43: Quinn

I can't help but glance over at Riley, I've done it so many times already. She's beautiful, absolutely stunning.

"Is there something on my face?" She asks and I widen my eyes in fear. Fuck, I've been caught.

"Oh no, your face is spotless," I respond, making her laugh.

"Okay, then I'll be back. I need to grab a textbook," she says getting up walking over to the bookshelves.

Damn, I need to be more inconspicuous. I do not want to get caught admiring Riley again, I'll probably come up with a worse answer.

A few seconds pass when Riley comes jogging back over to me, "um, I'm too short to get the book. It's on the top shelf."

I smirk and reply with, "So, you need your knight in shining armor to help you?"

Riley rolls her eyes and grabs my hand. She drags me over to the bookshelf and points up. I see what she is looking for, but instead of helping her I decide to tease her a bit. I know that it's blowing my friend cover, but I can't help it. I really like Riley.

"What are you going to give me if I help you?" I ask.

Riley looks at me in disbelief, but after seeing that I'm serious she sighs and goes along with my silliness. "A banana that I have for lunch."

"Ew, that's not what I'm into, you should know this," I tease and Riley starts to blush.

"I didn't mean dick!" She blurts out and people around us look up to stare. Riley tries to hide her face in my shoulder and I can't help but start laughing.

"Stop, you're making it worse," she begs as she tugs on my shirt.

"Hey, you're the one who yelled dick out loud. That's on you, it's payback for trying to feed my a banana."

"I didn't mean too, ughh," she responds looking down in embarrassment. I chuckle softly and can't help but put my finger under her chin so I can lift her face so that she is looking at me.

I drop my hand and stare at her. I'm enchanted by her beauty and I can't stop but raise my hand again so that I can brush a strand of hair behind her ear. Riley shivers at the close contact I make with her skin and her cheeks start to turn red.

"What's wrong, Riley?" I ask teasingly.

"Nothing," she says back fast, but she refuses to look me in the eyes. She looks past me at the textbook.

I sigh and turn to grab the book so that I can give it to her. She thanks me and turns to leave, but she walks right into the bookshelf. She hits it so hard that there is a loud bang and she bounces back.

Riley automatically raises her hand to cover her face. She bends over in pain and I jog over to her.

"Oh my god, Riley. Are you okay?" I ask as I wrap my arms around her.

She croaks out a no and I glance up to see the librarian walking towards us. "Why are you two making so much noise?"

"She hit the shelf really hard," I answer for Riley who is still covering her face.

"Ouch, let me see," the librarian says and Riley drops her hands. Her face nose and cheek is red from the hit. Depending on how hard she hit the shelf, she might or might not get a bruise.

"You should go to the nurses office. I'll write you a note so you don't get in trouble for missing some class," the librarian says.

"Can I go with her?" I ask.

"Yeah sure, why not," the librarian responds as she writes on a post it note. I walk Riley back to the table where we were doing homework to grab our stuff.

"Does it hurt a lot?" I ask her.

"Yeah," she whispers as she grabs her bag and fast walks out of the library. I follow close behind her and grab her hand to make her stop.

"What's wrong?" I ask. She's trying to look down and when I pay more attention I notice that she has a sad look.

"What's wrong?" I repeat.

"I always make a fool of myself. No matter what I do nothing ends up working out," she whispers.

"Oh, Riley. Come here," I say as I pull her in for a hug. "It's okay, no one is perfect. Everyone has clumsy moments, it's normal. And I don't believe that nothing works out, so far everything has been good. Mason and you are still good, you made a new friend and you still have me. Things don't look so bad, do they?"

Riley gives me a small smile and I boop her nose. She gasps in pain and I face palm. "I'm so sorry, I forgot...and you thought you were the fool."

Riley starts laughing and I know my work is done. I may have accidentally hurt her now, but I also made me smile and that's the most important thing in the world to me.

"Come on, let's go get you an ice pack," I add as I wrap one arm around her and pull her in the direction of the nurse's office.

Suddenly Riley does something that shocks me to my core and automatically gives me goosebumps. She puts her arm around my waist and holds on. I pretend like everything is okay, but I'm actually hyperventilating inside.

Within a few minutes we make it to the nurse's office. They greet us and make us sit down to wait since someone else is already with the nurse. Riley sits down next to me and out of nowhere she leans her head on my shoulder to rest.

I try to stay absolutely still and act like I'm normal, but I'm freaking out. Riley is on a role now with making me feel crazy. The butterflies are going insane in my stomach and my heart is beating so fast, I'm scared that Riley will feel this and make a comment.

However, the bell rings which takes me out of my thoughts. "Oh no, maybe we should go, it's not worth it to be late to class," Riley says.

I stop her and hold her down in the chair next to me. "Riley, calm down. The teachers will understand, don't worry. You need an ice pack so you don't bruise, okay."

Riley sighs and agrees, but adds, "I'll stay, but you should go. I don't want you to get in trouble."

"I'm not going anywhere, Riley. You're more important to me," I blurt out and Riley's eyes go wide and she immediately looks down.

"I shouldn't be more important than your education," she whispers.

"Well too bad, you're just going to have to deal with that, Riley. I'm not going anywhere, now or ever. I'm sticking by your side through anything," I add.

Riley finally looks up at me and she has the cutest surprised facial expression. "You really mean that?"

"Of course I do," I reply. She smiles and I do too. There's no way I couldn't smile with Riley around.

Without thinking I reach over to grab her hand. At first Riley is shocked, but she relaxes into my touch. I can see her small smile as she stares at her hands, but she tries to shake it off and says, "You're an amazing friend."

I smirk and reply with, "You too. We make good just friends."

"Yeah, we do," she replies as we continue to stare at each other. I notice that Riley's gaze drops and she looks at lips. She catches herself and looks back up to eyes, but the action just makes me want to pull her in for a kiss.

My heart is beating like crazy and my breathing is erratic. I look at her lips and I can't help but lean a little closer to her.

"Okay, who's next?" Asks the nurse as she lets a student out of her office with bandages on his arm.

Riley and I both sit back in our chair and try to forgot what just happened. Riley is speechless at first, but then speaks up, "ah, me."

"Okay, come on in," the nurse says.

Riley and I get up and head inside the office. "What are you here for?" She asks looking at me.

"Oh, uh nothing, I just came with her," I reply.

"Then you should wait outside," the nurse responds.

"Can she please stay, I just feel better when she is around," Riley adds.

The nurse sighs, but complies. She directs me to sit in the chair as she checks on Riley.

I try to sit still in the chair as I try to calm down my heart which went crazy after hearing what Riley just said.

The nurse touches Riley's face and abruptly pulls back her hand. "You're burning up, kid. You might have a fever."

"Oh, no. I don't have a fever at all, actually," Riley tries to explain.

"I need to check your temperature now, the nurse says as she looks for a thermometer.

"No, I'm not sick. I just heat up when I'm nervous that's all!"

"You're sweating so much and you have flushed cheeks, you've got to have some kind of sickness," replies the nurse.

"No, I promise I'm not sick!"

"I'm not taking chances!" Says the nurse.

What in the world is happening right now. I want to laugh, but I'm also very interested in why Riley is so nervous. Is it because of me? Did she also feel all that tension earlier? Is this reactions because of me leaning closer to her?

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Author note: if you got a notification earlier today about the update, and couldn't load it that's because I unpublished it. You see when you try to save, the save option is next to the publish option. I accidentally pressed the publish button when I wasn't done yet. Sorry.

Also, I made a new youtube video about a creepy ghost encounter I had.

If you want to see it, the link is below. Please subscribe to my channel, or would mean the world to me.