Chapter 2
Con and I pick Scarlett up from her house soon after leaving the Grill. Conner just stares at me as she's walking off her front porch. I sigh "Ugh, fine!" then I get out of the car and get into the back seat.
Scarlett jumps in looking at Conner "Babe, I'm so so so proud of you! You looked so handsome tonight in your cap and gown." she says before kissing his lips.
He winks at her. "Baby, I'll wear it later for you if you'd like." Scarlett giggles, and I just let out a screech.
"EW! Can you two stop! I'm going to throw up!" I smack him in the back of the head, and he lets out a loud laugh as his chin raises in the air.
On the way to the party we pick up my brother's best friend Ross. I've known him since I can remember. He lives down the street from us, and from day one my brother and him were inseparable.
Ross is going to Lone Star community college near Conroe, where we live so he could still live at home. I swear he was more upset when he found out Conner was leaving then Scarlett and I were.
Ross slides in the back seat. "What's up guys?"
I answer. "Thank God you're finally here. I think if I spent another minute alone with these two I would vomit". Everyone laughs at my response.
Scarlett looks back at him "Congratulations Ross!"
"Thanks Scarlett." he smiles at her in return.
"So Ross" I begin to ask "Are you excited that you're finally finished with High School?"
"Ahh, I guess. You know I'm an adult now, and I'm not sure if I'll be good at adulting and all that shit."
Conner peeps up "Ah man, are you kidding? You're going to do fine. Anyway, you still have mommy and daddy right down the road if you ever get scared or lonely." He jokes as Scarlett and I both smack him in the head this time. "Ow!" he yells.
A few minutes later we're pulling up to Zach Elliot's house where he's throwing an end of the year bash because his parents are out of town until next week.
The place is already packed with cars, and some of the guys from the football team are unloading a keg from a truck so Conner and Ross hurry over to help them. While they help them, Scarlett and I make our way into the huge house to find Zoe and Emily.
"Mora! Scarlett! Over here!" I hear Emily. She graduated too. I was bummed. She is leaving for the university of Washington. Even though she isn't my best friend, we're still very close. We have so many common interests like books, and movies. If I ever want my nerd to come out, I always call her.
Zoe is in our grade. She says we're her squad. She's more into the party scene, and is more popular with the guys.
"Hey, come. We saved you a seat!" she screams, and Scarlett and I sit down on a long sectional couch raising our voices so we can hear each other.
"How long have you been here?" Scarlett asks.
"For an hour or so!" Emily yells back.
I can't stand all the screaming going on. "I'm going outside. I can't hear in here!"
They all shout back "What?!" so I give up and just motion as if I'm taking a drink, and walk out back where the majority of the people are at. Scarlett tags right behind me.
"Ahhh much better." she says as she's scanning the yard for my brother. Him, and Ross are already at the beer pong table teamed up against Zach and Travis.
"Yes!" Ross celebrates his winning shot, when suddenly a random guy sneaks up behind him picks him up and throws him in the pool.
As everyone is laughing at him, he pulls himself out of the deep end with his blonde hair now dripping wet, and dark from the water. "What asshole just did that?" He asks in anger, but everyone just keeps laughing at him.
On my 13th birthday Ross got me a big personalized heart shaped cookie from the small bakery in town that read Happy Birthday Mora in cursive, and for a week Conner chanted, and teased me. "Mora and Ross sitting in a tree..." I was so mortified and embarrassed, but for the next year I secretly had the bit of a crush on him. We even talked on the phone a few times, but over time that crush died out. He never came out and said he actually liked me, and I never made anything out of it. We've only been good friends since.
Not hesitating, I grab a towel and bring it to him. "Thanks" he says standing on the edge of the pool shaking out his hair. Once he's dried off, he sits next to me on linked patio chairs. "Want a drink?" he asks.
"No thanks" I lift up my hand and wave my cup around and smile.
"Ahh" he laughs. "So are you going to your moms again for the summer?"
"No, I don't plan on it. I want to spend this last few weeks with Con before he leaves for camp" I pause for a minute "Well I don't want to be stuck with Mom and Ron for two months without him. I've already told mom, and she's fine with it." Ross draws a smile up on his face.
"Cool, so I'll see more of you before school starts?"
"Yep" I respond and we both take a swig of beer.
Later on Scarlett and Conner are playing beer pong against Zoe and some guy she met at a concert last week. I doubt she even knows his full name. Ross, Emily, and I are sitting on the side now with our feet dangling in the pool water, cheering them on.
For a split second I look away from the game, and that's when I catch Aiden Bryant and his girlfriend Sophie sitting on the same side of a distant picnic table. They appear to be having some sort of disagreement because I can see her tearing up, and he is clearly losing his patience with her.
Aiden Bryant is in my grade. He's about six foot tall, and has dark brown hair with light blue eyes. He has a few freckles that sit high off his cheek bones. He's a pitcher for our baseball team.
Last fall he got suspended because of a fight he got in over a girl he kissed who was in a relationship with one of the senior boys.
I never understood why any girl would want to date him. Yes he is very good looking, and mysterious but he just isn't the dating type. He's always with a different girl every time I see him.
I don't get why a girl would want to put herself through all his misery.
While watching them, he suddenly turns his eyes, catching me staring at him. I quickly look away back at the beer pong game mortified that he just caught me peering at them.
When I finally get the nerve to look back over there, they're both gone, so my mind goes back to the beer pong game in front of us.
It's now hours later, and after a few too many beers I'm ready to call it a night. Of course Conner and Scarlett win the game, and now he's moved on to a poker game, as Scarlett is sleeping on one of the patio chairs with a towel draped over her using it as a blanket.
Ross, Zoe, and Emily leave with a couple guys to eat Waffle House.
"Conner, can we please leave now?"
"Just let me finish this game." he pleads with me until I give in.
"Fine, but hurry!." I demand. He just nods, keeping his eyes on his hand.
I decide to walk to the front yard where Conner's car is and wait by the curb. Once I'm sitting down I pull out my phone to get on social media. A few minutes later I hear a voice, and when I look up it's Aiden.
"Is this seat taken?" He points his nose down next to me. His hands in his pockets.
Aiden has only ever talked to me once or twice, and it's always been in class. Outside of class we have two different cliques of friends.
Hesitantly I nod. "Sure."
He sits down pulling out his phone too, and doesn't say anything. Does he want me to talk? He must, because why sit next to me when there are a million other places he could be sitting right now.
"Are you waiting on a ride?" I decide to speak.
"Yea. My friend should have been here twenty minutes ago." he answers before looking over at me. "I guess that's what I get for drinking so much, huh?" he grins a little.
"I totally understand that feeling right now." I return a smile.
"Mora, you're not driving are you?" he asks and hearing my name on his lips gives me a weird sensation that I haven't ever really felt.
"No. Scarlett's only drank two beers tonight. She's driving us home if Conner will ever decide to leave." We both laugh. I've never seen Aiden Bryant laugh.
The curiosity guilts me into my next question. "Is that why your friend is picking you up? Because Sophie is drunk?"
He turns his face, and looks down at his feet with a large sigh "No. I didn't want her taking me home."
"Why?"
He stares back over at me this time in response to my nosy question. "Because I didn't want to."
"I thought you two..." he cuts me off fast, and now I feel awkward.
"We're not together. We haven't ever been together." he speaks slowly. "She wanted something more serious, but I'm not ready for that. I told her that when we started talking. I thought she understood, but I guess she didn't." he complains.
"Oh." I say, and look back down at my phone. I didn't expect him to be so honest.
Suddenly Conner and Scarlett are walking up from behind us, and I lightly jump. "Mora, are you ready?" Conner asks.
"Yea." I respond, and stand up keeping my eyes on my brother and friend instead of the hot guy sitting down next to my feet.
Scarlett just stares at Aiden, until Conner finally speaks up. "What's up man?" Aiden stands up with me rubbing the back of his pants with his hands knocking off the dust.
"Hey. I'm just waiting on Shawn to get back from Waffle House to give me a ride home. I rode with Sophie, and she's already left."
"Jump in, we'll drop you off." Conner offers him.
"Nah man, it's okay. He just texted me and said he's pulling up any minute. But thanks."
"Okay, we'll see ya later then."
Aiden lifts up his hand in a small wave as bright headlights hit all of us at once. "There he is now." Scarlett say's.
Aiden doesn't give me another glance as he starts to walk away and gets into his friend's truck, and shortly after we leave as well.
Conner passed out in the front seat in no time, and Scarlett just looks at me in the rear-view mirror and asks "Why were you sitting with Aiden Bryant?"
"He just came up to me and asked to sit down."
She squints her eyes at me. "That's really random."
"I know. I seriously think he was just waiting on his ride, and saw me there so he didn't want to be rude." I'm sure that's exactly why he wanted to sit there. To not be rude...
All of a sudden Conner is awake saying with confidence, and a little drunkenness behind it too "Be careful with that guy."
I roll my eyes and look at the back of my brother's head. "Guy's I seriously just let him sit next to me while we both waited on rides. I didn't think anything about it, so neither should you."
God, I can't even sit with a guy without them thinking I like him. I didn't even sit with him. He sat with me.