The Time Until (7 page)

“It was bound to happen sooner or later.” His
blasé attitude about this monumental occasion makes Sam and I laugh even
more.
 
Quentin cracks a small knowing
smile and Ethan congratulates him with a hardy slap on the back.

“Okay,” Sam begins after catching her breath, “
tell
us about this mystery girl that has pushed you through
the cursing wall.” Sam and I place our heads in our hands and throw the most
innocent look on our faces, in perfect sync.
 
We both stare at him.

It doesn’t take long for Quentin to cave and
start laughing.

“She’s an interesting girl,” he starts to
explain, but stops there.
 
Quentin looks
over my shoulder, as I suddenly feel someone behind us.
 
Sam and I spin around as if on cue.
 
The girl jumps back a few steps.

She’s pretty in a
skater,
I hate the world, kind of way.
 
She has
dark brown hair that’s almost black when compared to the bright purple
streaks.
 
She’s wearing dark colored
make-up, but only enough to be noticeable, not enough to scream ‘look at
me.’
 
She’s wearing a black Sex Pistols
t-shirt and jeans with large holes in the knees.
 
Her only pieces of jewelry are the spiked
choker around her neck and the two studs in each of her ears.

“Whoa!” she looks freaked. “That was freaky.”
She glances at Sam and me for a while.
 
We look at each other at the same time, in perfect sync, then back to
her.

“Wow, that’s like really scary shit.” She seems
to be calming down a little as she gets used to us.
 
Sam and I look at each other again and then
flash her almost perfectly identical smiles.

We’re like a pair of twins that look nothing
alike.
 
It’s a game we’ve perfected over
the years.

“Are they always this creepy?” she asks over
our shoulders.
 
Ethan shrugs.

“You’ve caught them in a good mood,” he answers
her. “They haven’t done the evil twin bit in a long time.” Suddenly we both
jump to our feet and step toward her.
 
She retreats a few steps as if we’re going to eat her.

“Name’s Sam Cohn.”
Talking means the game is over.
 
We can
mimic movements with little cues, but we can’t match our voices or words.
 
That takes way too much guess work.

“Name’s Alan Green,” I reach my hand out to
her.
 
She hesitantly grasps it and shakes
it gingerly.
 
She still seems cautious
around us and I start to think we went a little far with her.
 
Sam just grins at her.

“Arianna,” she introduces, “Arianna Legacy.”
Sam can’t seem to hold in her snort and I have to shoot her a wicked look to
get her to stop.

“It’s not a stripper name,” Quentin answers the
question no one asked, but everyone was thinking. “I asked earlier.”

The look that Arianna is giving Quentin right
now doesn’t leave much in the way of imagination.
 
It doesn’t take a lot to know what
unimaginable things this girl is thinking of doing to him.
 
I wonder if that’s the reason things are rocky
between them.
 
Knowing Quentin, the
question was asked as a joke, but he doesn’t do the tone right.
 
People nearly always mistake it as him being
mean or rude.

 
Sam
steps up close to me and grabs my arm in a tight embrace.
 
She leans over, whispers in my ear and I love
the press of her body on mine.

“I guarantee those two will be dating each
other by the time we start college,” Sam whispers.
 
I can’t even think about that far in
advance.
 
Sam smiles a cocky smile and
backs away from me.

“Holy shit!”
Arianna
exclaims, she’s pointing at Sam and me. “You guys are the inseparable couple
that’s not a couple.” And just for good measure, “Right?”
 
I shrug, I’ve heard the rumors.

Sam and I are really conjoined twins that were
surgically removed.

Sam is secretly having my baby.

I’m really her slave and am only allowed out
during the day with her.

The list goes on and on.
 
Sam and I usually ignore them.
 
We know our relationship and no one else
needs to.

“That’s them.
 
The inseparable couple of idiots.”
Ethan answers
her with a large grin on his face.
 
I
groan and roll my eyes.

“You guys are the talk of the school.” She
seems way too excited about this.

“Are you guys really separated twins that fell
in love and now live in incestuous sin?” Okay, I haven’t heard that one
yet.
 
From the look on Sam’s face, she
has.

“That’s obviously not the truth, idiot,”
Quentin chimes in.
 
Arianna flashes him a
glare able to freeze Hell.

“What is your problem, ass-hat?” Arianna pushes
past Sam and me as she steps up to Quentin.
 
Quentin puffs out his chest, as if expecting a
fight.

“I think my problem is pretty obvious,” he
counters, “don’t you?” Arianna raises an eyebrow.

“Obviously not, dickhead!” she tells him.

Quentin’s face starts to turn red with anger.

“Who’re you calling a dickhead, you
purple-haired hippy?” he retorts.

The two bounce insults off each other for few
more minutes before the bell rings for us to go back to class.
 
By that time, they seem to be having more fun
than actually being angry at each other.
 
Sam leans into me again as we enter the classroom.

“See, told you they were meant to be.”

I’m still on the fence about it though.

“You still coming over
tonight right?”
Sam asks as she takes the seat next to me.
 
I nod.

“Good.
 
My dad says he has something to talk to me about and I didn’t like the
way he said it.” She starts fidgeting.

“I think I’ll need back-up,” she adds quickly.

“Don’t worry,” I tell her, “you’ll definitely
have your incestuous sinner of a twin there to ‘comfort’ you when your father
tells you how he knows about the evil relationship you are in.”

Sam giggles to my rather conspicuous criticism
of the new rumor, but she still seems distracted and lost in thought.

She’s not telling something me about this meeting
tonight with her father.

Present Day

“How did that happen?” I ask raising one
eyebrow.
 
Quentin shrugs and Arianna
blushes.
 
I can’t help but smile.
 
They are cute together despite the
differences.
 
There’s a story there that
I would like to hear someday.

“Things just happen to happen,” Quentin offers.

“But you guys hated each other in high school.”
Quentin looks at Arianna and I can see something pass between them.

“We didn’t really hate each other,” he turns back
to me, “just didn’t see eye to eye on things.” I think I understand.
 
While he’s talking, I notice something
flashing around in his mouth.

“Is that a stud in your tongue?” I can’t believe
it.
 
Quentin has changed — his father
would never have allowed that.
 
He simply
smiles without opening his mouth and nods.

“You have ruined him,” I playfully yell at
Arianna.
 
She has a big smile on her
face.

“Wasn’t that hard to do.”

“Well, I’m happy for both of you,” I tell them.
“And I know Sam will be ecstatic.
 
You know
she always said there was something between you two.” They share a look of
concern between them.
 
I don’t like it.

“What?” Quentin shakes his head.

“No, you don’t get to ignore the question.” I’m
starting to get angry again.
 
Why does
everyone look like someone just died?
 
And suddenly I don’t feel so good.

What if it’s Sam?

What if they don’t want to tell me that she’s
dead?
 
Is that why everyone looks sad and
concerned when I bring it up?

The little ball of lava in my chest is now a ball
of fire and growing.

What the hell is everyone’s problem?
 
What, they don’t think I deserve to know that
my best friend is dead?!
 
They think I’m
too weak to handle those emotions?
 
Who
are they to decide what’s best for me like that?
 
They have no right to keep this from me!
 
I’ve clenched my fists so tight that my
knuckles are white and pain is starting to build in my palms.

I really want to hit someone right now.

Arianna seems to notice my emotions.
 
She’s been almost studying my face since she
got here.
 
She looks concerned and really
surprised at my reaction.

I can’t say I blame her; I’m surprised as well.

“Alan, it’s not like that,” she tells me. “Sam is
fine, no change from what we’re told.” I start to breathe and try to get the
ball under control.
 
Okay, so that kind
of thought process is not a good thing.
 
I try to swallow the fire down, but I’m having a bit of trouble with it
this time.
 
My thoughts are still crazy —
jumping from knowing she’s fine to imagining her dead.
 
It’s making it hard to control my lava stream.
 
I have to think she’s alive.
 
She has to be alive, why else would the nurse
say I could see her tomorrow?

No, I
know
she’s alive.

“Yeah, we just feel like you should be prepared in
case she doesn’t wake up,” Quentin adds.
 
Arianna’s eyes grow wide and she hits him in the arm.
 
He utters a curse when he realizes what he
said.
 
I’m still controlling my emotions,
but what he’s saying is making sense.
 
I
already had those thoughts cross my mind a few times.

Doesn’t mean
I want to be reminded of it, you prick?!

That irrational side of my brain is really making
it hard to restrain myself.

Calm down.
 
I know there is a chance she won’t wake up.
 
Calm down.
 
Quentin is not a bad guy.
 
He means
no harm.
 
Calm down.

I take a deep breath in and hold it.
 
My vision clears and I feel the calm.

I slowly let the breath out, calming prickles
dance from my lungs down to my feet.

“I know there is a chance that she won’t wake up.”
I’m a lot more breathy than I want to be.
 
Calming
myself
is more tiring than running the
mile in PE.

Another deep breath.

“I have to think positive,” I admit, “or I’ll go
crazy.”

Arianna and Quentin look at me with a bit of
sympathy in their eyes.
 
They both have
known Sam and I since we were 11 — Quentin a little longer.
 
They know how close we are and all that we
went through together.
 
They have the
right to be sympathetic to my pain.

“So tell me how things are going.
 
I haven’t talked to either of you in a long
time.” I finally have gotten myself under control again.
 
The ball is still there applying pressure to
my rib cage, but I’m able to keep it down.

For now.

“It’s great.
 
Fresno State is awesome.” Quentin answers quickly, thankful for a change
of subject.

“That’s good,” I reply. “Anyone we know go there
besides you two?”

Another shared look between the two of them and my
ball is rattling the cage again.

“Katelyn Price,” Arianna says quietly.

Katelyn’s name still affects me, even to this
day.
 
My breath hitches and my heart
skips a single beat.

After all these years, she still has that effect
on me.

Katelyn Price, my one
regret
.

“Does she know about this?” I ask, maybe a little
too hopeful.
 
Arianna shakes her head no.

“We haven’t told her yet,” she adds.

“Wait for a while.
 
She might not even come.” She nods her understanding.
 
Kate and I didn’t exactly end on good
terms.
 
She never talked to me again
after the epic graduation blow out
we
had.

I have no one to blame but myself though.

Rapidly, my arm starts to ache as if in response
to our conversation.
 
They told me that
the pain can be intense, they weren’t kidding.
 
This is pain.
 
I hit the red call
button and a middle-aged nurse walks in.

“You okay?” Stupid question, but I let it slide
since the pain in my arm is keeping the flames in my chest at bay.

“My arm hurts a lot,” I tell her and she nods as
she goes to get my painkillers.
 
Arianna
looks at me with concern.

“That happen a lot?” she asks me.
 
I nod my head as the nurse returns.
 
Immediately, the pain starts to subside.
 
Arianna looks at Quentin as I start to close
my eyes.

“Maybe we should go now.” I try to open my eyes,
but the pain medicine is making me groggy and it’s very difficult to do.
 
I do manage to see Quentin nod before they
close completely.