They Say Love Hides Behind Every Corner. I Must Be Walking in Circles

Chapter 34

I glared at the evil bald man as best as I could in the dark, but then, remembering that he had the power to make or break me, I decided it would be of my best interest to quit my childish glaring. As much as I would have liked to give him my best evil eye, I supposed it would be more reasonable not to.

“Well… whassup, yo?” I greeted, sitting up in my bed and yawning loudly. I guess I was still tired. Well, of course I was. This guy had the habit of showing up in the middle of the night. He was going to be the cause of the bags under my eyes, and that would not make a very happy Shay. Actually, now that I thought about it, this guy was lucky I hadn’t punched or bitten him yet.

He just grunted at me and I had a good mind to go and bite him, but luckily, for him, at least, I managed to contain myself. I was sure that biting him wouldn’t help out very much, either, no matter how much I might have possibly enjoyed it. The thought made me sad, but this guy could change everything, again…

“I’m so, so, so, so, so, so, so freaking sorry!” I blurted out suddenly, hiding my face in my hands before looking up once more. “I swear, I didn’t mean to! Well, at the end I did, but I was peer-pressured into it! Okay, that’s a lie, ’cause I never give in to that crap, and I never will, but still! You’ve gotta understand! It was the only way to make sure Serena was happy, or else she wouldn’t have made a move on the Finn issue! That girl deserves to be happy! She’s, like, one of my best friends now, and I knew that she loved Finn, so I had to do something! I couldn’t just leave her hanging like that! I—”

“Relax,” the bald man interrupted. Man, I really needed to learn his name. I was getting kind of tired of calling him ‘the bald man’ or ‘the evil bald man’. “You’re not in trouble. Heavens, you’re annoying, kid.”

I beamed happily, mostly at myself. I liked hearing that I was annoying for some reason. I wasn’t sure why. It just made me feel like my life had meaning. Also, it was fun to hear that I had succeeded in driving someone insane. “I know.  It’s a gift, really. Most people probably wouldn’t agree, but I know a lot of people who’ve tried to annoy people and they just stink at it, so I’m thinking my ability to do it so easily must be a gift. I mean, I’m good at it, so it must be a gift, right? That’s why they call them gifts. I think. But anyways … What were we talking about again? Oh, right. You said I wasn’t in trouble. But how am I not in trouble? I mean, I figured I was in trouble after what I did, which I am very, very, very sorry for, by the way.”

“Honestly, if it was up to me, you would be in trouble, but our God works in mysterious ways.”

“Omigod, so Serena was right? She was actually right, for once in her life? Oh, alright, fine, she’s been right a lot of times in her life, but that’s no fun to say, now is it? But she was seriously right? Oh my God!” I was mostly talking to myself, since he obviously had no idea what I was going on and on about now, unless he had been spying on me, which in itself was likely, I suppose. How else would he be able to keep track of whether or not I had kept my end of the deal? The thought was still creepy, though. I mean, this guy was stalking me, practically. But what if it was his job, like the paparazzi? Except I wasn’t famous, so… “God is involved in this. Well, duh, of course He is. I mean, He’s involved in everything, so why not this? But … I mean, I just figured this was a punishment, but then again, I also figured that He had something to do with this but at the same time I didn’t… gosh, I’m confused.”

“I suppose this was all merely a test, and you somehow, miraculously, passed,” the bald man mused.

“Hey!” I found that offensive. “I am very much smarticle, mister, and I am very offended that you would dare imply otherwise! See how smarticle I’m talking? That’s a sign that… guess what? I’m smarticle!”

“I just said you passed, didn’t I?” The bald man looked irritated. “Kid, you’ve got to listen to the important part, not just the part that involves you.”

I frowned. It was true, I supposed. I was a little self-involved, to say the least. “Okay, I guess you’re right. I mean, I can be a little self-involved at times, but c’mon. I’m awesome, aren’t I? Right? Right? Right. Now, what were we talking about again? Oh, right. Wait… I forgot. What was the important part, again?”

He shook his head at me and sighed.

What? My memory was good, but it wasn’t that good. I mean, I hadn’t even been paying attention! How did he expect me to remember what he had said?

“I said that this, everything, was merely a test, that you somehow, miraculously, I might add, passed,” he repeated.

“Seriously? I passed?” I was absolutely dumbfounded. How the hell had I passed?! “I can barely pass my math tests! And, okay, fine, I can barely pass my Chemistry tests. Okay, alright, and my Spanish tests. I’m just no good at those. But anyways…If I can barely pass normal stuff, how the hell am I supposed to pass a test of life? That’s practically impossible!  But I passed it? How’d that happen?”

The bald man shrugged. “I suppose you showed you were worthy of redemption by putting others above yourself for once, and I, believe it or not, do actually agree with God’s verdict.”

“You do?”

He nodded emphatically. “Oh, yes. It was quite evident in the way you talked about your friend, Serena, and how this would affect her, not yourself.”

“Hey, dude… what’s your name, so I can stop calling you the evil bald man?”

He gave me a hard look, and I realized that some people didn’t like the nicknames I gave them. “Charles.”

“Oh! So I can call you Chuck?” I will admit I was excited at the prospect. I had always loved the name Chuck. “Ooh! How about Chucky? You know, like the evil dolly thing in that movie? That movie wasn’t even scary, though, so I don’t get why people are always like, ‘Oh, no, it’s Chucky!’ I have a good mind to bite all of those people.”

“Yes, so now, I have done my job. I have delivered this message.”

I was about to speak, but he held up a hand to stop me. “Please,” he begged. “Just…don’t say anything. I have had enough of your rambling for one night. Please, just accept what I said, and rejoice. You are free. You are free to do God’s will, and be with whomever you want.”

I wasn’t rambling! Was I?

“Oh, you know who I want.” I wiggled my eyebrows suggestively. “Wait, does that include Orlando Bloom? Could I have him?”

But Chucky was already gone. I was sad, but I realized at that moment that Chucky was most likely my guardian angel, which was why he, in particular, was sent to me.

Well, Chucky, good luck guarding me in the future!

***

I woke up, stretching my arms over my head in a loud yawn. Ugh. It was time to go to school again.

In the corner of my mind, I was replaying last night and I realized something: Chucky had never specified anything. He had just said that I was free. But did that mean that I was still the only one, along with Serena and Lisette, of course, that knew what had happened?

I couldn’t help but frown at the prospect. I didn’t mean to be selfish, but after everything Forrest and I had lived through, I had sort of wished that he might remember.

I was still frowning after I had changed and made my way downstairs. My dad was already at work, and my mom was sitting at the dinner table as one of our maid-ladies made breakfast. Yeah, my mom wasn’t really the working type. Ceci sat beside her, and Damien was at the fridge grabbing a glass of milk, shirtless, as he usually was in the mornings.

There was a reason I didn’t like having Jasmine here all that often, as you may have just realized. It was seriously disturbing for me, and I would honestly just rather not deal with it.

“Morning, Mom,” I greeted, sitting down besides her at the dinner table. “Ceci, Damien.”

They all grunted their response, except for my mom, of course. She, being the proper lady she was, had to give an appropriate greeting. “Good morning, darling. How did you sleep?”

“Just peachy.”

Her lips set into a tight line, but otherwise, she said and did nothing. I guess she had decided not to dignify my answer with a response.

After a yummy breakfast, I made my way outside so I wouldn’t miss the bus. Again. Really, it was very annoying having to chase that thing down once a week.

Unfortunately, I had decided to go outside a tad too late, because I saw the big yellow bus turning the corner, and I cursed under my breath. I started sprinting to try to catch up with it. “Hey! Yo, stupid bus driver! Slow down!”

Obviously, Rick couldn’t hear me. But I kept screaming and I kept running, nevertheless.

Eventually, I got to the side of the bus where the door was at, and the bus driver noticed me and stopped. With a small scowl, I boarded the bus.

“Geez, Rick, could you not do that every week?” I asked, shaking my head as I took my seat next to Maddie.

Our moms insisted we let them take us to school, because the buses were repulsive and all of that crap, so of course, we took the bus just to piss them off.

The rest of my day was sadly uneventful, at least compared to tracking down the bus that morning.

As I made my way home, I couldn’t help but let my mind drift back to the fact that no one but Serena, Lisette and me remembered. I knew perfectly well that it was probably selfish and ungrateful of me to keep complaining about it internally, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted Forrest to remember everything.

“Honey, get ready, we’re going out to eat,” my mom said the minute I got home from school, which was about six o clock, since I had decided to hightail it to Maddie’s for a while.

I groaned. “Noooo!”

My mom gave me a look.

“Okay.”

I trudged my way upstairs and put on the pretty blue dress my mom had bought me that I had actually liked. Yes, I was surprised, too.

I decided to take my sweet time getting ready, just to annoy my mother, which, of course, worked. I thought her voice was going to give out from how loud she was screeching at me.

“Alright, alright, mother!” I screamed back, shaking my head as I ran down the stairs to try to make amends. Okay, that was a lie, I just wanted some food.

The car ride to the restaurant was really boring. Everyone was quiet, just because my mom was pissed. So you could probably imagine how ecstatic I was when we finally got there.

“Shay, please, be courteous to the help this time,” my mother reminded me as we walked into the Chinese restaurant.

“Mother, when am I not?” My tone was far too innocent to be perceived as believable, and I could tell that she saw that, if the sour look she gave me told me anything.

“How many?” the Chinese lady asked in that annoying way of hers. I had been here a ton of times, and that lady always pissed me off.

“Six,” my dad answered, and the lady showed us to our table. He said six because Damien and Bianca were coming to join my father, my mother, Ceci and I.

I sat down on the edge seat and ordered a Pepsi, as I usually did. And that was when I saw him: Forrest. “Oh, shit,” I muttered to myself, but Ceci heard me, with that freakishly amazing sense of hearing of hers.

“What? Oh.” She must have spotted him, by the tone of her voice.

“Yeah...”

With my luck, of course, he spotted me the second I muttered that, and a grin lit up his face. I couldn’t help but feel a trickle of hope that things might just work out after all at that moment. “Well, look who we have here,” he said with a chuckle.

“Oh, Shay,” my mother gasped. “You’re not going to introduce us to this young man?”

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. My mom was so annoying. “Nah.”

“What?” She was really pissed, so I decided I would change my answer.

“I said yes, of course!” I didn’t, obviously, but she was dumb enough to believe it. “This is Forrest. He’s a friend.”

“Just a friend?” my oh-so-smooth (note the sarcasm) mother asked.

“Mom, shut up!” I immediately blurted out, shaking my head.

“Shay! That is no way to talk to your mother!”

“Then don’t say stupid things!” I retorted.

I had completely forgotten Forrest was there until he snickered in amusement. “Shay, do you wanna go grab some food?” he asked me just as my mom glared.

“Sure,” I replied, standing up. I would take the risk with Forrest if it meant getting away from that table. “Thanks for that,” I told Forrest when we were out of earshot. “That lady’s driving me insane.”

Forrest chuckled. “No problem.”

I shot him a grin, and then proceeded to pile my plate with food.

“Man. You’ve got quite the appetite, huh?”

“I’m hungry,” I replied simply, shrugging and stuffing a piece of chicken into my mouth.

He laughed quietly and grabbed some chicken himself.

I went back to the table without him, since I wanted to get started on the food, but I heard his heavy footsteps behind me. Well, that and the fact that he was screaming at me to wait up. That, of course, only made me walk faster.

Now, let me just tell you right now, it is not pleasant having your parents bombard a guy, who isn’t even your boyfriend, with questions, that in my opinion, were way too personal: “Are you seeing anyone?” “What college do you plan to attend?” “Do you smoke?” “What are your grades like?” “Have you lost your virginity?”

Yes, they asked all of those questions.

All.

Of.

Those.

Questions.

I, for once in my life, wanted to die of mortification.

I was so happy when the annoying Chinese lady came with the bill and the fortune cookies, I almost cheered out loud. “Here you go. Hope you enjoyed!” she gushed before skipping away.

No, I am not even kidding.

“I wanna pick first!”

I loved those fortune cookies! I opened mine and read: Everyone that was important in your life will remember all that occurred.

“What the—?” I didn’t get to finish the question, because I blacked out.

***

 Top 3 Quotes of the Day:

1: "Ohmygod. I freaking HATE this bald guy. Seriously, someone needs to shove him into Pegasus's lake and throw rocks at him. It hurts, also if you've like just eaten a banana. Maybe someone should feed him a banana. You know, if hypnotics’ works, then you could, like, hypnotize him into thinking he's a monkey. Then he'd eat a banana. Anyway, where was I? Ohyea! Hypnotize him... Oh, no, I mean, I hate him! Yea! I WANT TO RI OFF HIS BALD LITTLE SHRIVELED ZOMBIE HEAD (Is he a zombie? He seems like a zombie in my mind...) AND FEED HIM TO THE HYPNOTIZED MONKEYS. THEN I'D KILL THE MONKEYS AND REMAKE THEM OUT OF MARSHMELLOWS SO I COULD EAT THEM AND THERE WOULD BE NO EVIDENCE. AHAHAHA. HA HA. HAHAHAHA. Have a nice day ;) <3" –iSammy

2: "OH. MY. GOD. STUPID BALD MAN, GO AWAY. NO ONE LIKES YOU. JEEZ! CAN'T THEY FREAKIN' JUMP EACH OTHER WITHOUT SOME BALD DUDE GOING "no, no, no!' ? MY GOSH." –JessicaG

3: "I think the bald man is gay and has a crush on Forrest and so he doesn't want them to be together. Or oh my god he has a crush on Westley cuz he's gay and all right, and Westley wanted Shay before so he was like oh no you didn't Shay I'm gonna switch your body and kill you! Wow this Lisette person really must have pissed him off. Maybe she pissed in his cheerios. Well anyway so now the bald guy is coming to thank Shay for rejecting Westley (Kinda) and he and Westley can live happily ever like the jackass's they are. That's all I got Good day and Good Riddance " –Watergirl258