two.  i'm not chris  !
real life & imessage...

✦

YESTERDAY, EDEN DID A LOT OF thinking about her quick and short encounters with chris. the exact number of times she had accidentally held eye contact with him (four), his rigid handwriting on the little paper she took out numerous times last night, and more so the embarrassment she felt anytime she opened her mouth. the confidence she seemed to have most of the time was mostly a front and disappears the second she is alone.

now it was time for her to suppress everything she's been thinking about, and shove it to the back of her mind. it was third period again, and she was sitting in front of him again. her mind wondered if he would try talking to her first, or if she would have the courage to do so. what if neither happens and they never talk again?

there was a long silence between the two for majority of the class. eden was not only too scared to speak up, but she just didn't know what to say. there was nothing she could think of to spark a single conversation with him.

it wasn't until half way through the period when chris decided to tap her shoulder. she didn't want to seem like she'd been waiting for this the whole period, so she turned around towards him while making it seem like she didn't care all that much.

"sorry i called you a smart ass yesterday."

it took eden a solid fifteen seconds to realize he was talking to her. all that time she spent worrying about the fact, and she was still thrown off when it actually happened.

"it's cool. i was being one." she admitted, noting that she was, in fact, being an ass about his question.

"no, i asked a dumb fucking question. i honestly would have answered the same way."

"i don't know about that. i think i was being pretty funny." her eyes had a hint of a challenge in them, like she was one hundred percent sure that she was easily the funniest out of the two.

"you don't think i'm funny?" he furrowed his brows in question, sounding offended.

"you just don't seem like the type." she shrugged, picking up her purple mechanical pencil and spinning it around in her fingers. then tapping it against his desk.

he stopped the repetitive taps by grabbing the pencil with two individual fingers, so he could speak. "i don't know. i can be pretty funny."

"make me laugh." she titled her head, then resting it on one of her hands that was already on chris' desk behind her. she was invested.

he completely blanked, it was like he forgotten how to be funny. not knowing what to do, he looked up at her to see if she was judging his silence. but the sudden eye contact made eden feel immediately nervous, making her laugh out of random.

"what?" he asked with a smile on his face, confused on why she was laughing at him, but also smiling because he was thinking about how her laughter was so beautiful. it completely caught him off guard at first.

"nothing." her laughing stopped and he swore that he would do anything just to hear it again.

there was a long beat of silence between the two as they both tried to figure out a way to keep the conversation going.

chris was the first to say something to her, asking, "are you going to sit with me at lunch today?" referring to how she was supposed to the day before, but never showed up.

"i want to, but i have to go to the office again." she didn't even want to go because she didn't know what they wanted, but she got a slip earlier in the morning saying she had to be there.

"okay class!" mrs. walker tried to get the class's attention. it put chris and eden's conversation to a halt, and she was worried they weren't going to be able to pick it back up. she just tried to listen to her teacher instead of thinking about what she was going to say to him.

"so today we have an assembly for the end of volleyball ball season, or whatever it is. so our schedule is going to be slightly rearranged." she looked directly at eden, who only gotten here yesterday and whispered, "sorry, eden." then she looked back at the board which had all of the times and periods and where everything was going to be today. all eden could retain was that the assembly was the last period of the day.

"i took a picture already, if you want i can just send it to you." chris offered.

she almost turned it down because she knew she could take her own picture and it would have honestly been faster, but she realized that getting chris's number wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world.

"sure. you can do that if you want."

"can i see your phone?" he held his hand outstretched towards her, and she gave him her phone with no hesitation. he held it out in front of her face to unlock it, before texting his own number and handing it back to her.

xxx-xxx-xxxx
goof

xxx-xxx-xxxx
who you callin a goof? 🤨

xxx-xxx-xxxx
that was you chris 🫤

xxx-xxx-xxxx
i know 🤔

xxx-xxx-xxxx
maybe you are a goof 🤷‍♀️

xxx-xxx-xxxx changed
xxx-xxx-xxxx to "goof 🥸"

xxx-xxx-xxxx
HAHAHA
that's your name now

goof 🥸
im a certified goof man
what abt you then???

xxx-xxx-xxxx
you are☝️
and eden's fine

goof 🥸 changed
xxx-xxx-xxxx to "eden 🤔"

goof 🥸
that will change at some point
just so you know

eden 🤔
mkay...

goof 🥸
anyway here you go

*sent 1 attachment*

eden 🤔
thank you thank you

goof 🥸
you're welcome you're welcome

JUST THEN, THE BELL COMMENCING their lunch period rang. mrs. walker made everyone work until the bell, causing all the students in the room to scramble as fast as they could once they were able to.

eden stayed in her spot, waiting for everyone to leave the hallway so she could easily go the opposite direction of the lunch room, towards the main office.

the little meeting took a lot less longer than she had anticipated, but she still didn't want to join her lunch period halfway through. everyone would have been staring at her trying to find literally the only person she knows here. so she waited in there until her next class.

the rest of the day up until the assembly was very mediocre compared to the beginning half. it ended up being a lot of sitting and writing notes, almost making her pass out on her desk it was so boring. but finally the end of the school day was here.

once her grade got called down for the assembly—first called because they were seniors—she made her way down to the gym (more like she followed the crowd). and as she walked into the gym, somehow she was able to spot chris from only a few feet away. he was also the only person she knew that she could sit next to at this assembly. would he really want to though? he hardly even knew her.

she made her way over through the jungle of students, tapping him on the shoulder once she was able to reach him, "hey, chris?"

but when he turned around, she noticed he looked slightly off and there was utter confusion on his face like he didn't know who she was in the slightest. was he seriously going to pretend like he didn't know who she was?

"i'm not chris," he immediately said, shutting down every hurtful thought she just had about chris. and she's glad because she didn't want any of those to be true.

"i—" she was speechless. because if this wasn't chris, who the fuck was it? before she was able to say anything, another completely identical person almost ran up to her.

"hey, eden!" he smiled, explaining himself, "i'm sorry i'm late, mrs. walker wanted me to catch up on my work during study hall. i told her i'd do it tonight."

he then looked at his clone, "i see you've met matt."

"i wouldn't say meet." eden responded, not feeling like she met someone at all. she could infer that they were twins, but she still couldn't process that there is now two of chris.

"yeah, she thought i was you." the so-called matt said with a chuckle. he thought this was funny. it must've happened a lot.

"can you blame her? she got here yesterday." chris defended her, knowing that there was no way she could have found out before this. especially if she wasn't at their lunch table the past two days.

"true." his brother agreed. 

chris then looked at eden, tilting his head as he asked her, "did you want to sit with us?"

"would you mind?"

"no not at all, and if nick hates it, that's his problem." chris said, not realizing that she also has no idea who nick is.

"he won't, trust me. you'll be fine." matt assured her, realizing she took that very seriously.

"wait, who's nick?" the brothers smiled in unison, knowing they were going to have a great time watching her face when she realized they were, in fact, triplets.

"you're gonna find that out, follow us." she followed not having much other options because she for sure was not going to sit alone.

once they got to the very end of the gym, eden started to look around at the students who were already sitting down. she noticed a couple that she had reoccurring classes with or that's she's seen in the halls. there were no names to any of the faces she was seeing—except one.

she had to do a quick double take to make sure chris and matt were still in front of her, as the student she was just staring at looked exactly like chris too. there were a couple differences each of them had like their hairstyles and clothing that she started to notice.

"nick, this is eden," he gestured to the girl behind him. "she's going to sit with us. she's new."

"no shit, i would have one hundred percent been friends with her already if that wasn't the case." he stopped talking to chris, and motioned for eden to sit next to him to converse with her directly instead. "your outfit is literally amazing, where did you find that shirt?"

chris ended up sitting on the other side of her while matt sat on the other side of chris.

"uhh im not sure, my mom gave it to me?" she responded with a lot of uncertainty because she really had no clue where her shirt came from. it was one of those pieces that has always been in her closet, and she never really wore it til now because she didn't like it as much before.

"that's fine, that's fine. i can already tell we're going to get along." his words along with his reassuring smile made the heat rush to her cheeks, she's never been told that she would make a good friend off the bat like that in her entire life. it took her completely off guard and also made her feel a lot better about herself than she did two minutes ago.

"that means a lot to me, thank you."

"just be careful with matt and chris, because they're fucking weirdos." eden's heart skipped a beat, suddenly not sure if she was making the best decision of becoming friends with them. she hoped that wasn't the case at all, and he was just joking like they have been.

"nick— that's not funny." matt chimed in at the mention of his name.

"yeah, if anything you're the fucking weird one." chris backed his brother up, looking directly at his other.

"i am?! me?? me as in nicolas? not you?!" nick practically yelled back, but not loud enough for it to catch the attention of everyone currently around them. he didn't want to cause a whole scene right before the damn assembly.

though eden visibly sunk in her seat, not wanting to be right in the middle of the cross fire between the siblings, and chris was quick to notice.

"let's just shut the fuck up because we're already making her uncomfortable." he spoke up, looking at her and motioning that she would be safe to sit back up normally, and she did.

"i'm sorry this was your first impression, i swear we're actually really fun to be around. don't leave us?" nick apologized, looking back and forth from eden to chris. like he was trying to also apologize for chris himself.

"i mean, i don't really have much options, do i?" she laughed at the fact that she really wouldn't have anyone else to talk to if she chose not to talk to them anymore. they were all she had right now.

chris laughed along with her, knowing that she was referring to the fact that she hasn't really made any other friends in the past day other than him. he was her first friend, and that made him feel somehow special.

✦
nat's notes !

eden is literally just me with my school crushes. :/

also the chapters for this book are
ending up pretty long 😟

<3