Were You Expecting Flowers? ✔️

10

You don't know what love is
Until you've learned the meaning of the blues
Until you've loved a love you had to loose
You don't know what love is
____________________

I KNOCKED on the boys' room door and was greeted by Jay.

"Heyo, Isle Orphan. I didn't know you were coming over." He said.

"Hello to you too." I mocked, entering.

Carlos looked up from his laptop. "I invited her."

Jay raised an eyebrow at him, a smirk dancing on his lips. Carlos responded with an overexaggerated eyeroll, then turned to me.

"It is a pain living with this guy." He said in all seriousness.

I laughed. "I bet."

Jay wagged his finger at Carlos. "I can beat you up anytime, remember that." He said, taking his blue and yellow jacket off the clothes hanger and reaching for his bag.

"Heading over to the auditorium?" I asked, settling into a chair and resting my feet on the desk.

"Yeah. Lonnie's waiting."

This time it was Carlos who raised an eyebrow at him, adding in loud smooching noises, which caused me to snort in laughter.

"You guys are so lucky we're not on the Isle right now." Jay said, halfway out the door, "Or else you'd be toast. And for the record, Lonnie is actually teaching me something that isn't as boring as computer science."

"Hey, I love that class." Carlos argued, before Jay shut the door behind him.

I looked around the room. It wasn't the first time I've been in here, but the decorations they keep putting up always amuses me.

I sat up, realizing I forgot a part of my daily routine.

"How are you?" I asked Carlos, who stopped typing to acknowledge me.

He smiled slightly. "This is something you're gonna ask everyday?" He said.

"Did you just picked that up?" I answered before explaining, "You said it makes you feel better."

He set his laptop aside and ran his gloved hand through his hair. "I mean, I didn't expect you to be so committed to it you know." He said, "And I know you're not used to caring about anyone other than yourself, so-"

"I'm trying, Carlos." I cut him off, my tone indicating I was a little disappointed that he expected me to be nothing more than just cold and heartless.

"No, I didn't mean it like that." He spluttered. He crunched his face up and exhaled. "Sorry."

"Hey, I thought we agreed on removing that word from your vocabulary." I said.

He gulped. "Right." He said, "What I meant was, I don't want to make you do something you're not comfortable with. Like Evie, I could tell she had a hard time being nice to me at first."

"That's just because everyone's first instinct on the Isle is to be scary."

"I know. And I loathed that."

"Yeah, so let me try to not be scary for a minute, okay?" I said, "How was your day, Carlos?"

He leaned back, as if he was suddenly taken over by exhaustion. "Terrible." He confessed, "Ben had Jay and I try out for tourney today, and as pure usual, Jay was amazing at it. I, on the other hand, was horrible. The coach literally suggested for me to try out band."