Day 18

I bite the top of my pen as I recall the recent days, trying to pinpoint missing details from this trip.

When Arianna and I went shopping together back in Zurich, I came across this exquisite notebook, and in that instance, I just knew I want to have it as my travel journal.

I can't believe I'm writing a travel journal!

I sit straighter on the bed, checking off the places we visited in Geneva, Zurich, and Ardennes so far in my head. The moment we got to Brussels, we headed to the Atomium. It gave the similar impression I had in CERN; I felt alive.

I go through the tiny details in my journal and after being satisfied with the sum of information I've written in it; I put it away and pull up my laptop.

Going through the plan Adrien and I made in Geneva, according to it, tomorrow night we'll head to Gravesteen and two days after that we'll travel to Bruges, being our last city in Belgium.

Lost in rereading the plan, my cellphone blinks on, its light catching my attention from the corner of my eye. I lean over and pick it up from the nightstand and read the text sent from Arianna.

'Come to my room.'

I stare at it for a minute before abandoning my stuff on the rumpled mattress and push myself to my feet.

With phone in one pocket and key card in the other, I walk out of my room and make way to Arianna's hotel room. I stand facing the door with a vacant expression and mind, not knowing what to do.

My heartbeat rising as I try to gather up my courage to knock.

It's preposterous. This simple action driving me anxious up to this point. She asked me to come here! It makes no sense, why must I freak out.

Plus, she's been super nice with me in the past days.

With a sharp intake of breath, I rap my knuckles on the wooden surface.

I chew my bottom lip as I wait. Maybe she wanted to send it to someone else?

My legs take me a step backward, as I contemplate fleeing back to my room. That's when the door flies open and Arianna stands there looking surprised with one eye having eyeliner and the other not.

She twirls the pencil in her hand, "Girl, you seriously need to knock louder than that. We thought Adrien is hearing sounds and going crazy," she remarks and a smile breaks through her face as she steps aside and I trudge inside.

With hesitance, I nod. The first thing I locate as I get into the room, is Adrien sitting behind a desk with his laptop in front of him and his black-rimmed glasses on the brim of his nose.

I thought he didn't use glasses any more. Guess I was wrong.

He offers a loop sided smile which I return with a small one. Stepping further into Arianna's room, I see Dylan sprawled on a sofa, with his red and white electric guitar.

The moment his chocolate-brown eyes land on me, he straightens himself, making space for me.

It'd be awkward if I sit anywhere else now.

Dylan has been behaving in a strange way. Everyone's been acting weird. Arianna is to my utmost surprise kind to me, Dylan is busy in tireless attempts of coming up with topics to keep on talking with me. And Adrien... well, he's back to being the high school Adrien. Not to the extent of bullying, but being moody and snapping at everybody for everything.

I seat myself next to Dylan, and push my hands between my lower thigh to prevent them from fidgeting. My shoulders hunch on their own accord as I avoid everyone's gaze.

"Hope you weren't busy doing anything major, I figured the three of us are here, so you should be too," Arianna explains as she steps in front of the full-length mirror. I look up and meet her eyes through the mirror, "Plus, I thought why should we be the only one's putting up with Adi's narcissistic whims," Arianna adds with a sweet smile.

Eyes widening, in an incredulous tone Adrien repeats, "Narcissistic whims?"

Dylan bursts into laughter.

Arianna spins around, facing him, setting her free hand on her hip. "What? You're the one who's been nagging our heads off," she retorts.

"Because you're treating me as if I'm your assistant!" he fires back.

I bite my bottom lip to stop myself from giggling.

"Aw, don't say that my little cousin brother," she says with fake sweetness and a mischievous grin playing on her lips. "We have our own responsibilities. Ellie is the planner, I'm the one who records everything and Dylan over there has the audio part. The only slot remaining is editing, and the only person with no responsibilities is you. Easy math," she shrugs and turns to the mirror.

Adrien glares at her for an entire minute before giving up, pushing his glasses up his nose and getting back to work. Which by the looks of it, is watching tutorials of editing videos.

Arianna connects her phone to a tiny speaker, and Bad guy from Billie Eilish plays.

I notice Adrien rolling his eyes, before Dylan scoots closer to me, still his guitar in his lap, his knee touching mine.

Arianna taps her foot and singing with the song while finishing her makeup as Dylan cracks awful jokes, his gaze most of the time fixed on me.

I don't know if it's normal or not, but having someone's constant focus on me feels weird and makes me even more anxious.

I fake smile and laugh at his jokes for the sake of politeness and to save us from things getting unpleasant. He talks about various topics. Mostly music, genres that I identify artists from while touching my hand from time to time.

Losing the count of the songs and time, I sense someone's gaze burning through me. In between Dylan's words, I glance in its direction.

My eyes lock with Adrien's jade ones, shooting daggers at us.

Did I do something wrong? Or said something improper, maybe?

I face away and concentrate on Dylan, trying to ignore the anxiousness in hope of stopping my fingers from fidgeting and leg bouncing.

"Ow!" Adrien's voice causes me to jump and for Dylan to stop talking.

I turn around and hold back my laughter with effort as Arianna and Adrien glare at each other. Arianna's one hand on her hip and the other holding a gigantic makeup bag.

She points her index finger at him as she exhorts, "Focus! I won't let you ruin my chances of becoming famous on YouTube,"

"I'm going to sue you," Adrien says.

"Not before I sue you," she retorts.

They haven't aged after ten, I'm hundred percent certain of it. I mean physically they have, but mentally they've stayed the same. Not that I'm criticizing, in fact, I'm starting to find their banters amusing, instead of getting uncomfortable.

"You're so annoying," he states.

Arianna huffs and rolls her eyes, "And you're so dumb, I wonder how you graduated from Stanford,"

"Smart people always look dumb to idiots," he replies with a smug smile.

She glares at him and then smacks him with the makeup bag again, "This is for calling me an idiot," she smacks him for the third time, "and this is for whining and complaining,"

"You want to have a channel, why the hell I must do the hard stuff!"

"It's not hard, you're just slow. I'm sure if I'd given this to El, she would've had a Ph.D. by now," she states, crossing her arms.

I lean into the sofa, pushing my glasses higher up my nose as I study them with wide eyes.

"You are-" he starts but Arianna shakes her head, raising her palm in front of him and he stops.

A mischievous smile appears on her face as she looks between Adrien and me. "Idea!" Arianna enthuses, making Adrien groan, and Dylan chuckles. "Ellie," she looks at me, plastering a sweet smile and I realize in an instant what's next. "Will you please help edit and sort my videos for our YouTube channel?"

And I was right.

With everyone's attention on me, it's impossible to muster up the courage needed to decline her. I swallow hard, and shake my head as I open my mouth to force out declining terms, but she's faster than me.

"I know you don't, but I'm sure you can learn. Plus, Adrien will be your assistant," she grins at me.

"What!"

She ignores him and fixes her shining with excitement blue eyes on me, "Please say yes," and gives me the closest thing to puppy dog eyes.

I need to learn how to say no before it gets me into circumstances I don't want to be.

"Okay," I mumble.

She squeals with exhilaration. I stand from the sofa and in the following moment, I'm tackled with a bone-crushing hug.

I'm not a fan of hugging, only on very rare and special occasions, but I guess with Arianna the case is different as I try to not be awkward and return her hug.

She steps aside, her eyes crinkled at the corners, her dimples on full display. "This'll be great!" She raves, making me smile.

With hesitance, I move my hand through my hair and then push my glasses up my nose as I avoid Adrien's gaze.

He stands up and places a chair next to his and in small steps, I make my way to him. Daring myself to look up, expecting him to be glaring at me, I find Adrien smiling at me, in a kind manner. If I'm to consider it in an optimistic form, he looks somewhat happy, which makes no sense, and it's confusing, so I shove that thought into the back of my mind.

Down the drain goes my plan for trying to stay away from him.

I sit next to him, taking in the notes he's made on his laptop before continuing with the tutorial videos, while Dylan plays different songs on his guitar and Arianna hums the lyrics to the ones she knows.

+++

((Well, they're bonding quite well :)) don't you think?

Anyway, what do you think about this chapter, and Adrien's behaviour? What about Dylan's behaviour? Any thoughts on him so far?

Thanks for reading this far, hope you enjoyed it! ^^))