Chapter 4

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four

far.from.normal

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I guess my torture continues even after school hours.

It's not everyday I will look up into the sky and giving whoever up there the stink eye. I rarely complain, despite my destitute mindset. I rarely get excited about things either. If my mood were a stationery, it'd be a very straight, very sturdy ruler. The one made from stainless steel.

But today has proved to be particularly annoying. I can't help glaring at the clouds. Even then, since spring is ending, the clouds are disappearing too.

Summer is near. My last summer.

I should be happy about this. If there were one thing in life that could turn the straight ruler that is my mood into flexible rubber, it's summer.

The keyword here is 'should', because obviously, I'm not.

Firstly, my mom texted me that she's not going to be able to pick me up. My house is not that far from school, so the drive shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, but it's still a considerably long walk.

Secondly, there's another ball of sunshine within my eyesight.

Normally, I won't bother myself with noticing people. But Orion has practically shoved his presence towards me, and now it's hard not to notice him when he's around.

Of course, he's surrounded by people. After all, he's like a shining star. He can't help his twinkle. The one called Jake is included. I have to mentally kick myself for recognizing Jake. I guess Orion's assessment of Jake really stuck to me. There's a brown-skinned girl with choker too, talking to him and lightly punching him from time to time. I guess that's Marian. The girl who will kick my ass for not having the desire to eat a lot. There's also another girl. This one is short-haired and so pretty she nearly outshines Orion. But she's quiet and doesn't seem to like to talk, preferring to just smile and nod at her friends.

Just before I take the first step into the road, I feel a hand on my shoulder. "Hey."

I try not to turn around. "What do you want?"

"I've just been talking about you to my bandmates," Orion smiles as he points to the people behind him. They're all looking at me and smiling and waving. I pretend that I don't see them.

"That's so honest of you," I say.

"No, silly. I've been talking good things about you." He laughs as if I've just said something funny. "I was just telling them about how good you are with words." He pauses. "Written words, since you're so stingy with them verbally."

I don't know how to answer to that comment. I nod to the people behind him, since they seem like they're expecting some sort of reaction. I really want to go home now.

"Usually your mom picks you up, right? Why are you walking home?"

I don't know how he knows about that little detail from my life. "She's not coming today."

"Ah... is your house close?"

We live in a nice neighborhood where 90% of the students are within 10 blocks of our private school. So of course he knows that the answer will be yes. A lot of students start driving when they reach grade 11. But I haven't bothered learning to drive because-

Well, you know.

"I can drive you home." He says.

"Absolutely not."

"Why? Are you afraid I'm going to kidnap you?"

I narrow my eyes. "Well, some serial killers do have friendly faces, but no. That's not why."

"Thank you for the friendly face commentary! I'm not sure that's what guys like to hear, but I'll take that."

"Hmm."

"Is that an improvement?" he grins again. I guess this is what having a puppy feels like. "Usually I get nothing. But now I'm getting a 'hmmm'."

"I'm going home."

"Hey, no, no. Come on, let me drive you home. That's the least thing I can do for all your future help."

✦

I don't know how it happened, but I end up in Orion's car. It's not a new car like most of what the students have, but it's a nice car nonetheless. It feels like him somehow. He has the whole bonanza: car perfume, leather seat, even little toys attached into the dashboard. It must feel so nice to have something decorated to feel like you.

I've input my address to his GPS so he's only following the robotic lady voice. I try to look at the window as much as possible to give as little window (see what I did there) as possible for a conversation.

Since it's Orion, however, he finds a reason. Right now, it's about a song.

"Oh, I love it when he sings," he says right when a male singing voice comes into play. "You know he writes his own songs based on his and his family's experiences? It's so cool."

I try to listen to some of the lyrics. And this song is not just like the usual song where the singer repeats the same tumblr-y reff over and over again. It's a storytelling told in singing. I feel privileged being able to hear this, as if a friend is telling me a secret about his life.

"What's his name?" I ask. I might want to listen more of his music later.

Orion stops the car. My head jerks forward because of the sudden movement. "Shut up."

I haven't been speaking much, and I just continue to do so.

"Shut up, just shut up, Lucine!" His whole face becomes animated.

I shrug, hoping the my gesture remind him that I have been shutting up.

"You mean you don't know Warden Boseman? He's like, the biggest and coolest singer-songwriter in this decade!"

"I don't really listen music from this decade."

His mouth makes a perfect O. He shakes his head. "I shouldn't be surprised. What, so you only listen to the 'classics'? The Beatles, Carpenter, and the likes?"

None of the words make any sense to me. "I have a CD collection of Mozart Music for babies from when I was younger."

At this point, his lips might as well be on the floor. "I'm sorry, did you say CD?"

"I said CD."

"Just making sure that my ears are alright," he scratches the back of his head. Finally, he starts driving again. "Please tell me you know what spotify is."

"Spo-tee-fy?"

"Oh my god, where have you been living? You have a phone right?" He glances towards me. I don't want to jeopardize both of our lives now, so I take out my phone for easier inspection. It's not new, but it's not old either. My mom got it for me on my 15th birthday, because she wanted easier access to me.

I use nothing on my phone except for the regular texting and regular calling. Plus the web browser. That's the extent of my knowledge of smartphones. I prefer to do most stuff on my laptop, anyway. And having too much apps cluttering my phone can be distracting.

I nearly shriek when Orion snatches my phone and starts scrolling. "No fingerprint scan?!" He shrieks first. He spends two more seconds on my phone before another shrieks comes out from his phone. "Seriously, your phone is more boring than the one I had in 2011, and it was a blackberry."

"You had a phone when you were 9?"

"You didn't?"

I take back my phone, somehow annoyed by his barrages of questions and implications about how not very normal my life is.

"I'm sorry if the whole sum of me doesn't really conform to your idea of what normal is. But I've never pretended to be anything otherwise, haven't I? It's not rocket science, Orion. Weird people know that they're weird. You don't need to rub my nose on it every time it's brought up."

My little outburst surprises me. In fact, the way I feel right now surprises me. It's been a while, a very long while, since the last time I've ever felt like this: heart palpitations, sweat covering the entirety of my skin, eyes burning with rage. I'm not someone who gets angry. Or happy. Or excited. Or anything. But now-

"You called my name," Orion finally says after a long bouts of silence. "Whoa, I'm sorry I know that it's not the point of your speech, which is a great speech, by the way. I'm sorry. I didn't realize that I've been a jerk. I'm not going to point out your weirdness in minutely basis, and for the record, I don't think it's a bad thing per se." He pauses. "Your... ah, your weirdness."

"Well, I wish in my next life, I'll be born as someone quite normal."

He blinks a few times. "Oh. Oh, right. You're still doing that thing."

The rest of the drive is silent. Orion sometimes glances at me, and I try to not glance at him back. After he gets into my home, he smiles at me and tell me sorry one more time before driving off.

I go back to my room. My room is huge but sparse. I don't have a lot of furniture or entertainment inside my room. Mostly I just sleep and wait until my parents at home so that we can play a good house.

My room is huge, but there's only one bed in it. There was supposed to be two beds, but it wasn't there anymore. There was supposed to be a piano but it wasn't there anymore. In the back of my mind, though, the piano and the extra bed still exist. They exist and they haunt me whenever I look at the empty space.

I google Warden Boseman and I find out more of his songs. They're so good and catchy. They make my fingers drum on the table.

And then I do something catastrophic. I download the piano app on my phone and then attempt to replicate the song.

But of course, my fingers are faulty and they keep freezing mid-notes.

I delete the app right away and go back to bed.

After all, what makes me think that I deserve a little bit of fun?

I just need to get through these 9 months.