Chapter 3
"Thanks for getting my bag. I...I. I’m Ariadne "
Okay? I can't believe I gave my name to a stranger and that too without being asked. Embarrassment crawled up my face and I felt like a total idiot. He glanced up at me for a moment and then he walked away. My brows rose as I watched his back. His reaction didn't make me feel any better.
Okay? Uhm what was up with the rude behavior?
I staggered my way to the exit and eventually made my way home.
"Could someone get the dishes done? ". Mom immediately shouted as soon as I walked in through the door.
It wasn't like there was anyone else in the house. I headed straight for the stairs and completely ignored her. Halfway up the stairs I heard her call my name. I turned to find her holding a spatula in her hand.
"Hey honey what's wrong", she asked
"Nothing mom "
I headed up our room, going straight for the bathroom. A few minutes later, I stepped out and put on a dress. Then I headed downstairs only to find Ariana sitting comfortably with a bowl of pasta. I grabbed my bowl and sat across from her. Mom exchanged a weird look with Ariana, but I ignored them.
Tuesday morning as I walked to my locker and completely ignored everyone, I saw Maisie busy shoving her tongue down Uriel, captain of the football team's throat but they barely spared me a glance. If people wanted to ignore me, I might as well ignore them back. The locker beside mine on the right opened but I ignored that as well.
"Hey... PSs", someone whisper yelled. I didn't even bother so much as to blink because I didn't care. I grabbed my books and quietly began to walk away. Suddenly, I felt a hand on my arm, and I turned in time to find the face of the newbie staring down at me. I quickly shrugged his hand away and headed for the classroom. He scoffed arrogantly and grabbed my arm once again, pulling me to a place I didn't even know.
I struggled in his hold while everyone awkwardly stared at the two of us. He didn't even seem to care about the fact that he was causing a scene though. My heart was pounding fast as he pulled me into the music room. Finally, he let my hand go once we were alone. I rolled my eyes and folded my hands across my chest. He licked his lips slowly and took a step away from me so I could finally release the breath I was holding.
"Ariadne...... ", he drawled out "it's a beautiful name. You have a beautiful name"
I didn't know what to say at that moment, so I kept quiet. He took another step and I tried to ignore his movements. I didn't feel comfortable when he began to pace around. In the next second I felt his hand was on my jaw and my eyes widened in surprise.
"So beautiful ", he leaned in and whispered again to me in a husky tone. He licked his lips and before I could blink, those very lips were on top of mine. He gently tilted my head to the side, sucked on my bottom lip for a microsecond and then left me there... Frozen like Greek statue. I don't know how I managed to get through the rest of the day or how I got home but when did, I skipped dinner and went straight to bed.
Wednesday and Thursday I managed to evade the newbie, I only went in minutes after the bell rang, wrote whatever I could and quickly disappeared into the girl’s bathroom. Afraid that the crazy guy may decide to wait it out, I spent 2 hours every day in there doing nothing except reading harlequin books. And believe it or not, I may have grabbed them from Ariana's shelf.
Everyone would have gone home by the time I came out of hiding and it worked so well that I stuck to it on Friday as well.
I smiled as I came out of the bathroom feeling like I just won the lottery, because I had avoided him all week. Suddenly I felt a hand cup my mouth from behind, blocking out any sounds of protests. My eyes widened in surprise, heart racing as I got dragged back into the bathroom. The closed behind us and I felt panic flare in every cell of my body, momentarily immobilizing me. The hand left my mouth and I turned instantly to stare at his face. Suddenly, he pushed my back harshly against the wall.
"Did you think you could hide from me? ", he asked making me shake my head desperately while he laughed.
"I didn't think so too princess... But you managed to, didn't you?"
Princess?
Again, I shook my head no.
"I'm going to let you go but you better not scream... ", he whispered, and I immediately nodded to him. "Oh wait, go ahead and scream all you want. I forgot everybody's already left. Even the janitor closed a few minutes ago"
The thought of being alone with the crazy guy in front of me in the girl’s bathroom scared the living hell out of me and he must have read my thoughts from my face because he smiled.
"you're so adorable you know", he took a step back and admired my face? i wasn't even sure what he was doing at this point.
Adorable? How was a person who literally had her eyeballs bulging out of their sockets from fear looking adorable to him? Oh God, was he a psychopath?
I continued to stare up at him and when he started taking steps towards me again, I began to walk backwards and away from him. He grabbed my shoulder harshly and I could feel his hot breath fan my face. My lips trembled as I thought of how he'd stolen my first kiss without my consent. Would he kiss me again? He let me go suddenly and turned his back to me. His fingers brushed through his already messy looking hair, and he groaned. I took that slim chance to calculate and made my move for the door. I headed straight for the door but before I could reach it, he grabbed my hand out of nowhere.
"Not trying to act smart now, are we? ", he asked. I shook my head no and he laughed. He really has a beautiful laughter. Once again, he turned his back on me.
"I've only been here for 3weeks, but you drive me crazy, you know. One moment you're this cute, adorable girl who barely says a word to anyone and the next it's like you're this person who just must give everyone a piece of her mind"
He has been here for what now? 3weeks? How in cupid's name didn't I notice?
My brain wasn't processing everything he'd said. How the hell didn't I know he'd been here for that long? My mind tried and failed to wrap around what he was saying and failed. A sudden thought stopped me in my tracks, completely baffling my mind. Is he mistaking the two of us as one person?
Does he think I'm Ariana? If he had only been here for 3weeks, it was likely he wouldn't be able to tell the difference between Ariana and me. I blinked up at him and stared at his reflection in the mirror behind him. He stared at my face for a couple of seconds through the mirror, his eyes darkening a little before I blinked again, and he had turned around and kissed me again.
Like hello? I'm not a kiss all you want buffet!. Had he even heard of something called consent?
I held onto the sink for support as my weak knees failed me. This kiss wasn't slow like the first, this one was almost bruising.
My back was pressed against the sink harshly once again and I whimpered in pain. His tongue forcefully pushing into my mouth and made me freeze in my spot, my breath hitched, coming in gasps. My hands reflexively pounded at his chest when my oxygen deficient brain began to blur my vision, but the crazy guy gripped my hip and pushed his thigh in between my legs. I screamed; too bad everything came out muffled.
A second later, he let me go and swiftly walked out.
Like somebody please teach that boy some manners for heaven's sake!
I moved my shaky legs, forcing myself to stare at my image in the mirror. My lips were red and puffy, my cheeks were flushed, and my hair disheveled. I took a moment to slowly brush my hands through my hair and then took another to calm my erratic breathing before I finally walked out. Somehow my legs managed to carry me home and I headed straight for the bedroom again.
I LOVE WRITING
Chapter 4 Ariana was already crowding the couch and I didn't really care. I called my part time job and apologized, gave her a flimsy excuse that I was sick. It wasn’t believable, but she bought it. I spent the rest of the weekend ignoring everyone. I ignored their questions, ignored their stares and I ignored everything. On Monday, I woke up with a start. Pillow drenched in sweat, I sat on my bed and tried to recollect the dream I just had. I couldn't. "Hey, are you okay? ", Ariana asked I ignored her and headed for the bathroom. It wasn't like we we're the best of friends. I really applaud her for trying but she really didn't have to. I was dreading school because of a certain crazy guy and for a moment I was tempted to skip school, but the thought of failing an exam changed my mind. I took a quick bath, pulled on black jeans and a plain T-shirt. Then I headed down to the kitchen to grab some juice. Mom smiled at me, and I sent a fake smile back to her. She nodded when I po
Chapter 5 He grabbed my hand forcefully dragged me to a mini-SUV parked by the side lot. I would have protested but I couldn’t because of our agreement this morning. I watched him maneuver the car out of the school lot and internally screamed for help. His phone rang loudly disturbing the peace of the vehicle and he scrunched up his face. Whoever was calling wasn’t someone Jeong Gyu was very fond of. I ignored him and focused on my phone, making doodles on the blank screen. After about ten minutes of driving, he pulled up in front of an old building. Honestly, if this was a date, it was the worst possible place a person could thing of. But of course, coming from a person like him wouldn’t be a surprise. “Just stay in the car and find something to do”, he instructed before getting out and banging the car. I raised a brow as I watched him disappear into the building. I was not about to wait around like a goody-two shoes, hell no. I immediately scurried out of the car like a house ra
Chapter 6 26TH JANUARY 1984 I was probably hallucinating but I heard someone drag in a breath when I was dumped like a pile of trash on the floor. I saw different pairs of boots, but his familiar black ones grabbed my attention just like the first day. I dared not look at his face because I could feel the anger rolling off him in waves. I felt the shift in the air, and I just wanted to willing faint at that moment. Unfortunately, even my own body was working against me now. There was movement and the room went from hot to chilly within a second. There was a split-second before muffled moans of pain filled the room. I struggled to apprehend the current situation, but Jeon Gyu was already on top of the other boy, punching his face into a pulp. It was in that instance that I noticed something; a detail that I hadn’t bothered with earlier. The other boy had a brown mullet. “You can-have-every girl you-want, Taemin but you can’t lay eyes on what’s-mine. You dared to even touch-her! And
Chapter 7 “Eon Jin" Someone called and I turned from my locker to find a girl. She had beautiful brown eyes and long chestnut hair. It was the girl from last week. The one who had taken over Ericka's locker. She caught me staring and pierced me with a venomous stare. To be fair, she did look like a snake, that was not metaphorical in the least. I must have forgotten I was on her hate-to-associate-with list and quickly averted my eyes while closing my locker. I heard her pink heels as she walked away. Taking a deep breath, I headed for the classroom when someone bumped my shoulder into the locker. The person didn't even bother to apologize. When I turned, I saw someone in a hoodie slip into the crowd of students and disappear. I got to the entrance of the classroom before my slow brain realized that I had forgotten to grab my books. So, I headed back. Halfway there, I heard hushed whispers and murmurs. Curiosity got the better of me and I inched closer to the voices. I rounded the
Chapter 8 1ST FEBRUARY 1984 The next couple of days were very hectic, emotionally, and physically. The calls kept coming in randomly and ending abruptly. Almost like this person was playing a game of hide-and-seek with me. At first, I had labelled them as regular prank calls until that night. It was pouring suddenly, half of Seoul area especially Gangnam had flooded, and people could barely go anywhere. I was left alone in the house after I refused to accompany Ana and mom for a seafood dine-out. Honestly, all I wanted was some oysters and shrimps, but my laziness wouldn’t allow me to get off the couch and go with them. I settled for takeout but with the roads looking so bad I had to cancel that as well. The option was to text Ana to get me some seafood on her way back, assuming she does see my text at all. My phone beeped out of the blue and I felt relieved that she had texted back. I did see a text, but it was from a number I didn’t recognize. “i’m watchIng you…0_0” Completely fr
Chapter 95TH FEBRUARY 1984 “Maybe we can do something at swim team for our final project”, Daniel Wong said as we headed for lunch. I smiled lightly at the idea. It was actually one of the best we’ve been able to come up with over the last couple of days and I wasn’t about to dismiss it. Somi giggled excitedly, and for some reason I think the rest of us knew exactly why. Ritz however remained silent as our pack of four settled into a not-so comfortable silence. To be honest, I’m kind of glad that I’m not alone anymore (even if it’s only been for a couple of days). This project has really taken my mind off so many things, including Jeongguk. We’ve been dating in secret for some months now and he’s been very good to me. Occasionally, he does fly into a jealous rage and then devour my lips when he manages to catch me alone, like the time he found me in the Math teacher’s office giggling about a not-so funny Dad joke. He had given me a stern disapproving look and then during lunch, he
Chapter 10 I sighed when I entered our shared bedroom. Ana was seated on her bed, swiping videos on TikTok. Earlier on today, Ariana had been feeling down with a cold and I had to go through the whole day switching clothes and attending all her classes. I scoffed unbelievably at how naïve I had been and how Mom had manipulated me. It was all her idea because she didn’t want her favorite daughter to miss a class. Anger bubbled inside of me, and I tried to suppress it. I can't believe I spent the whole day pretending to be Ariana and all for what? so she could go get herself all dolled up? Now that I look more carefully, I can see that she’s in black cargo pants: something she hadn’t bothered to add to her wardrobe previously. One thing was clear to me, Ariana was just a selfish brat with whom I unfortunately share the same face. Sadly, I as an elder sister was willing to stick my neck at a guillotine for her. I ignored her as best as I could and slipped my cover over my head. I had
Chapter 11 He walked in with an air of supremacy. And my eyes followed him as he sat right across from me. Our eyes locked briefly, his sparkling with surprise and mine from admiration and shock. There was absolutely no mistaking it, it was my favorite artist. V. For years, I have always wondered how I would react when I finally met him. I had always wanted to remain calm and collected, didn’t want to be remembered as a crazy fangirl. His hair was fluffy pink and he had two pink stud earrings in one ear. He had no make-up on, but he was still unarguably hot by being comfortable in his own skin. I could even count all his moles from this distance and lord, I forgot those are one of my favorite things about him. He smiled at me, and all the colors of the rainbow exploded right in front of me. I felt a nudge from my side and looked up to see Jeongguk’ s disapproving eyes. I forced some composure on and looked down at my plate. “thought you said you couldn’t make it”, someone asked “Y