Chapter 37

I refused to read the instructions, he stared at me before continuing with the procedures. He had of course memorized them all. 

" Are you seriously planning on never talking to me again?"

" Not now Jerald. "

" When then? Tell me because I have been trying to talk to you for the last five days. "

" 28.5...write that down," he said in reference to the experiment he was carrying out. I felt frustrated.

" You write it down, "

He shook his head, then he proceeded to try and write down the recording, but I pulled the book away.

" Jerald-"

" Stop calling me that! I know you're doing it intentionally and trust me, I get the point. "

" Which point are you referring to Jerald? I'm only trying to complete an assignment. "

The casual tone he used angered me immensely. I took the book, wrote down the recordings, accurately guessed the rest, then I quickly began working on the questions. He asked me what I was doing but I ignored him.

Not long after I had finished all the questions, so I tapped Mark's shoulder and gave it to him. He was the group member busy on his phone. 

" Give this out when Mrs. Greywall comes to pick them. If she asks where we are tell her we took a bathroom break. "

" Yeah, sure, " he said absentmindedly. 

I grabbed Calen's hand and pulled him out. He was reluctant and didn't want to go but I wasn't having any of that. I went all the way to our spot, he had stopped struggling and now followed next to me, but he had pulled his hand from my hold. 

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I stared at him as he walked over to a tree and leaned against it, his arms crossed as if he were just waiting for me to get it over and done with so that he could go back to his work. 

" Calen, " I began, my tone pleading. I had never before been in such a situation. Never had I had to consistently ask for another person's forgiveness. Mostly because I always tried my best to not wrong anyone. But I had deeply wronged him. He stared at me, and the care and affection was still there, always had been, the only difference was that he was fighting to not let it show. He wore a blank expression, uncrossing his arms and tucking his hands into his pockets. Then he turned away from me and kept his face focused to the side. 

" I keep apologizing, over and over I try to get you to listen. But you're so set on not hearing me out. Have I truly wronged you that greatly? That you want nothing more to do with me?" 

For the longest while he maintained his silence. Not even glancing towards me. And I thought that he was honestly mad and would possibly never forgive me, but then he looked at me with a quizicall look and asked me, " Who or what am I to you J.R? If you're so willing to turn your entire back on us the second you fear something is wrong? " 

He had called me J.R again, but the way he had said it made me feel worse about the situation. There was pain in the name. The real kind. Those two letters were pronounced with raw anguish. And I was to blame for that. 

" I'm sorry, " I said for what felt like the hundredth time, and I meant it. It was a sincere apology. 

He scoffed and shook his head. I didn't know whether to be hurt by that or whether to get angry. I had always known he had a trait for stubbornness but I had never imagined it could be this immense. 

Grunting, I paced the space around me. My face buried in my hands, then I stopped and turned on my heels to face him. 

" What else do you want me to do? I made a mistake, I acted out of fear-"

" You hurt me. "

I stopped talking. 

Calen Silverstein always said things in this open way, as if he were bearing his soul open. Almost everything he said held meaning and depth and his main aim was always to impact feeling and emotion from his listener. And this time he succeeded, I felt the hurt he spoke of as if I was impacting it on myself at the moment. And I knew that an apology would simply never be enough to repair the damage I had done. I honestly had not meant any of the words I had said. I didn't wish for us to be over and I didn't regret ever having accepted his proposal. But how could I tell him that when I had already caused so much damage.

I walked over to the log next to the tree he was under and I sat down, grateful when he didn't move away. 

" You played well, congrats on your teams win. " He suddenly said, referring to polo. We had won and I was named the star player or something of the sort. My mind had been all over the place that time due to the situation with Calen. 

" Thank you. You were also great. " 

I had never seen him at the matches, but I always felt as if he was there. And now my theory was confirmed. I felt happy.

" You're welcome, and thanks, "

" You're welcome. "

It was as if we were playing a game of chess with our words. Each one of us carefully planning out the next words to say, I was just relieved that he had initiated actual conversation.

" Your sister seems nice. Not at all like how you described her," 

I chuckled and picked up a broken stick from the ground, drawing patterns on the soil with it. 

" I was just as surprised, I suppose we both thought we knew each other despite being strangers bonded only by blood. "

" She kept asking me to talk things out with you, before and after each race. "

I hadn't known that Aliyah had done that. It made me cherish her even more. 

" I wasn't expecting her to react how she did. It came as a shock. "

" Doesn't it make you question how you assume everyone will react to the news?" 

I concentrated on pushing around a little pebble with the stick, not wanting to really think about his question. The last thing I wanted was to give myself false hope. He let out a sharp exhale.

" You can't lash out each time you're in an uncomfortable position, that's just not the way to deal with things. "

" I know, " I admitted. Then I glanced back up at him and pursed my lips apologetically.

" I'm sorry, " I said again.

" I know, " he also said, then he finally joined me on the log and picked up the pebble I had been so focused on, throwing it out into the distance. And I took it as a metaphor, the pebble symbolized our state of conflict, and now it was gone. 

" You owe me five days worth of your company. " I seriously informed him after a while. He laughed and ruffled my hair.

" Oh my sweet J.R. How powerless you render me. "

I smiled to myself, but he noticed it and smiled as well. Then he reached into his shirt pocket and took out a neatly folded piece of paper, handing it over to me. I unfolded it and realized it was filled with these little quotes and paragraphs.

" I came across them while reading, thought I might put them down for you. "

To know that he had been thinking of me even when we were not in good terms was pulling at my heart strings. How much more perfect could he be?

" You mean more to me than you'll ever know. Never doubt that, " I told him and he nodded. I meant it, he was as precious to me as the very air I breathed. 

" The truth does not hurt, it teaches........." I began to read. 

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That month came to an end, and suddenly it started to really dawn on me that our graduation would be in a mere two months time. I had no choice but to return home and shoulder my responsibilities after that, Calen planned on joining the university and taking up a course related to writing. He had caught me once, while I had been looking up good music schools within London. And for a second we had both dared to dream,to tackle the situation from a " what if.." angle. But then that had been more wishful thinking..The truth was that we had no future outside the school walls. And wishing that we did was equivalent to throwing ourselves off bottomless cliffs.

So we became observers of time. Dwellers of the present. I had grown so much as a person in the last four months and it was mostly thanks to him. 

All our classmates were ecstatic about finally being done with highschool. But they did not have a Calen Silverstein. And they did not have princely duties to fulfill.