Chapter 10: Strange Situations

I woke up the next day, feeling much better. I could tell simply by me waking up before my alarm sounded, like usual. Everything seemed right with the world again. I had successfully fooled everyone I loved about what happened to my face, and now all I had to do was make sure Kyle held up his end of our deal. I was also feeling excited about something… other than school that is. It was still a few months off, but I was really looking forward to the X-Factor auditions. Riley’s reaction the previous evening really sent me over the edge in thinking I could really have a shot at it. The best part of it was if it didn’t work out how Riley believed it would, I wouldn’t have the shame of it put on my name. It would be just a random nobody named Harry Styles who failed, and not I, Marcel Sty.

I lied in bed thinking about all this for a few minutes, before happily throwing the covers from my body, and kicking my legs over the side of my bed. I stood up, stretching my arms up towards the ceiling, until I felt all my bones crack and relax. I found my glasses on their usual place on the night stand and proceeded to walk over to my bathroom. I flipped the switch to let the room flood with light. I squinted my eyes a bit in the mirror, investigating my jaw line closer once again. The bruise, and constant reminder of my lie, was even less noticeable than the day before. I let out a sigh of relief knowing I was practically scotch free of anyone finding out about it. I stepped away from the mirror, and turned towards the shower. I pulled the lever to hot, and waited for it to heat up a bit before stepping inside.

I got myself ready as usual, and hung up the Harry Styles clothing, I had tiredly tossed on the floor before bed the previous night, back in the closet. I found my bag and headed down the stairs. I walked into the kitchen to grab quick breakfast before school, and oddly my mum wasn’t in there. I assumed she was already getting ready for work, so I quickly ate a small roll and drank some juice before heading out the door to see if Riley was walking with me, or if stupid Kyle picked her up once again.

It was another cloudy, yet lovely day out. I looped my arm into the second strap of my backpack while walking off around the corner to Riley’s house. I really wanted to walk with her. For some reason I had a small and weird amount of confidence from her reaction the previous night. By no means was I feeling I could tell her how I felt, it would’ve been extremely inappropriate timing, but I just liked her reaction to me acting a bit more buoyant.

I stepped onto her porch like usual, perhaps standing up a bit straighter than usual, and knocked a few hard times across the metal door. There wasn’t a note and I hadn’t gotten a text, so I figured she must have still been at home. My assumptions were proven correct when I heard the rumbling of footsteps coming down the steps inside and a figure pass by in front of the door. I stepped back a few steps as door knob twisted and opened to reveal a perky and bubbly Riley.

She exited her house and let the close slam behind her. “Hey Marcel!”

“Hey Rils. You seem in a good mood this morning.”

“I’m just excited to see you I guess.” She smiled a big cheeky grin at me.

My heart fluttered as we began the walk to school side by side. “R-really? Why’s that?”

She playfully bumped into my side, while holding the straps to her own bag. “Well… it may be because I have a sort of surprise for you.”

I rose my eyebrows in wonder and confusion. “A surprise? What sort of surprise?”

She smiled widely at me once again. I wasn’t sure if I should be worried. Riley did naturally have a colorful personality, but she was never quite like this. She looked straight out ahead of us before looking back at me even more excited yet. “Well… when I got home last night, I did a lot of thinking about what we had said, what had happened, and just everything.” My heart began to beat faster not really sure what to expect. “The part where you had said you didn’t think you could talk to girls really got to me. I wondered why I was so different.” I shot her a surprised face at what I believed she might have been on the verge of saying. “Then it hit me… I’m different because I am the only girl you ever talk to! It frustrated me because I know what a wonderful guy you are, Marcel, and I know that if you go on the X-Factor you are going to have to get a lot more comfortable talking to girls and women.”

My heart immediately sank as her rant began in a completely different direction. I sighed and shook my head, “Where are you going with this, Rils?”

She pushed me again lightly in the arm. “Let me finish!” She stated matter-of-factly. “Where was I?...Oh, well you need to become more familiarized with how to schmooze a woman if you want a shot past the judge’s decisions. Most of the voters are teenaged girls, and if you want them to vote for you, you are going to need to wow them with your personality, which I know is there. You just need to let people see it!”

“And?” I asked getting a little impatient as to where she possibly could be going with this.

“AND… I am going to set you up on a blind date!” She stated proudly.

“What?! Riley… no I can’t.” I shook my head in refusal. My heart sank even lower. Not only did the person I loved not know my feelings, she was trying to play matchmaker with me.

She grinned. “I knew you’d react this way, but relax Marcel! It will be a great experience. Just a nice evening out with a girl, one of my close friends actually, that’s all. It doesn’t need to be anything serious obviously. Just a learning experience. Can you handle that?”

I walked in silence for a few moments, trying to decide what to say next. “Who is it Riley?” I tried to ask calmly and rationally, as I didn’t want to upset her. She did go through the trouble of trying to help me, even though I didn’t really want this particular type of help.

She grinned happily at my ability to calm quickly. “It’s Hayden! I set the whole thing up. She said she would love it if you took her out on a date!”

I rolled my eyes to the side, making sure she didn’t catch it. “Doesn’t she like… hate me? Isn’t she the one who always told you, you were stupid to be friends with someone like me? Why would she ever agree to that?”

Riley looked forward, seemingly stunned by my words. She began to stutter out, “I-I uh… no, Marcel. How could you possibly think that?”

I faced her with a serious face. “I’ve heard her say it to you before… Besides, other than that it’s obvious. It’s how everyone feels about me.” I let my shoulders slump a little at the last sentence.

Her mouth fell open and her excited attitude fell all the same as well. “No, Marcel. I- she wouldn’t have agreed to it otherwise. I have her number, just text her and set up a date. Like I said before, it doesn’t need to mean anything. Treat it strictly as a learning experience.” I still wasn’t convinced and she slipped her bottom lip out in a pout and began to bat her eyelashes. “Please, Marcel? I planned this all out. Do it for me?”

I had a feeling she knew with that last question I had to comply. I rolled my eyes a bit more playfully. “Fine…but I think it’s going to be really awkward. Are you sure you didn’t force her into it?”

There wasn’t any hesitation in her voice, but I felt like there most likely should have been. “No! Not at all!”

We began to arrive on the school grounds, and I wanted to put an end to the particular conversation for a while. “Okay… Riley… I will do it for you… and for a… learning experience… just give me her number. I’ll try to figure something out.”

“Great!” she beamed. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a little slip of paper.
She handed it to me, and I unfolded it in between my fingers. There were several numbers, Hayden’s number I assumed. I looked at Riley with slanted eyebrows and squinted eyes. “You really have been planning this out, huh?”

“I sure have!” We opened the double doors to school only to be greeted by my least favorite people, Kyle, Seth, and a few others of their little posy.

I don’t know how Kyle always knew exactly when Riley and I would arrive. I found it extremely creepy and it slightly angered me that he was always there to swoop in. He wrapped an arm around Riley from the opposite side I stood on and kissed her on the cheek, making her giggle. “Hey babe!” I noticed he hardly ever used her name. It was usually form of pet name. I looked away, not really sure what to do. I feared that if I ventured off too far I’d find myself being tracked down without the protective eyes of Riley in a back hallway, shoved up against a locker by Seth or one of the other three guys.

Lost in my thoughts I hadn’t realized Riley’s mood change from her giggle to completely pissed off. I turned back to them to see her staring intently on Seth. Kyle was talking to everyone about plans for the rest of the week as we slowly walked from the entrance of the school. I wanted to tap Riley to get her to snap out of her trance, but I wasn’t sure what she would do. Her face looked wild, and I didn’t want her to say anything to Seth.

Unfortunately I didn’t have to interrupt for her to take action. When there was a few seconds of lull in the conversation, she spoke loudly directed at Seth. “So Seth… I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

Everyone looked at each other with wide and worried faces. I faced Kyle who looked the most worried of all, besides me. Seth continued to play it cool, and I realized with a tad bit of relief that Kyle had talked to him about the whole situation. “Yeah… what about?”

Her voice rose a couple octaves. “You know perfectly well Seth, you little asshole! What the hell were you thinking when you punched Marcel!”

My pounded hard in my chest. I desperately wanted to leave the conversation, but knew I couldn’t as Riley threw Kyle’s arm from her waist, and temporarily moved closer to me. Normally I would have loved this, but a harsh face grew across Kyle, directed strictly at me. Riley’s attention, however, remained on Seth. “It was an accident, Riley! I was just trying to have…umm… a bit of fun.”

I didn’t know how… but somehow we came up with similar cover stories. It still didn’t settle with Riley she flung from my side, to right in Seth’s face. His eyes grew wide as he wasn’t expecting this. Riley spoke loudly, “Are you kidding me!? You punched someone Seth! You don’t get to do that without some sort of resolution!...Even with it being some sort of stupid accident. It should have never happened in the first place!”

Kyle tried to interject, moving his attention back to Riley. “Babe… it was just an accident, Seth didn’t mean to—,”

She turned from pointing her finger into Seth’s chest, momentarily at Kyle. “You knew about this? And you didn’t do anything about it?!”

“I just- I…”Kyle stuttered looking at the ground. I had never seen him put so much in his place. Riley could be scary when she was angry. I tried to stay out of it all by keeping on the outskirts of all the action. My eyes were wide, not sure what to expect out of all this. I was feeling helpless again. A feeling I absolutely loathed.

Riley shut Kyle up by waving her hand at him. She was definitely in control of this particular situation. We attracted the attention of a few more people in the hallway. There was just a certain fire about Riley. She faced Seth again, taking a step into him. He even looked somewhat intimidated, not expecting this from little Riley. “Well… what is done is done now. I saw that bruise though, Seth! It was even the day after, so I don’t even want to know what it looked like when it happened!”

She shrugged his shoulders. “What do you want me to do then?”

She pointed back at me, “Fucking apologize. It’s the least you can do!”

My eyes met with Seth, and I quickly looked around trying to escape the situation. I stood there frozen as Seth pushed past Riley, with a quick glance at Kyle. Kyle gave him a short nod, encouraging him to do it and get it over with.

Seth stepped in front of me. His eyes looked down upon me. His jaw and fists were clenched. I then met his eyes with mine again. I stood up straight, but felt afraid and down that Riley once again had to stick up for me. I could tell Seth wanted to actually punch me so this apology wasn’t for nothing. He spoke harshly, yet tried his hardest to sound genuine. “Marcel… I’m sorry for what happened. I won’t,” He looked over at Kyle one more time. “…let it happen again.”

I nodded my head and tried not to stutter, “Yeah… it’s uh. Fine.”

Seth backed away, and I scanned the crowd for everyone’s faces. Everyone who wasn’t in the conversation went on with their activities with wide faces. Kyle stared sternly at me, and pleased with Seth. My eyes locked with Riley who had finally calmed a bit. Her face was still somewhat angered, but there was something relieved about it as well. She gave me a short smirk letting me know, from her perspective, everything was going to be okay. Somehow this didn’t make my heart slow down. I didn’t know what was going to happen from then.

Notes

Here is an update for you guys! I am so sorry if there are more mistakes than usual in this chapter. I wrote it rather quickly because I wanted to get an update in before I went away for the weekend with no internet!

I hope you like it anyways! Comment, comment, comment!... because I love to read them! ;)

What do think of Riley setting Marcel up? What do you think of the confrontation? What do you think will happen from here?

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Thanks for reading and being patient!