"You don't like it, dear? Is the flavour off?" my step mum, or mum as I often call her, asked me from her seat across the table. She was in the process of wiping Van's face when she must have noticed my solemn mood. I have never known Van to eat neatly. "I love it, honey. It's very delicious. It might be one of your best yet," my dad pipped in. He hummed in delight to sell his words. "No one was talking to you," my mum stuck her tongue out at him. "I was talking to our eldest, but I'm glad you like it," she smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek. They were so cute. I want that for me and Kiara. "Love it," he emphasised with a wide smile. "I love it too, mummy," Nessa said as she bounced in her seat. Her little fists clutched her baby spoon like a spear. I have never known Nessa to sit still. "Me too, mummy," Van chipped in. "I can tell. Even your cheeks are enjoying it," mum giggled as she wiped off the remaining food that stuck to his chubby cheeks. "I think it's
The following morning, I got up earlier than usual. Kiara and I were the heads of the student council and we held meetings before school started on Mondays. I quickly and silently got dressed and then made my way downstairs. Unexpectedly, Daniel was sitting in the kitchen. His laptop light illuminated his hunched figure. I shook my head; he was going to ruin his eyes. "What the hell Dan? Don't you sleep?" I grumbled and grabbed a slice of bread. "I have exams coming up," he stated. He was staring intently at the screen. I leaned against the counter and ted my plain slice of bread as I watched him. Daniel never asked me to help him study, despite knowing that I could and would help him in a heartbeat. I think he thinks that we're enemies in the academic field. Competition is good and can really help with confidence, so I was rooting for him to beat one of my scores. "What are you going to do about Kiara and that other girl?" his question came a bit muffled as he was chewing on h
Mindy firmly latched on to my arm as I looked around for Kiara. Mindy's grip was tight like she was afraid I would run off if she loosened it a little. If I knew where Kiki was, I probably would have run off. I knew that I wouldn't be able to focus if Kiki was still upset with me. After our fight yesterday, I could barely eat, so before school was the optimum time to air our grievances. "Zacky, walk me to class, please?" Mindy looked up at me through her lashes. Her nails were still embedded in my arm, it didn't hurt but it was uncomfortable. Truthfully, Mindy was such a beautiful person and I could see myself falling for her if I had never met Kiki. "Um," I started and glanced around the sparse crowd walking through the halls. It was no use; Kiara was long gone by now. Perhaps I should call her, there was a high per cent chance that she would not answer me. She rarely answered phone calls, to begin with. The chances of her answering when she was upset are next to nothing. "E
For the first time in the longest while, I was awake during my classes. However, sticking to my original Zack-esque quality, I wasn't paying attention to the lesson; I had bigger things to deal with at the moment. That bigger thing was how I planned to make peace with Kiara. I ran through tons of solutions.Buy her a new scented candle? No, she was strangely very picky about those things. It had to be the right colour and glass shape or she would hide it under her bathroom sink. Take her to see a scary movie? There was one coming out soon, but I hated the horror genre so that wouldn't work. I'll put it on the back burner though. Make peace with Kevin?I couldn't stop myself from laughing out loud. It wasn't even a snort but a full-on laugh which resulted in the teacher sending me a glare for disturbing his class. I covered it up as best as I could with a cough and the lesson moved on like I hadn't just laughed at the death of Martin Luther King Jr. "Hey," someone psst at me. I tur
I drove quietly while Kiara continued to pretend to be asleep. I wanted to say something to her but, over the years of knowing her, I knew she wouldn't want to talk at the moment. The radio created background noise as I took the route to Kiara's and my secret place. While I wanted to respect Kiara's decision to stay silent, I couldn't add another thing for us to avoid on our list. If there is one thing I learned from my parents, it would be that communication is a driver of relationships. "I told Zoa to raincheck on the shopping trip. I hope you don't mind me doing so,'' I said after a few more minutes of silence. It was up to me to take the leap. As expected, Kiara did not say anything. ''Mindy told me she saw you crying. What's that about?'' I tried a different angle. Once again, she kept quiet. Her silence did nothing but, irritate me. Kiara knew I knew she wasn't sleeping and still she decided that ignoring me was the best option. ''Could you please stop ignoring me? It'
"Are you going to stay over tonight?" I asked as we drove to my house. We have been chit-chatting on and off since I drove out of Cave Cream's car park. The random pop song acted as a filler for the silence. "I'm not sure yet. If it's too late then yes," she replied as she held her hand outside the window. Kiara usually preferred to drive with the windows down. I always had to make sure I had the inside of my car clean because the dust and dirt from the outside made their way in. I never knew why she liked to have the window down. I never asked and she never told me; I figured it was just one of those things that don't necessarily have a reason. "Are you going to cook dinner? I'm hungry," Kiki said, turning her attention to me. "Why didn't you say something sooner? I could have stopped somewhere," I glanced over at her. "Don't worry, I'll cook something for you. Do you want anything in particular?"
''Go get them, best friend,'' I said, ''I'm proud of you," I slowly left the school car park, occasionally looking back to see Kiki waving at me. She was so cute. Even though her cuteness could make the sun seem brighter, my mood was slowly going down because I had to go to my mum's house today. Before my dad met and married my step mum, Kristen, we lived close to my mum. Or perhaps she lived close to us. My mum has her own home in many countries but, she chose to live way too close to her ex-husband. Her many houses were the same homes she would either make us run away to or leave me there for hours while she went out. If she didn't do that, she would randomly pop up at our old house, and I knew that her actions bothered my dad; he never said anything about it to me. Since she would show up whenever she wanted to, I saw her at least four times a week. That was during the days when she wasn't off somewhere doing god knows what. When my dad became official with Kristen, she still sh
"What?" I blinked slowly. This isn't real; I was obviously trapped in some sort of twisted Alice in Wonderland wormhole. "He's so shocked he can't even say anything," the crowd laughed. Shocked doesn't even begin to describe what I was feeling. I didn't even know what I felt if I was being honest. Maybe disbelief is the word I was looking for. "Why would you spring something like this on me, and what went off in your head that made you think this was the way to do it?" I snapped. "Zack, you're embarrassing me," mum gritted her teeth. Her once happy tv appearance was gone. "I'm embarrassing you? I'm not the one who shoved a camera in her son's face even though he's repeated told you that he hates it. I'm not the one who had this huge thing in front of a fucking live studio audience. Have you lived in the limelight so long that you can't distinguish reality from this fake world?" I gestured to the crowd besi