The Understorey, Book One of The Leaving Series (8 page)

Chapter
Three
Restraint, You Are A New Enemy
Of Mine

That Monday, I drove to school kind of early
but not so early that there wouldn’t be kids in the lots. I stepped
from my truck and slammed its door. The slam rang through the air
and I caught the attention of Jake Sotheby.

“Jake! Hey Jake!”

“Hey, Elliott. What’s up? You ready for
Friday’s game?”

That was all anybody thought I was good for
and all they ever wanted to talk to me about. I was popular but for
a singular purpose.
    “Yeah, I’m ready. Hey, do you know Julia
Jacobs?”
    “Yeah, dude. Everybody knows Julia. She’s hot
but really weird. Why?”
Hot but weird. Maybe I would be throwing the first punch.
    “Oh, nothin’. Does she park in our lot?”
I knew she was in the other lot but I asked a general question to
fish for something more specific.
    “No dude. She’s in Lot A. She has the spot
across from Casey Wuthers.” He smiled. “Why? You thinkin’ about
tackling that?”
    “What the hell does that mean?” I asked
seriously.
    “Nothing. See you at practice.”
He knew I wasn’t going to play along.
No wonder Jesse likes that
guy so much. They share a one track mind. Jerk.

So, plan A was finding Jesse because he
parked in the same lot and plan B was ‘running’ into Casey Wuthers,
a girl I barely knew but was cool enough with that I could still
approach her without it being weird. Honestly, all I wanted was a
glimpse of Jules. One more glimpse to add to the millions I had
already stolen but this time I needed to see her so it would give
me the courage to do what I needed to later that day. The first
time I would see her each day would send me hurdling into an
anxiety attack. I figured if I saw her early enough, I could be as
relaxed as possible by the time we had class together. I had about
a million things I wanted to say to her, whether she would respond
or not didn’t matter. I needed them off my chest, for my sanity’s
sake.

The ironic part is I knew she searched for me
too. That’s what killed me the most. It confused the heck out of
me. I often caught her eyes on mine like they were that day in
Chemistry but she would always make herself appear distracted
immediately after. She cracked me up. I was never in control enough
to do anything like that. I think she got a small kick out of
torturing me but that was okay. Her pretend frostiness was just
another thing I liked about her. She was feisty.

I cut through the school toward Jules’ lot.
Her car was there. I searched around but Jesse was running late, as
usual, and Casey Wuthers’ car was there but she wasn’t.
Well,
crud.
While searching for someone else, anyone that I may have
even had the slightest acquaintance with, I caught Jules walking
through the parking lot toward me and for reasons beyond my control
I found my feet carrying me forward. I was close enough that words
came out of their own accord, providing me with an involuntary plan
C.

“Jules?” I confidently asked, seconds from
collapsing.

She didn’t respond.
    “Julia?” I nearly shouted.

She walked right past me and I, against my
better judgment, followed suit. Before I could reach her she was
already through the doors. I picked up my pace, tossed open the
school’s double doors and raced into the hall. When the doors
opened, the air spilling in from the outside tossed her hair about
her face and carried that honeysuckle-orange scent rolling towards
me. I recovered from the fragrant punch and when I caught up with
her dug my hands into my pockets to keep from seizing her in my
arms. The last thing I wanted was an electric shock to spook her
away from me again. I wound my way around the other students in the
crowded hall, leaned over her shoulder and spoke closely into her
ear.

    “Jules, can I talk to
you?”

Goosebumps rose on the flesh of her neck. I
had gotten her attention. Though she didn’t confirm it with that
pouty bottom lip, I had definitely caught her attention. She
stopped at her locker and began to spin its dial.
Alright, two
can play at this game.

    “Jules,” I sighed,
casually leaning my shoulder against the locker next to hers. I
kept my hands in my pockets for safekeeping. “Seeing that you won’t
talk to me, I guess I’ll talk to you. I want to know what we’re
going to do about what happened in the hall outside Mrs. Kitt’s
class, and inside her class,
and
every time we’ve seen each
other since? I’m dying here.” I pulled my hands from my pockets and
ran them through my hair but put them back, just in case. “I can’t
eat. I can’t sleep. I dream about you all day. Against my will,
you’ve
polluted
my
thoughts
.”
She turned, wide eyed, angry and mouth agape. Just the effect I
wanted.
    “I never said I didn’t like it,” I amended with
a smile.
She turned back to her locker.
    “I know you’re feeling the same things,” I
continued.
She rolled her eyes.
    “I can tell I affect you Jules. You can’t hide
it.”
    “You do not,” she finally spoke.
And her voice was like velvet. I almost melted into a puddle onto
the floor.
    “I
know
I do. You’ve restarted the
combination to your locker seven times Jules.”
Her fingers dropped from the dial, she raised her head and stared
straight ahead.
    “I just remembered. I don’t need anything from
my locker,” she said stoically.
She turned and walked off, her hair brushing my arm as she stalked
away. Even her hair bit with the literal electricity we
shared.
    “See you second period!” I yelled, very
satisfied at the seemingly meaningless conversation. I knew the
truth though. There were deeper meanings behind everything she did,
the little she had said, and the way her body avoided mine, avoided
the touch that she was obviously denying existed. She
was
scared. Can’t tell you how I knew it, she didn’t wear the emotion
at all but she was scared and I had plans to change that. Jules was
beginning to infect my brain and the only antidote I could think to
alleviate the pain was more Jules. I went to first period alone
with my own thoughts and a smile that caught the attention of every
girl I walked by.
    Walking to Mrs. Kitt’s class felt like the
longest trip of my life. My legs felt heavy with anticipation
knowing the fight that Jules was probably going to put up, but I
was ready.
Metaphorical punches, mom. Metaphorical.
I had no
clue what I was going to say to her. I could think of no plan of
action during first period and ultimately decided to go with my
gut. I hesitated slightly because unplanned conversations with
Jules had proved disastrous before, i.e. the teeth debacle, but
winging it at her locker didn’t turn out so badly so I went with my
instinct.

I had a good feeling she’d bring up the
bookstore and I had at least planned on being honest there. I
didn’t care if she believed me or not. Either way, I wasn’t going
to let her make me feel like I purposely did it and that was
that.

I stood outside the door to Mrs. Kitt’s class
and took a deep breath before swinging it open. I choked and
coughed on the deep breath I took when I saw her face and the whole
class lifted their head noticing me briefly, except for Jules.
Smooth, very smooth.
She glanced from the corner of her eye
and the nerves that tingled in her stomach tingled in mine.

Thanks to the supernatural phenomenon that
was our electricity, I was privy to everything Jules felt. If the
feeling was powerful enough, I could feel it without even touching
her which explained the butterflies we shared in that moment. It
was an understood knowledge that welled inside my chest and I was
never so grateful for anything before in my life. It told me what I
wanted to know.

I sat next to her and began to lean in but
before I could say anything, Mrs. Kitt had started passing out our
seriously delayed textbooks, something about the printers making a
mistake, and the donated paper covers from Justin Weber’s Auto Body
Shop and asked us to wrap them.

They were so stupid looking. On the front was
obviously an older picture of Justin Weber because he was easily
twenty pounds lighter in the picture than he was in real life. He
was standing in front of his auto body shop and there was a rented
sports car between himself and his garage. On the hood laid Kitty,
in a fitted jumpsuit with Justin’s logo on the front. Kitty was
Justin’s ex-girlfriend from Charleston who left him for a ‘big
city’ man but he just wouldn’t let her go. “She’ll be back,” he’d
 always say. Poor guy, total denial. On the top in big letters
it read, ‘Come to Justin’s. We’ll treat you right.’

Jules had already begun to wrap her book. Her
thin fingers carefully measured the folds and creased them
attentively. She pressed the side of her thumb’s knuckle across the
crease to make sure it took. She did this for all four sides of the
cover but on the fourth crease accidentally gave herself a paper
cut. The shared pain was sharp and intense and made me jump when
she did. The throb subsided when she brought her knuckle to her
tongue to soothe the ache. She looked over at me briefly, knowing
full well I felt the slice.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Yes, thank you,” she said, breathing heavily
from the realization rather than the laceration.

She turned back to her task. Jules was the
only one who wrapped her book inside out so the paper would be
blank and she could draw on it later. When she was done, I threw a
dorky smile her way, and copied her, but for a very different
reason. I took out my pen and wrote on the top of the cover in very
small letters, bracing myself for the long fight it was going to
take to erase whatever idea she had of who I was and what I wanted
her to be to me.

Hi.
What do you want Elliott?
Can we talk?
About what?
You know
what.
About your following me to Koan’s?
I
DID NOT follow you to
Koan’s.
Right.
Exactly. I am right. It was
a coincidence. Boy, you
must think the world revolves around
you.
I do not! Don’t try to make me appear as if I’m
imagining things.
I’ve noticed you watching
me.
How would you even know that Jules? If you
weren’t watching me as well?
It’s Julia, Elliott.
Class is about to start. I don’t have time for your
games.
She turned to her own notebook. I wrote and
shoved the cover into her face.
Are we ever going to talk about what happened the
first
day of school?
She hesitated, but at last answered
me.
I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Jules.
My name is Julia, not Jules, Elliott. How
many times do I have to
tell you?
I know that
but I like Jules. I’ve noticed I’m the
only one who calls
you that. It makes me a part of
you that only we
share.
She wasn’t expecting that answer and I could see
when her eyes widened then quickly narrowed that she wasn’t exactly
adverse to the idea. Whew.
What’s your motivation?
I have to have a motivation
to talk to you?
Boys like you
always
have a motivation.
Boys like me,
huh? You’ve never struck me as the
type who read into
stereotypes Jules. I didn’t know
you were such a
snob.
I’m the snob? Spare me.
What about
the first day of school, huh? Did I act
like a snob then? It
seems to me that you’re the
one who’s the snob. You’ve
avoided me like the
plague. You see me coming and you run
the other
direction. I’ve gotten the cold shoulder from you
for
the past three weeks.

She reached out her hand to yank the pen from
mine in retaliation. Her finger grazed mine and the contact struck
a sparkled heat between us. We pulled away as if they were hands
held to a stove. Everyone around us were completely unaware of the
netted lightning bolt that stuck us stiff to our seats and quieted
us from its silently deafening effects. With trembling hands I
wrote,

There’s no denying that baby
girl.
You’re right. I cannot deny that, even if I
wanted to.
I looked at her, confused.
Do you?
What?
Want to deny
it?
Kind of.
You’re literally breaking my
heart Jules. Am I really
that bad?
It’s not
that. It’s just, I don’t trust you.
Why?
How do I know you’re the same Elliott Gray who would play
with
me on the rock bridge as kids? You seemed to have
changed
when we entered eighth grade. It seemed as if
overnight we just
stopped being friends.
Maybe I
was the snob.
Oh, Jules. I’m sorry, really. I was an idiot and
afraid
of girls. Honestly, it seemed like you wanted
nothing to do
with me so I stopped talking to you.
I wasn’t some girl
Elliott. I was your friend. It was all so awkward
that first
day and I didn’t know what I had done. Only one day
had
passed since last we saw one another, but you ignored me
as
if we hardly knew each other at all. I admit, I did act as if I
wanted nothing to do with you, but I was only doing that to
protect myself from the way you were acting. I’m sorry too.
I
should have just come out and asked you.
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
Again, I’m sorry. But, I have to admit, I’m kind of
glad
we ignored each other.  
That was mean.
Ask me why Jules.
Okay, why?
Because, if
we hadn’t grown apart maybe we never
would have found our
‘thing’ and I kind of like our
‘thing’. Growing apart meant
that we became the
people we are today and you seem to be
an
amazing someone, whom I may have never noticed
had
we not grown up without each other. Our ‘thing’
may have
gotten lost in the friendship.  This brings
me to my
next question. What’s happening to us?
I don’t know.
Your guess is as good as mine.
She swallowed hard. She
knew what was happening.
I know what happened to us.
Then why’d you
ask?
I just wanted to confirm that you knew too, so
I
don’t look like a fool again. I do an incredible job
of looking foolish in front of you without even
realizing
it until it’s too late.
She put the back of her index
finger up to her mouth and quietly laughed at me. She was laughing.
Progress. All it took was an incredibly frightening ‘thing’.
What’s so funny?
You. You’re
funny.
Why?
Because even with our ‘thing’,
our powerful, powerful ‘thing’, your
ego is afraid of
rejection Elliott Gray. This town still has a slight
hold on
you, I think.
You’ve got me pegged pretty well
Jacobs.
I know.
What should we do about it
then?
Talk after class?
And why not now? As
far as I’m concerned, we’ve
just gotten started. You’ve
somethin’ better to do?