The Wallflower Ch 10

This is not a very long chapter, just so you know. I promise the next chapter will be back to the usual 4 pages. Tune in on November 2015. I'll be joining in on the National Novel Writing Month. I'll be posting chapters of my new novel. It will be in the BDSM genre. 50,000 words, which is about five chapters plus two Wallflower chapters. So, rate/comment/email me. Hope you enjoy the chapter :D

P..S Thanks for whoever spotted Nicholas's age discrepancy. I went back to look at my character profiles and realized he is in fact 23. I'll edit it when I do my final draft.

*****

'What am I going to do with my life...I can't spend it the way it is now.'

Lily sighed as she looked at the fridge. One...two...three...four...five...six... It had been six weeks since she had graduated from high school. Other than her recent change in lifestyle, friends, and living situation, not much had changed. With the way things were going in her life, she'd be an old, forty-year old woman with nothing going on in her life, but a sadistic Spirit to keep her company.

'Oh fun,'

Lily thought, rolling her eyes as she flipped some of the bacon in the frying pan. When she placed the cooked bacon on plate, she looked back at the calendar. Her bland future was not the only thing that had Lily begrudging the coming days of her life. Next month was the first days of college. An experience that she wouldn't be able to get to be apart of. The bitter thoughts of the unfairness of it all clouded her brain and made its way down to the tip of her tongue. Lily didn't want to say it. She didn't want to add being a bitter old woman on top of her life sentence. But the words tickled her tongue, urging her to at least say it once.

"All that hard work...and all I get is a dead end minimum wage job," Lily said aloud as she pushed the scrambled eggs around in the skillet. "No...because of some bitch who has the audacity to call herself a mom." Lily's temperature rose as her anger wanted to erupt with just thinking about her.

She hadn't thought of her mom in weeks, and she liked it that way. The woman was apart of her past, and that is where Lily wanted her to stay. Her mom never called her to see if she was OK, sick, or even possibly dead, so Lily held the same attitude towards her. She didn't even entertain any wishes of misfortune on her either. Her mom couldn't do anything to hurt her anymore. Lily just had to pick up the pieces of her life and go on from there. The only piece that seemed to be in place was her job.

'I mean I like my job, but...I can't waste my life away there. Only thing I can do is get an education.'

And getting an education cost money. Money she was surprisingly able to save because of low rent and the few times she actually needed to use her car. But of course she didn't have the kind of money to be able to go to a university at the moment. Only a community college. Lily mentally sighed at the thought. She had been a straight A student who was apart of every honor society available and graduated top ten percent. Lily smirked to herself as she flipped over the pancakes. But there were so many other students who had backgrounds the same as hers, but only a select few got full scholarships.

At first, she had protested the thought of not going to college. She had the grades, the awards, and the extra curricular activities. A school had to give her enough money to go there without paying a dime. That's when she realized reality was a real bitch. And that reality was no matter how good her grades were, unless she was some six-foot heavy bound football player with an impressive record no school was going to give her a full scholarship. And America is supposed to be supporting academics? Supporting academics her ass.

At that point of her life, Lily thought community college was out of the question, but at this stage in her life, she had no choice. She had to apply to a community college, fill out FAFSA, and unfortunately, apply for a student loan that would take forever to pay off. But, hey, she had to do what she had to do.

"What's with the long face, cowgirl," she heard Nicholas say behind her. Lily looked behind her to find Nicholas lumbering into the room with an extreme case of bed head and dressed in only his boxers. Lily no longer stared at him in his state of undress. This was now her normal to serve Nicholas breakfast in his underwear.

"Nothing," she muttered. "Just thinking."

"About what?" Nicholas asked as he looked into the fridge for his personal carton of orange juice.

"About going to college." Lily reached into the cupboard and got a plate to put the pancakes on as they began to turn a golden brown.

"You should go. You're smart. Where do you want to go?" Lily glanced out of the side of her eye to see Nicholas leaned onto the fridge, drinking his orange juice while staring at her through his hair.

"The local community college." She flipped the pancakes onto the plate, but stopped as she heard Nicholas splutter and choke on his juice. She turned around and saw Nicholas was bent over and coughing while turning red. Lily quickly placed the plate on the counter top and hurried over to him to give him a couple of smacks on the back.

"What in the blue devil is going on?" Mrs. Yates said, appearing in the doorway.

"Nicholas just choked on some juice is all." Lily looked down at Nicholas, rubbing his back as his coughs subsided. Nicholas began to stand up while gasping for air. He wiped way the drool before fixating his eyes on Lily.

"Are...are you...out of your...mind?" Nicholas asked while still gasping for breath. Lily stared at him confused.

"What are you talking about?"

Nicholas let out s final cough before straightening up. "Lily, you have to be out of your mind to go to community college."

It felt like a weight fell on Lily's head. When being around Nicholas, this feeling became the usual. "You have got to be kidding me!" Lily raised up her arms in exasperation as she walked back to the stove to check on breakfast. "I think you're nearly choking to death, but what you're really doing is just being a drama queen!"

"Did I miss something?" Mrs. Yates asked as she sat down at the table

"Nicholas is having a drama queen moment," Lily murmured.

"Well I just think that you're too smart to be going to community college." Nicholas interjected. It's for people who didn't do good in highschool, don't know what they want to do, or-"

"Or what Nicholas?" Lily turned around and placed her hand on her hip. "Broke? Because that's what I am. I work a minimum wage job, have to room with you and a sadistic ghost for low rent, and end up only having enough to pay for groceries and maybe a few extra things. I don't have enough to pay for community college even when I get paid! I have to take out a student loan just for that!"

"Why don't you just apply for a scholarship like everyone else?"

"Scholarship month has already past. I have to use my own money to pay off the tuition, classes, and books."

Nicholas and Lily stared off against each other. She, daring for him to say anything else, stared back with crackling fire in her eyes. He, trying to think of something to get her to abandon her thoughts of going to community college, scrunched his face but realized this was one battle he was going to lose.

"You're eggs and bacon are done, hon," Mrs. Yates interrupted while sipping on coffee that Lily didn't even notice she had gotten during their exchange. Lily tore her eyes away from Nicholas to take the skillets off the heat and scrape them onto a plate. She sat each plate down before retrieving a plate for herself.

When she turned back around, Lily saw Nicholas's back as he walked out of the kitchen. "Aren't you going to eat breakfast?" she yelled behind him.

"I don't feel like eating," he called back, barely containing his anger as he trudged up the stairs. It took all the will Lily had to not slam the porcelain plate on the table as she sat across from Mrs. Yates.

'That fucking, ungrateful, sonofa-'

"He really can be insufferable," Mrs. Yates remarked before pressing her lips to her mug of coffee. Lily gave a small snort in response as she reached over to put a few stacks of pancakes on her plate.

"More like bipolar. One moment he has this carefree attitude, the next he acts as if I pissed in his cereal."

"Maybe it's because he likes you."

Lily's face heated from the possibility but easily pushed it aside and put a piece of pancake in her mouth. "We're just friends."

"I never inferred you were anything else, dearie. It's just obvious." Mrs. Yates got up from her seat as she fetched herself a plate. "If you never came to live here, he'd still have kept that woman around both here and at work. What happened at that shop was a disaster waiting to happen. Just too bad that you had to get caught up in all that."

It was just Lily's luck, or Anna Belle's stupidity, that the unstable woman tried to attack her while Nicholas was right beside her. Now that Lily really thought about it, the incident was definitely due to Anna Belle's stupidity. Nicholas was Anna Belle's boss. How did the woman think she had the balls to get in his way, literally, cause a scene in front of everyone, and try to attack someone in HIS shop right in front of him? Lily rolled her eyes at the remembrance of the whole thing.

'He really needs to pick his stalkers better,'

Lily thought as she speared another piece of pancake to put in her mouth.

At least Anna Belle would no longer be a problem. According to Nicholas's employees, the chick was in a mental hospital. Lily knew the chick was crazy, but not to that extent. But then again all Anna Belle really needed was a little "push" off the deep end.

Lily's fork clattered onto her syrup laden plate as the thought flickered like a sparking lighter and then grew to consume her entire brain. When she was first told of Anna Belle's fate, she had chalked it up to the chick over reacting to Nicholas cutting any ties with her and as a result her obsession with him consumed her. But then again, what had caused Nicholas's epileptic attack after he left? It could have very well have been stress. But with the Spirit inside of him, Lily could not rule out that He caused Anna Belle's insanity. Whatever he did, it was worse than what he had done to Louis. The possibility of something worse than his "pranks" were unfathomable. Could the Spirit really be that cruel?

But anything was possible when the Spirit was involved.

~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~

"What in the world did you do to Nick?" Sal asked the moment she walked through the door with his lunch.

"What are you taking about?" Lily asked with a blank stare.

"Ever since he got here this morning he's been acting like a total heel." Sal looked behind him, causing Lily's to follow along with him. He was right. Nicholas's hold demeanor was rigid and tight as he worked on a man's tattoo. It was so bad that it looked like he was glaring at his own creation before he was even finished. Nothing about him gave way the usual care free personality he had at his job.

"He's just being a drama queen," Lily rolled her eyes. "And who says I did anything?"

Sal turned around and gave her a look that said "It's so freaking obvious."

"Never have I seen Nicholas come here with a moody expression like that until you started rooming with him. And he's only like that when you two get into a disagreement. It's like a raincloud hovering over him and unfortunately, for us, we get wet too. So spill it."

'Are you serious?! What is Nicholas's deal? It's just community college for God's sake!'

"I decided I wanted to go to college," Lily said.

A pause in the conversation lingered between her and Sal. Sal look at her, expecting more. But when none came he tried to urge her for more information.

"And yooooourrrree...moving out?"

"Nope I'm staying where I'm at."

"You're going to do something extreme to pay for it?"

"No."

"Then what's he so pissed about?" A tinge of annoyance was in his words as he crossed his arms.

"He hates the fact that I'm going to apply for community college."

Sal stared at her dumbstruck as he took the time to absorb the lunacy of the whole situation. "I'm going to kick his ass. He's been barking at us all day and a real stick in the mud because of something as small as that?" Sal let out an exasperated sigh as he rubbed his temple. "I've been friends with him for years and I wonder what has kept me from clocking him in the back of the head."

"Because you work for me." Lily and Sal both jumped when Nicholas's cold voice came from behind her. Lily turned around and met with the hardened gray stare. She glanced back to see that even Sal had powered down the moxy he had just worked up a few seconds ago. It was almost comical to see the Goliath of a man yielding to the silent power of David.

"And I would appreciate it if you would keep my personal life out of the shop," Nicholas said, interrupting her thoughts and brought her eyes back to him. He looked down at the bagged lunch in her hands and took it from her. He muttered a small thanks and went off to the back room.

Sal and Lily stared off after him, ensuring that he had shut the door before going back to the conversation. "Where did he come from?" Sal whispered, not taking any chances that Nick would play another Houdini act.

"I thought you would know," Lily whispered back, while looking behind her. "Maybe we were just too preoccupied to notice him." Lily gave a short shrug before turning her body towards the exit. "Well since he doesn't look like he wants to talk to me, I'll be going. I'll see you tomorrow, Sal." Lily gave Sal a wave before stepping out of the shop.

She let in the humidified air into her lungs and let out the steam through her nostrils. Lily looked up at the sun beating down on her. God, today was hot. Had to be the hottest day of the summer. And she chose today to go back to her highschool to get her transcript which was on the other side of town.

'It's not like I don't have gas in my car. I'll just drive over there.'

Even the drive over there wouldn't even put much of a dent in her gas. Lily let out a sigh as she walked back to the townhouse. It was a pain to have to think about money. Living around it for so long, she was just so immune to it. But for the next part of her adult life she'll have to worry about paying her tuition, paying off student loans and working extra jobs to pay if off. Lily pushed the hair out of her face as the humidity plus the appending frustration weighed on top of her.

By the time she got to her car, her body was dripping with sweat, which frustrated her further.

'C'mon, Lily. Stop stressing out. Don't stress out about it now. All you're doing is getting your transcript.

' Lily let out a breath as she turned the ignition on and put the car in drive.

But the more she kept telling herself to pull it together, the more her vision began to swim. The more her ears started to tune out the everyday noise of the streets. The more she could hear...something. It was whispery and faint but then grew to a dark and guttural laugh. The laugh was on the borderline of violent and sadistic but yet maintained its sanity. Knowing that its very existence, though only audible, crawled underneath her skin. When Lily felt the crawling of fingers climbing up her legs, she opened her eyes and screamed.

Slamming on the brakes, she screeched to a halt just behind the stop line at the red light. Lily pushed back her hair and rested her head against the steering wheel while blinking rapidly to ensure that she was still awake. When did she black out in the first place? Maybe it was the stress. "Why would I be stressed out from going back to highschool?" Lily asked herself, annoyed at the fact that she nearly got into an accident because of some stress.

Angry beeping from behind alerted her to the changing light. She pressed her foot on the accelerator as she headed towards her destination. Lily thanked the Lord that the school was only a few blocks away, but when she pulled up in front, she froze in her seat. Now she remembered why this place gave her anxiety. Of course there was Brandon and his sill relentless abuse. Abuse...yeah, that's what Nicholas called it.

Lily shrugged off the ever-present Brandon drama and unbuckled her seatbelt. But no, the problem with this school was not only just Brandon. It was the crowds of nameless people that disturbed her. The students that either stared in enjoyment as if your life was an entertainment reality TV show, wondering what will be today's episode. Other students would join in with Brandon and hurl insults at her while they witnessed him physically abuse her as if she deserved it. And then there were the few that turned their heads to see what was going on and then turn their head as if they didn't care to get involved. There wasn't one person who ever came to her rescue. There was no hero in her story.

'Suck it up, Lily,'

she scolded herself as she felt the impending tears behind her eyes.

'It was in highschool. Get over it.'

Even though she scolded herself, a small voice inside her said

'Yeah, but higschool was two months ago. And higschool lasted for four years...and so will college.'

Before the smaller voice gained any more power, she launched herself out of her car and clomped across the parking lot. She pulled the door open to the front entrance of the school and made her way to the front office. It was now or never.

Lily pushed open the door to see a familiar face. Miss Jolene. She was one of the counselors at the school that Lily was assigned to. Miss Jolene was one of the few counselors that took her job seriously. She wanted the students that were assigned to her to reach their maximum potential, whether it be trying to go to Stanford or go straight to work. And if she felt that a student was, as she said, "undervaluing themselves" then she would say so. Lily just imagined the look of disappointment on Miss Jolene's face when she tells her why she's here.

"Hey, honey," Miss Jolene got up from her seat and held her arms out, welcoming Lily in for a hug. Lily accepted the hug as Miss Jolene rubbed her back with a warmness that spread throughout Lily. Miss Jolene patted her on the back and stepped back to sit back in front of the computer. "How's it goin', since you walked across that stage from all of this?" she said motioning about the building itself.

"I'm fine," Lily said, putting on a weak smile. "I've been working and got myself an apartment."

"What about school?" Miss Jolene turned from her computer with hands brought together and a searching stare that knew Lily was holding something back.

Lily let out a small sigh and thought to herself

'Here we go.'

"That's why I'm here. I need my transcript to apply...to community college. I know it's late but I need to do this or else I never will," Lily rushed out.

Miss Jolene gave her an expressionless look before asking her next question. "Lily, I thought you wanted to go to the big university here. I know you'd do well in the classes."

What was Lily to say? The truth was she didn't have the money for university. The truth was her mom basically forgot she had a daughter and kicked her out. The truth was she lived in a sinister apartment because she didn't have a place to go. None of it sounded good... so she lied.

"I just want to get the general education courses out of the way before transferring to the university."

"Lily...hon...please stop those lies." Miss Jolene looked her straight in the eye. The look that was as stern as iron and as sharp as a harpoon. "You and I both know your AP scores. If you went to community college for the reason you gave me, you would only be there for one semester as a part time student taking one or two classes. And honey, you will be bored."