20| Hickey

Someone needs to explain the process of breathing to me.

Arsen's lips brushing against the sensitive areas of my neck set my nerves on fire. My heart drums against my ribs and all I can do is keep my eyes shut tightly. I don't know why he pushed my head into his neck, especially when the principal hovers nearby. Arsen starts making guttural sounds, which further adds to my embarrassment. I try to push him away, however he grasps my shoulders tightly and his teeth gently but firmly bite down on my skin.

I gasp in surprise.

I wasn't serious when I said I wanted to know how it felt to kiss him when he was conscious.

"Both of you, this is my first and last warning to you! No more PDA!" The principal rushes past us and pretends he's noticed nothing peculiar. He must be used to Arsen pulling stunts like this.

I shove Arsen away from me and my neck. He has no idea how much this intimacy affects me.

Arsen's eyes dance back and forth between my neck and my face. Frowning, I twist my shoulder forward and almost have a heart attack.

"You gave me a hickey?!" I can't believe it. Quickly pulling out my phone, I make sure my eyes haven't deceived me. "What the heck was it for?!"

He wipes his lips swiftly. "I saved you from getting a detention and honored you with my--"

"Hickey!" The word feels so foreign.

"Get over it," he says smoothly. "You're neither the first nor the last girl I have--"

"Hickey," I repeat in a trance.

"You can hardly even see it," he mutters. I glare at him, hoping he'd understand that he's not helping the case. "What? None of your boyfriends ever gave you one?" he asks sarcastically.

I shake my head furiously. I've never had a boyfriend. Hickeys are a long stretch. "That doesn't matter. You don't get to kiss me without . . . No, you don't get to kiss me. That's it." I pull together my shirt's collars, covering every inch of exposed skin.

He says nothing. In fact, he drops the matter completely, not before I catch slight remorse on his face. Back when we were kids, we predicted us to be the star couple in high school. School's almost over now and we can't even exchange a polite hello.

"Whatever. Now, do you want my help staying alive or not?" he quizzes.

"Of course I do."

"Then, you have to join the gang."

"What?" I ask almost laughing at those words. When I catch no hint of playfulness in his expression, I continue, "Are you kidding me? Do I look like some gangster, ready to sell coco down the streets?"

"You already know your other options, Cruz," he says and starts walking backwards, towards the doors that led out of the stairway.

"Don't leave me," I whisper frightened, "like this."

"Make up your mind. I've done everything I can to steer you away from their minds, but all my efforts went to waste." The pain and exasperation in his tone multiplies my guilt. "I faked the amnesia thing because I saw Leo walking down the street where we fell from the motorcycle. I took care of my so called manager at the racing event. I had to settle down the diner issue because you lost my buddies the drug dealing place. They could've easily eradicated your family from New York. Today, you brought out the worst news of all." His voice is on the edge is so is he. "Don't ask me to stay here and encourage more of your foolishness. Either you're with me or you're not. There's no more Arsen cleaning up after your ridiculous mess!"

He leaves me standing there, holding on to my collars and my emotions.

What have I jumped into?

¤》¤《¤

"So, you and Arsen?" Isa wiggles her eyebrows.

She holds a fashion magazine in her hands while propping her legs on the chair across from hers. I take the chair diagonal to hers. Skipping last period in the library will land us in hell of a trouble. But facing Arsen's gang in gym class will be worse. Truthfully, if I couldn't even face them, I couldn't join their force.

"What about me and him?" I ask, flipping open my math homework, pretending to be busy.

"You totally have a thing for him and vice versa!"

I raise an eyebrow. "I do not! He's the last person in this school I can ever have a thing for." At this moment, at least. She definitely doesn't seem convinced. Thank god, I closed the top button of my shirt earlier to hide the stupid hickey. "Isa, can we please not talk about some delinquent being my potential crush or love interest? That's not my type."

I hope it's not my type.

"Fine," she says, dropping the topic. "By the way, do you think Danie is gonna say yes to Ben?"

"Yes," I reply immediately. "He literally got punched for her."

She nods, agreeing. "That punch though . . . " She trails off into a burst of laughter. "He got punched by a fat meatball."

I can't help but laugh with her.

Until I remember that fat meatball is someone Arsen expects me to befriend.

That boy seriously can't expect me to ditch my friends for his.

"Hey, have you heard that Arsen and his pals killed some guy recently?" Her voice drops in a barely audible volume.

"What?" I almost gasp.

"Yeah! While you were busy with Arsen, I overheard the gossip girls saying some girl went to the guys and called them out," she says, leaning forward as if sharing a huge secret. Everyone who gossiped, Isa labelled them gossip girls. "I didn't hear when or who she was, but dude, that chica's toast." She leans back and lets out a nasal laugh. "Some people are a whole other level of stupid."

I can't believe she's calling me stupid to my face!

"Maybe she was trying to scare them . . . ?" I reason.

"Oh please. You don't go up to the murderer and say, 'Hey, I saw you kill someone.' How dumb can you get?" Arsen said the same thing. Maybe I fell in a whole new category of dumb. "Why do you look so nervous?" Isa eyes me skeptically.

"Nothing." I force a smile. "I feel awful for her right now. But I doubt the ruthless rebels will kill her, right? I mean it'd confirm they've killed a person before. Right?" I'm desperate for some sort of comfort or condolescence everything was going to be fine.

"Probably not," she shrugs. "Not right now at least. Probably when no one's expecting it. We probably won't know the girl's gone until graduation."

I swallow hard. My own best friend told me, right to my face, without any sugar coating, that the ruthless rebels would kill me. Maybe not now, but in the near future. Quietly, I focus on the first math problem, scrutinizing at the numbers and variables as if they are written in Greek. Isa continues chatting about random gossip topic.

All the while, my thoughts wander from reconsidering Arsen's offer to whether I'd want my dead body to be buried or cremated.

Suddenly, another figure jerks the chair next to me, pushing Isa's feet down, and settling in.

One look at Danie's blotchy face tells me things haven't gone as expected.

"No."

"Huh?" I search Danie's eyes in confusion.

"I said no to Ben," Danie says, biting her nails like a nervous wreck. Isa and I exchange a glance that screams plot twist! Never in the last forty five minutes of skipping had we imagined Danie entering the library without Ben and announcing that she refused to go out with him. What a plot twist of life. As if I didn't have more than enough today.

"He broke his leg for you. He tackled a fat meatball for you. You still said no?" Isa says in disbelief.

I mirror her expression, apalled by the turn of the events.

Ben's been crushing over Danie for more than a year.

"I know I'm horrible!" Danie cries, burrying her face in her hands. "I don't feel that way about him! He's my best friend and I can't ruin that part of our relationship!" Unfortunately, I understand the meaning behind her words. She doesn't want to lose her best friend by dating him. "What if it doesn't work out? I'm losing both my best friend and my boyfriend."

I lost mine without even telling him I had a thing for him.

"Congratulations. Now, you've lost both without even giving him a chance," Isa mumbles. Danie's in tears. I glare at Isa to shut up and she responds with a guilty look. "Sorry, I didn't mean that. I'm sure Ben will understand and . . . "

"He nearly yelled at me for crushing his hopes," she says sobbing. Thank god, we are seated at the back of the library where no one can see us. "I've never seen someone so . . . heartbroken and betrayed before! All because of me! He doesn't even want to see my face anymore. Oh god, I can't shake off the guilt!"

It's okay," I murmur. "We'll all figure something out." Or endeavor to. The guilt, the remorse, the disappointment--I've felt it for years. I would never wish it upon my friends. Unluckily, Danie ended up in this situation. The only way out is clearing the situation out with Ben. "I'll go talk to him. He must understand once his head cools off."

Isa consolidates Danie further and we all convince ourselves to approach Ben later on.

¤》¤《¤

My day swings forward at an excruciatingly slow speed.

Before I know it, I'm home finished with my work and headed off to our new diner. As the diner being a gift for both mom and I, dad says if I helped out, I could make a little cash too. Who doesn't like money? I take the responsibility of how things are going and how people are treating each. We're short on staff: two chefs, three waiters, one cleaner, and one dishwasher. Basically, less than triple the amount dad has on his other restaurant.

No wonder he made me the part time general manager.

"Don't drop the food!" I snap at one of the servers as she trembles with a load of trays on her hands. All day long, food's been dropping here and there like people during the plague. The waitress squeaks something before banging her hip against a table and dropping the main course on a guest's head. "Great job," I mutter mockingly when she stares back at me with her doe eyes.

I take care of the guests first and then her.

"I'm sorry! It's my first day," she keeps repeating.

"Carry one plate at a time," I say calmly. "Don't make life harder than it needs to be." She stands there nodding as another set of customers enter. "Go!" She scurries away and ushers the customers to a table with a somewhat brave face.

Sighing, I settle down in my chair behind the cash register.

"Tough day?"

I meet a familiar pair of green-blue eyes and almost gulp in nervousness. "Satan?"

His eyes narrow before tiny wrinkles pop up underneath and he chortles remembering the Halloween night where he dressed up as the devil. "Vivian, outside of class, please."

"Of course." I smile forcefully. "How can I help you today?"

"A table for one," he says.

"You came to eat?" I say surprised.

"No, I came to Hula Dance."

I never knew he had a sense of humor. "Sorry. Follow me. I'll show you to your table." While he follows behind, I can't help but pray to god nothing wrong occurs. He's my instructor! Why couldn't he select another diner? Now, I'm going to have to give him a discount. I don't want to fail PE.

"Why were you skipping class today?" he asks.

"I wasn not!" I deny and sneak a glance at him, earning a look of disbelief. "How do you know I wasn't dying in some corner of the school?" Or getting hickeys in some corner of the school? We reach the table and I gesture for him to settle down, searching for an escape route from here. I couldn't handle this.

"You don't think your teachers notice?"

"Are you Mr. Dexter or Vivian right now?" I ask.

"Vivian."

"Then, you can't bring up school. You're not my instructor, just a guy who I met at the Halloween parade dressed up like Satan. Okay?"

His mouth twitches to smile, but he doesn't allow it. "Okay. Since I'm no longer your teacher, is it appropriate for me to ask you to join me for dinner?" Before I can refuse and internally scream that my nineteen year old teacher asked me to dinner, he adds, "Just for seven minutes. I'll even add a timer." He pulls out his phone and types in the seven minutes. "Yes or no?"

I bite my lip.

Seven minutes can't hurt right?

Seven minutes free of yelling, screaming, and sulking. Seven minutes free of cheerful greetings and farewells to customers. Seven minutes free of the events that have been bothering my mind. Ben, Danie, Arsen, Ruthless rebels, waiters--I need a break.

"Yes."

¤》¤《¤

A/N

Predictions?

Vivian and Val? (Vivian was a person I knew in high school. I thought the name was so unique! I don't know anyone with that name.)

Will Val join the ruthless rebels?

More hickeys? xD

Stay tuned because another twist coming up!

Thank you so much for all your votes, comments so far! I know my updates are slow. I have two jobs and university to handle. Bear with me. Just tell me the top three stories of mine that you want updated (in the order of importance). Winter break is coming and I'll work on my writing a little more and gift you updates for Christmas. Tis the season to be jolly!

This Christmas season has been dull this year though.

Anywho, please vote, comment, and share! <3 love ya peeps