𝓜𝓲𝓼𝓽𝔂 𝓢𝓸𝓾𝓵𝓼

39 | love, what a confusing feeling

The next morning Derek's voice woke me up, but I soon understood he wasn't talking to me.

"Yes, yeah I know she's here. She's sick and won't be able to come back until Monday."

Slowly opening my eyes, I realized I had slept on the couch.
With a rapid movement I took my phone, seeing that it was already 10am. But a few notifications caught my attention.
Isabelle had tried to call me, and had left a message on my voice mail.
There was also some texts from Emily.

After unlocking my phone who really needed to be charged, I immediately replied to Emily's concerned ones. Saying that I was fine, at home, sick. What a lie.
But it took me more time to push myself to listen to Isabelle's one.

With a sigh, I verified that Derek was still occupied, and brought the phone to my ear, as I was still laying on my side like a little child.

« Amanda, that's me, where the hell did you go? You can't just fucking disappear like that and think nobody would remark you're gone! Just... call me back when you get this. »
She literally shouted in my ear, taking me by surprise.

Just when I was putting my phone down, not able to delete this message, Derek turned back towards me, wearing this eternal concerned expression.

"The principal called me."

I nodded slightly, suddenly looking down to my hands. "I heard. Thanks for lying."

With a quick nod, he sat at the end of the couch, falling into a small silence for a few seconds.
"Your teacher also called me this morning, around eight I think."

Oh, right after she called me.

"How did she even get your number?" I uncontrollably snapped at him, feeling all my emotions coming back again in waves.

"She must have searched it in your file before the trip, that's when she first contacted me, remember ?"

My eyes immediately closed. Just talking about her was making my heart bleed. I wasn't even kidding, I was already at the verge of crying again.

"... Will you tell me what's wrong?" Derek lowly whispered, regularly tapping my leg in a way that wanted to be reassuring.

I remained quiet, burying my whole face in the blankets as tears were dangerously threatening to escape my eyes.

"Is it... about that person you once told me about?"
Oh right, I forgot I told him about a secret person right after our little meeting at the café. Clever, Amanda.

I wanted to force him to leave me alone, but the truth was I badly needed someone to talk to. It could have been Emily, but right now the only « father figure » I had was the person I really wanted to turn to.

So, I went out of my hiding-place, and did my best to look at him through the half-transparent curtain covering my eyes.

I just gave him a nod, and he understood.

"What happened?"

Well there was definitely many things that I couldn't say to him, but I still found things I could share without betraying her identity.

"A lot." I lightly giggled, while taking a sitting position next to him.
"First... that's a she."

That was a fucking big revelation for today maybe I should go now.
But his reaction was unexpectedly very cool.

"Well I figured it out, there are only girls at your school." he playfully rolled his eyes, forcing me to smile.

"Right. Well... she... has always been there for me... she tried to help me a lot. But like, she keeps coming to me, making me open to her, and then she closes her walls, ignoring me for days. She did it quite a lot already and... last night we just had an « argument » I think we could say.. and she admitted being jealous of seeing me with a friend of mine, and now I'm just confused to what her intentions are, like... I'm really lost. And there are... words you can't just drop like that. Nevertheless she did, again and again until she said she had.."