It was a bright and sunny day. I drove to school with an uplifted mood. As I drove across the quadrangle looking for a space to park, I saw Arienne sitting on the perch in front of the gym. Finally, I found a vacant spot. I collected my stuffs and scrambled towards her.
“Why are you still here?” I asked.
“Ten o’clock!” she giggled.
I looked at the direction she pointed and found the Hayes brothers standing gloriously by Howard’s van.
“Oh,”
She giggled again. “Do you like any of them?”
I answered her with a heavy sigh. At the back of mind I did asked myself: Do I like any of them? I banished the thought instantly when immediately I thought of one person. My quiet answer surprised me, too.
“C’mon Helaena! Look at the boy wearing the blue jacket…”
I was.
“I heard he’s the youngest. He’s handsome. I like Cezanne better, though. They’re all pretty good looking.”
She continued to gaze at them particularly at Cezanne. I waited beside her but ignored the sight.
“Cut it out, will you? Let’s go.” I said impatiently.
“Geez, don’t deprive yourself,” I was caught off guard and suddenly fell silent for a moment. “We’re going to be late,” I mumbled.
“But they’re looking at this direction,” she gasped. “Are they approaching us?”
I rolled my eyes at her and fought an urge not to look.
“Why would they even—” I stood up. “Let’s go,”
“I think they’re coming over here!”
“Stop gawking at them so they won’t—”
“Helaena,” I stopped dead and turned and around. It was Cade and Cezanne with their brilliant smile. Caleb was standing behind them. His expression was blank but still made my heart stammer. The sheer force of his presence was mesmerizing.
“H-hi,” I breathed.
“Nice weather we have today,” Cezanne said.
“Er, yeah.”
Cade chuckled. “See you in class Laena,” he said then the three of them walked away. Caleb didn’t even talk to me. A smile from him would’ve brightened my morning more but he’d always leave me confused and rejected.
When I had recovered from Caleb’s lingering effect on me I remembered I was with someone. Arienne!!! She stood beside me in silence, slack-jawed.
“Uh, Arienne?”
When color returned to her face, I sensed the hysteria building. Uh oh.
“Helaena! I’m certainly going to punish you for this!”
“What? W-why?”
“Why didn’t you tell me you know Cezanne?” Arienne fumed.
“Oh… I-I’m sorry,”
She shot a disappointing look at me.
“And you said you said you're not interested in boys—”
“What? No—”
“Hey, he's ancient. He's god. You could at least introduce me right?" she said, raising one eyebrow.
“Oh. I-I’m sorry?” I tried to apologize.
“Sorry?! Ugh!” she shuddered. “We’ll be late. BUT I’ll see you at lunch.”
We reached my classroom. Arienne’s was on the second floor. She threw another disappointed look at me before she left.
Every once in a while I glanced at the clock, anxious for lunch to come and it came fast enough. Arienne, Jessica and Ellaine sat waiting for me at the edge of the long table in the cafeteria. I walked up to them nervously and sat in between Jessica and Ellaine.
“Tell us everything.” Arienne started.
I told them how I met Cezanne, that day when they gave me a ride home. I also told them about Caleb being my classmate.
“How can you be so lucky?” Arienne exclaimed.
“Lucky?”
“Helaena, we are you friends right?” Arienne said eyeing Jeck and Ellaine.
“Yes.” I said nervously.
“Okay…can we ask you a favor then?” Arienne said slowly.
I looked down at my half-emptied Chocoberry bottle, certain I was about to do something horrific.
“Helaena?”
“What?”
“Please let us meet them!” Arienne finally said.
“Them?” Just as I thought, I knew this was coming.
“Cezanne particularly, and his brothers of course,” Arienne said raising a finger in mid air.
“I can’t do that!” I said frantically, thinking about Caleb. Those three were always together.
“Of course you can!” Ellaine encouraged.
“That’s kind of embarrassing on my part,”
“What’s embarrassing about that?”
“We’re not that close…,”
“But they like you. You’re friends with them, right?”
“I don’t know…”
“Please say yes,” Arienne pleaded. Ellaine and Jessica looked hopeful, too.
“Fine!” I agreed. I regretted the words as soon as it came out of my mouth. I sighed. “I’ll do what I can,”
“Yes!” The three of them said in chorus.
The giggling and pulling went on until lunch was over. Arienne was the most excited about it.
History was the least favorite of my subjects. After spending the last three quarters of an hour barely awake, I was ready to drop.
I walked to my next class determined that I won’t let Caleb ruin my day. Ever since I met him, I couldn’t stop myself from worrying why he was behaving like that. Why he would look at me that way, always leaving me breathless. Why he would not speak to me when his brothers seemed to like the friendship. Why I didn’t hate him despite his behavior. Did I like him? Maybe, maybe not but it won’t matter anyway. He had completely ignored me.
I entered the Physics Lab and found my seat. I placed my manual on top of the table and started shuffling the pages absentmindedly.
When he entered the room, my stomach did a back flip. Caleb seemed rather keyed up. He sat at the opposite table next to Howard Polgen. Howard elbowed him and he returned it with a friendly grin. The rest of the class arrived over the next five minutes. Four people joined their table: Franco, Lyndon, Cassie and Eloise.
“Hello Caleb,” Eloise greeted. The two girls giggled when Caleb responded with a timid hi and smiled. If I try to talk to him, would he even respond like that or would he turn his back on me and walk away.
Grrr. I felt my temper rising. It was very hard to concentrate. I struggled to avoid looking at Caleb’s direction and constantly reminded myself that I wasn’t going to let him affect me.
I went home after a laborious day and found Sam talking to Sid and Venice over the phone. She pressed the button of the loud speaker so we could both hear them.
“Hi!” I chirped happily.
“Hey Laena, how’re things?” Sid asked.
“Fine, I just got home from school.” I said.
“We miss you,” I heard Venice said from the background.
“Oh I miss you more!” I returned.
They’re doing pretty well at Saddlerock University and were really enjoying college. Sid had signed up in an organization for charity which really surprised us all. Venice was so absorbed with her nursing subjects that she and Sid hardly see each other and the reason why they call less often.
I felt tired when I woke up in the morning. It was just daybreak. I lay on my bed for a moment and watched the dust swirl in the ray of sunlight that entered my room.
I jumped out of my bed and skipped to the bathroom. The weather was nice again so I decided to wear something light. I ate a heavy breakfast since last night’s dinner wasn’t what you call dinner at all then I marched down the driveway.
When I got to school I wasn’t the only one early. I spotted Arienne, Jessica and Ellaine sitting by the bench. Jessica saw me approaching.
“Helaena,” Jessica called beaming.
“Hi,” I greeted.
“Wow, we’re all here.”
We savored the free time we had before the start of our first
class.
Mrs. Talens didn’t arrive. A substitute teacher left us a seatwork to work on. As soon as he left, the classroom babble started.
“Helaena,” Cade said.
“Yes?”
“Nothing, I was just bored,” he said
“If Andrea sees you talking to me, she would destroy me,” I warned.
He cracked a grin. “Let her, your untouchable anyway,”
“What?”
Cade and I talked about a lot of things. He was indeed a good chatterer. He’s got humor, too.
“Uh, Cade, can I ask you something?”
“Sure,”
“You said the first time we met that I looked familiar to you,”
“Yes, I said that and you asked me if we’ve met before.”
“Who do you supposed I was?”
“Caleb’s girlfriend,”
“Oh,” My mind was suddenly racing and I felt my face grew hot. I tried to conceal it by looking down on my workbook.
“Where is she now?”
“Somewhere…she’s forgotten about my brother,”
“That’s… too bad,”
“Yes, I should know.” Cade’s eyes suddenly looked cheerless “Does he still love her?”
“Unequivocally,”
When the bell rang, we submitted our worksheets to Mr. Kon and walked towards our next class.
I wasn’t sure if what Cade had said helped me. So Caleb had a girlfriend. He must be really lonely. I felt sorry for him that the love of his life had left him and he still loves her. How could someone forget about a boy like that? I placed my thought on the idea that I looked like her. Maybe that’s the reason why he was trying to avoid me. I wasn’t helping him to move on.
When school day was finally over, the girls planned to go to the mall for a shopping trip. Jessica was going to buy her mom a birthday present. We met up at the lockers then walked together towards the parking lot.
We stopped at Ellaine’s car since it was parked nearest. Jessica will be riding with her while Arienne and me will take mine.
“Could we grab something to eat first? I’m famished!” Arienne said.
“Yeah, me too,” I agreed.
“Let’s eat at Von Marqi’s! I want buffalo wings!” Ellaine suggested with delight.
I was as excited as the girls were. It’s been too long since the last time we did something like this.
We arrived at the restaurant ten minutes after Ellaine and Jessica. I had to call Sam that I will be home late and I’ll have dinner with my friends. I was also out of fuel so I had to drop by the gasoline station.
We ate a lot until we reached the maximum capacity of our stomachs. We were ready to leave when three unexpected people showed up.
Arienne couldn’t believe her eyes and kept muttering how lucky we were. But I didn’t feel the same because Caleb was there. They were given the table next to us. Cade who never failed to say hi to me every time we see each other walked up to our table first. His two brothers followed.
“Helaena, didn't expect to see you here,” he said in his most usual smile.
“Yeah,” I stood up. “I’d like you to meet my friends: Jessica…Ellaine…and Arienne.” I paused. “This is Cade,”
“Hi,” he said beaming.
“And his brothers…Cezanne,”
“Nice to meet you,” Cezanne said and gave them all a hand shake. Arienne was speechless. “And,” I forced a smile making it as genuine as possible then nervously looked at him, “Caleb.”
And that was the first time he returned my attempt with a smile.
“Hello,” Caleb said.
“Are you leaving now?” Cezanne asked.
“Yes. We’re going to help Jessica get her mom a birthday present,”
“Well then, we’ll see you around,” he said. “It’s a pleasure meeting your friends,” then he gave the girls another devastatingly brilliant smile.
Arienne was ecstatic but I was beyond words. I was glad her luck reached me.
“I can’t believe it. He’s really something!” Arienne exclaimed.
“There’s something different about them,” Ellaine said.”
“What?” I asked, suddenly curious.
“I don’t know, maybe because they’re too intimidating.”
“Yes and they seem nice, so polite,” Jessica commented.
“I agree,” Arienne said.
After two hours of going in circles at the department store, Jessica found her mom a nice vase. Our next stop was at the bookstore for the gift wrappers then we stopped by at Adrian’s fast food. We feasted with ice cream, fries and soda. All the strolling consumed our sugars.
Ellaine and I sauntered to the parking lot after Jeck and Arienne left. When finally I was alone, what happened at the restaurant started to fill my thoughts. It was Caleb again. It’s too good to be true. I hate false hopes. Tomorrow he’ll hate me again.
I reached home in half an hour. Sam was sleeping on the couch. She must have dozed off while watching TV. I didn’t wake her up and went straight upstairs. I was pretty tired myself.
The next day, I can’t wait for Physics to come. History was almost over. I started to count backwards from sixty in my head to pass the final minute.
It was drizzling when I got out of the building. I yanked on my jacket and walked in a rush to get to my next class. I sheltered myself under the roof overhangs of the buildings I passed on the way. Thankfully I reached the Arts and Science Hall soon after the light drizzle turned into a rain. My other classmates were stuck in front of the gym.
I took four flights of stairs before I finally got to the Physics lab. The classroom was still empty. I sat to rest on the closest chair to the door. I had to catch my breath. I felt lightheaded.
The weather was cold again. I stood up and moved to my table. I yanked off my jacket and hung it on the back rest of the chair. I tied up my damp hair into a pony tail to keep it from my face.
I let out a long slow breath when suddenly from the across the room I heard loud cracking noise that almost made me fell right off my chair. I thought something broke. I turned to inspect where the noise came from but what I found was a boy standing in front of the glass mirror at the back of the lab. He was tall and statuesque, surrounded by what seemed like a veil of pale light. His eyes were glowing white which gradually turned darker as the glimmering light faded, starting from the edges until it was the color of hazel.
Caleb.
He looked as stunned as I was.
I was bewildered. I had to blink. I had to breathe. I looked around us to check if there were other witnesses but it was just the both of us inside the room. He didn’t use the door. I looked at the windows, he couldn’t have used that either. The staggering moment was interrupted as a flock of our classmates arrived.
As my senses came back to me, I felt nauseous and dizzy. While my classmates listened to Mr. Twain’s new lesson, I looked at Caleb questioningly, my expression demanding for an explanation. I couldn’t believe what I saw.
By the time the last bell rang, I felt like I was going to faint. I was worrying if I could even drive myself home safely. I carelessly shoved my things to my backpack and stood up slowly.
“Are you alright? You looked like a ghost,” my seatmate said.
I nodded and smiled weakly.
“Helaena,” a low familiar voice said. “Helaena,” he called again. I felt a shiver run down my spine. Caleb said my name for the first time. But it wasn’t only that that made me instantly nervous, scared and hyperventilating. His voice, the way he said my name, he sounded exactly like the voice in my dreams. My face went paler than pale. No, it couldn’t be him, I thought.
“I should get you home,” he said.
I was too overwhelmed by what transpired this afternoon, by my assumption and by the fact that Caleb just volunteered to solve my dilemma. It took a while before I unscrambled myself.
“I can drive,” I said feebly, my heart still pounding against my ribs.
“No, we’ll take your car if you want and get you home.” he demanded taking my backpack from me.
“I can drive,” I persisted.
“Helaena, please,” he pleaded.
I thought about it for a moment. I had to confront him, he owe me an explanation about what happened so I nodded.
We walked together down the building to the parking lot. I felt awkward with the closeness and he was carrying my things. The way was paved with an imaginary line and the spotlight was on. Everybody’s watching us. I tried to walk faster, careful not to fall, staying close to any surface that could assist my balance. He stayed close too and followed my pace.
When we reached the parking lot, I scanned the area. The Swiftster wasn’t there. I stared at Caleb’s angel face, his tight lips suddenly curved up.
“I told them not to wait for me,” he said, answering the question I just formed in my head.
“Give me your keys,” It was an order.
I tried to open my mouth to talk but I felt I would throw up if I did. My condition told me I really need someone to get me home, not him if my luck permits but here he stood, dazzling and unbelievable. I took the keys from my pocket and dropped it into his palm.
We drove out of the school, through the damp streets. I still couldn’t believe that I was sitting next to Caleb. I had sat next to him before but this was different—I felt ill but impossibly happy. Caleb’s face looked peaceful. I hate false hopes but maybe, just maybe, he decided to move on and he’s not mad at me anymore. Over the nausea and dizziness, I managed to smile but there are more pressing matters I had to deal with. I imagined what I would say to him.
“Caleb, how did you do that? You appeared out of thin air!”
“When did you learn how to use magic?”
“Caleb, this may sound stupid but you sounded like the voice in my dream… Were you the one who saved me at Cerra Ave?”
Ugh! I shuddered at the thought. I decided not tell him about the voice but I’d want to know how he did the magic stuff.
He parked in front of Samantha’s house. We met at the back of the car.
“Thank you,” I said as he handed my keys back.
He nodded once. “You better go inside now,”
“Caleb, why did you help me?” I hesitated. “I thought you don’t like me,”
He stared at me with careful eyes. “I was preventing something to happen,”
“Preventing what?” I asked curiously.
“I needed to make sure you’ll reach home safe and sound,” he said quietly.
“Oh,” I was sure I blushed. His response was driving me insane. He’s totally being nice to ME and that’s not him. But I was not to be distracted. I had to take advantage of the situation.
“It’s getting late,” he muttered.
“Caleb…” I paused. “I saw what happened in Physics…”
He went rigid, his hands clenched into a fist. Caleb closed his eyes and I wondered if I angered him.
“What are you talking about?” he said rather calm.
I just stared at him.
He looked away, deliberating. I waited for his response. Each passing second made me more curious then finally he returned my gaze.
“And what exactly did you see?” he said.
“You came out of I don’t know where…you where enveloped by some sort of light and your eyes, it was all white and then all of sudden its hazel!—How can you explain that?”
He looked away again, smiling that most enthralling smile and somehow it irritates me.
“I know it may sound stupid but that’s what I saw,” I said, my lips trembling.
“I have to go,” he said. He was avoiding the subject. He wanted to leave and I didn’t want him to. Out of my frustration, I laughed at myself.
“You must think I’m crazy.” I said.
He looked puzzled.
“Helaena, I don’t think your crazy. It’s just that I can’t answer any of your questions,” he said in an agonized tone.
“Why?” I asked but he just stared at me again. I studied his face and tried to read his thoughts but couldn’t.
“Fine. It doesn't matter to me anyway. And tomorrow you’ll start hating me again.” From the bottom of my heart, its true. Whatever kind of bizarre stuff he's involved with, I don't care and I'm not scared. I just wish he would tell me.
“Why did you think that?”
I bit my lip and didn’t answer. I was hurting.
“Sleep well Helaena.” I heard him said, his voice—a lullaby to me. And I watched Caleb’s back disappear in the dark street of Wisteria Wing.
That night, I lay fitfully in bed, trying to get myself to sleep but couldn’t. I switched on the light and pulled myself up. I looked at the clock: it was quarter-past twelve.
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