I tried it for a week. It didn't work."

"Go see the resident nurse, at least."

"No," I said firmly, resting my tired eyes. "Put on some music, will you?"

"Sure."

"Thanks."

I heard Leo crossing the room to his computer, where a series of clicking followed, then some of his music filled the room.

"What is this anyway?" I said, burying my head deeper into my arms.

"Yellowcard. 'Rough Draft.'"

"This is
Yellowcard
? This is acoustic stuff, Leo."

"I know. It's their acoustic version of the song."

"You are so random," I mumbled.

"Leo?"

"
Ciò che?
"

I winced at his accent. "
Ciò che
," I repeated for him in the correct pronunciation.

"Shut up, you stupid Italian."

I grinned to myself. I couldn't deny that life was certainly filled with more casual insults than it ever had been. And it was always worth a good laugh to hear Leo butcher the romantic language in his Southern drawl. "Leo?"

"I'll stick with English…What?"

"You never told me where you were from."

"I didn't?"

"No. You've been avoiding the subject ever since I met you."

I could hear him toss his magazine aside. "I'm from Louisiana," he said quietly.

"Where in Louisiana?"

"New Orleans area."

"Go figure."

"My mom," he said (I could hear him turning over onto his stomach), "Comes from a line of rich former-plantation owners. She grew up on a plantation, actually – obviously there are no more slaves, but they still grow sugar cane. It's pretty modernized now, and the old house has been rebuilt to fit our modern needs. I grew up there."

"Okay," I said softly. "Why didn't you tell me this before? I was only curious."

"Everyone likes their privacy now and then, especially when it comes to their past," Leo exhaled. "You, of all people, should know."

I chuckled. He liked teasing me about what a secretive person I was.

"Did you finish your homework for Felisatti? The one where we had to translate the lyrics to that opera song she played for us?"

"Yeah," I replied. "That was a really stupid assignment."

There was a pause. "Can I please –"

"It's in the binder on my bed."

"Thanks."

"You really should try harder, you know. Italian's really not all that hard."

"I'll try harder…starting tomorrow."

I laughed. "It's always tomorrow with you."

We were quiet after that, listening to Leo's mix of music coming from his computer speakers. My mind wandered back to the letter from Winter. I imagined the pictures of her in Hawaii, and smiled to myself. I had to remember to ask her to send over one of those.

Hmm, and she had written about Morp. Selfish as it was, I wished she wouldn't go. I didn't want anyone to ask her to the dance. In fact, I hoped no one would ask her to dance, period, because she was bound to look gorgeous, as always. And I didn't want anyone else seeing her like that. Oh, man. What the hell was I going to do? Could I convince her to not go to the dance just through a letter? Hmm…

"What dance?"

"Huh?" I said, picking up my head and glancing at Leo, who was copying my homework while sitting on his bed.

"What dance? You said something about a dance."

I paused. I hadn't realized I had been talking aloud to myself. Hmm. Bad habit that I needed to learn to kill. It happened usually when I was tired. I took a quick peek at the clock. 11:28pm. "It was nothing," I said, getting up and stripping off my shirt. "I was just thinking about a dance that Winter was writing to me about." I pulled off my belt, letting my jeans slide to my ankles, then kicked them aside and pulled off my socks.

"Is she going?" Leo asked curiously as I headed into the bathroom. "What the hell is this? '
Non c'è più tempo per guardare una stella sopra noi
'?" He had to speak louder to get me to hear over the music.

I turned on the faucet and started to brush my teeth. "I don't know," I called back to him through a mouthful of toothpaste bubbles. "I hope not. Leo, it's a song. It's supposed to be poetical. Just try it, for once. What's '
Non c'è più tempo'
?"

"Why don't you want her to go? It means…something like…there isn't any more time. Hey, didn't you already brush your teeth tonight?"

"Oh, crap, you're right, what am I doing?" I realized, spitting out my mouthful. "Yeah, your translation's right. And then what comes next?" I rinsed out my mouth and toothbrush, shook it out, and put it back in the cup on our sink.

"And then…to look at a star above us? That doesn't make sense."

I re-entered our bedroom/living-area space and flopped onto my bed. "They're just lyrics. 'There is no time left to look at a star above us.' Look through the rest of the lyrics, then it'll make sense."

There was silence for a while as Leo jotted down the line. He asked, not looking up from his work, "Why don't you want her to go? You never answered me."

I sighed and turned my head into my pillow, preparing for another restless, sleepless night. "Everyone likes their privacy once in a while."