Forget The First (On Hold For Major Editing And Rewriting)

5. "All right ladies, give the man some room!"

I click my phone off and turn in search of Joel. Eventually, I find him in the stairwell with at least 6 girls hanging all over him. 

"All right ladies, give the man some room!" I spot a girl that I know to have a boyfriend.

"Really? Calla? You have a boyfriend," she gives me a guilty look.

"Go! Now! Shoo!" The girls disperse, leaving just Joel standing there with a cheeky grin.

"Uh, Thanks for that."

"Yeah, girls around here aren't exactly subtle." Joel inches closer to me, and I'm entranced by his beautiful eyes.

"Um, let's get you to lunch." I blurt snapping myself out of the trance I was in. Joel holds up a brown paper bag with a crown drawn on it.

"I've got that covered" he grins eyeing my lunch bag.

"and it looks like you do as well, so let's go somewhere else, somewhere that is quieter than the lunch room is." Joel confuses the hell out of me, one moment he wants nothing to do with me, the next he wants to get me alone.

"Yeah, I do have lunch covered, but I thought you don't do the whole 'friend' thing." I make air quotes around the word friend.

"Oh I don't, but I don't feel like going to the cafeteria. Plus clearly, you don't either, because you asked me where I was." I stare at his breathtakingly gorgeous chocolate orbs; willing him to say that he was just kidding, but he never does, he just grins. 

"Fine you win, there is a wooded area just across the street that cool?" he looks away from me and laughs.

"Yeah, that actually sounds like exactly what I need right now." Joel gives me a genuine smile; his teeth are pearly white and he has a little gap in between his two front teeth, it kinda cute. Joel's smile is so infectious, I can't help but smile back.

"You should smile more, it looks good on you." Damn, he is confusing.

"Follow me." We walk down the rest of the stairs and out the back exit. Before we cross the street Joel grabs my hand, but once we get across he drops it. I decide not to question why he grabbed my hand, but it still confuses me. 

"Alright now if we go through that little opening there we will be in a little field surrounded by trees."

"Ok, sounds great." We walk through the opening and enter my safe haven. Not many people know about this area, most people think it's just a forest. I look at Joel and there is a certain lightness to his eyes that I haven't seen before.

"Wow! It is so beautiful."

"Yeah, that was my reaction too when I first discovered this place." Joel looks over at me and I can feel him admiring my face.

"What?" I laugh, my shoulders gently bobbing up an down.

"Nothing, it's just you look so much more calm and happy here versus back there in the school." He's right I am happier out here.

"Yeah, I mean it's really peaceful here, whereas in school there are just assholes everywhere." I sit down on the soft grass and motion for Joel to sit down beside me. Joel sits next to me a little bit closer than I thought he would. I pull my knees close to my body and fiddle with the grass under the arch that my legs make. Silence falls upon us, but it's not uncomfortable, it's almost calming. 

"So when did you discover this place?" Joel breaks the silence and I have mixed emotions about it, on one hand, the silence was peaceful and calm and on the other hand, I got to hear Joel's voice.

"It was freshman year, I had a free period so I came outside to take some pictures of the forest and there turned out to be this space. It's so calming I just come here to think, I'm not sure anybody else knows about this place." I reminisce about the best day of my life.