Love Bites

The twins’ alarms went off in unison the next morning. They got ready for school, ate breakfast, and were ready when Blaine and Abby arrived to pick them up.

Getting to school early, they met up with Yuki and Yoshi, got their class schedules and compared them.

Cory had two classes with Yuki, one with Abby, and another with Kayla and Yoshi.

Kayla had one with everyone except Blaine, as they were all juniors except for him.

Yuki had three with Yoshi, two with Cory and one with the others, sharing PE with Cory.

Blaine unfortunately didn’t have any classes with them because of the grade difference.

By the time they were done, everyone was confused and had a good laugh.

The school didn’t offer Japanese as a language class, but both Yuki and Yoshi said they would help Kayla learn in their free time.

Both were fluent in English, so her offer was accepted with either had a problem, but all three knew it was in gesture only. When Yuki found out that Kayla spoke both French and Spanish, Kayla offered to help in that in lieu of English, to which Yuki readily agreed.

Yoshi wasn’t interested, so he thanked her in his grateful Japanese way, and declined.

They split up to go to their first class of the new school year. Cory had the farthest to go, so he walked a way with the others until they broke off to go either own direction.

Alone, he made his way to his first class when from behind him he heard, “Excuse me. Could you help me? I think I’m lost,” in a slight Southern drawl.

Cory stopped, not sure if the person was talking to him or not, but he wanted to be polite either way. Turning around, he saw a tall, striking blond with a pixie haircut.

Maybe an inch taller than him at 5’10”, and about the same weight as Kayla.

He pointed at himself, and she nodded shyly. “Oh course. Let me see you’re schedule,” he said, and she handed it to him.

“Well, Annabelle, this is going to be easy. We have the same class. Chemistry.”

She looked at him with surprise. “How… How’d ya know my name?”

“I cheated,” he admitted. “Your schedule, see?” he pointed. “Annabelle Castor.”

“Oh,” she said, blushing slightly. “Sorry, I heard all about stalkers in California and…”

“Great, first day – no, first hour of school and I’ve already been labeled a stocker. How about I just walk ahead, and you just follow behind at a safe distance?” he said handing her the schedule back.

Her eyes went wide, and she said, “Oh my… I didn’t mean to offend you. Or to imply that you are a stalker. Oh dear, not I’ve gone and done it. On my first day here no less.”

Cory chuckled and said, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve been told that lately I’ve been… well, never mind. Come on, I’ll show you the way.”

He started to walk and was surprised when she put her arm through his left arm, so they were walking arm-in-arm. This brought back memories of Lily to Cory. He tried not to dwell on it, so he talked instead.

“So, where in the south?” he asked.

“Pardon?”

“Your accent. Southern unless I’m totally off. Which part?”

“Oh, how silly of me. Georgia. Macon originally.”

“Ah, a Georgia peach,” Cory said, not thinking.

“Hum would that be a sweet or ripe Georgia peach?” she asked him haughtily.

Cory stopped abruptly, pulling her to a stop as well. He tried to pull his arm from hers, but she wouldn’t let him.

“That came out so totally wrong,” he said. “I’m such… so…” he sighed. “Stupid is a reoccurring word,” he finished.

“Well sir, I’ll take that as an apology,” she said, pulling him forward again.

Cory led her to the classroom.

When they arrived, she finally let go of his arm and said, “Thank you, um, you never told me your name.”

He felt like slapping himself. “Again, it should be stupid. It might be easier to just call me that,” Cory said seriously.

Annabelle looked at him, waiting patiently.

A few seconds later he realized she wasn’t going to just call him stupid, so he said, “Cory. Cory Hudson.”

“Well, Cory Hudson, you already know my name. Although you can call me peach if you want,” she said sardonically.

Cory blushed.

“My aren’t you cute when you blush,” Annabelle said as she ran her fingers through his hair above his eyes. She turned and walked into the classroom, leaving him standing there alone.

The bell rang and he hurried into the classroom and found a seat. It just happened to be one back and one over from Annabelle.

Since this was the first day, the teacher didn’t do much besides talk and Cory found himself looking – no, staring – at the back of the slender, elegant, towheaded girl near him.

He was watching her when she turned and looked directly at him. Realizing he was caught staring; he didn’t bother to look away or try to hide it.

Looking at her, he could see that she had lavender, almost violet-colored eyes. They were very pretty.

He saw her lips move. She mouthed stupid and pointed at the teacher.

The silence in the room Cory had created vanished, and he heard, “Cory Hudson? Are you here?”

Roll call, Cory thought. Stupid is right. “Here,” he said.

“Ah. Mr. Hudson, welcome. Try to remember your name please. It makes roll call much easier,” the teacher said, as half the class snickered.

Cory sank into his seat, trying to disappear. He wished he could become dim like Lily.

Lily… He sighed, then looked at Annabelle who was still watching him.

“See,” he said quietly, and she winked at him in return.

To Cory’s relief, the rest of the class went by without incident. The bell rang to end class and the kids filed out as Cory waited behind.

As the class emptied out, he got up and bent to pick up his backpack and he heard, “Come on stupid, you can help direct me to my next class.”

He stood and saw Annabelle waiting for him at the door. They walked outside to a spot out of the way, and she handed him her schedule again.

Cory looked it over more through this time so he might be able to point out other classes while showing her to her next class when it dawned on him. He pulled out his schedule and held it next to hers and said, “Well, showing you to classes today is going to be easy. It appears that we have all the same classes.”

She looked at him; those violet eyes searching for something before saying, “Hum, do I need to rethink the stalker thing?”

Cory’s eyes widened and he said, “I… don’t have anything to do with making schedules.”

He looked at her earnestly and with such innocent sincerity she started laughing. It was like the tinkle of little chimes or bells, Cory thought. Such a melodious sound.

“Cory, I was joking,” she told him. “I know you’re not stalking me… yet.”

She took his arm again and said, “Lead the way, sir.”

Cory led them to their next two classes, taking a seat behind Annabelle in each. He wondered if he could be stalking her already.

She seemed not to notice, out of politeness or innocence he wasn’t sure.

After third period, they had their lunch hour. Early lunch as the kids called it. The school had one lunch period after third, and a second after forth to split up the crowds.

As they were leaving third period, Annabelle asked, “Eat with me? Please. I don’t know anyone else here and I hate sitting alone.” She smiled at him, eyes intent on his. “I’ll even sit across from you so you can see more than the back of my head. I thought you might be an ass man, but my shirt is long enough to cover butt crack and I’m not wearing a thong so…”

Cory’s mouth started to fall open when Annabelle put a finger under his chin and closed his mouth.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re sort of predictable?” she asked with her slow, southern drawl. “Lunch. Face to face. Come on, I’m starving.”

She pulled him to the cafeteria, finding it by smell.

Cory was disappointed that he didn’t have lunch period with Kayla, but Yuki, Yoshi and Abby all had the same lunch period as he did. He and his new friend got lunch, and he looked for his other friends.

It seemed that they arrived first, so they found seats at an empty table and Cory put things on three other seats to ghetto reserve them.

Annabelle laughed her tinkling laugh when he told her what he called it. She told him she had never heard of a ghetto reservation.

Yuki and Yoshi were the first two to arrive and joined the group. Cory introduced them and sat there amazed when she started a conversation with them in Japanese.

Watching her talk to the two exchange students, Cory sat enraptured by the southern drawl accented Japanese. He was used to the pair talking in their native language and had picked up some as they taught Kayla, but Cory wasn’t adept like his sister and only caught a few words here and there.

Suddenly Annabelle looked at Cory and said, “I’m so sorry. It’s just been so long since I’ve been able to use my Japanese. By the lost look on your face, I see you haven’t learned it yet. Basically, my dad was in the military, and I spent several years in Japan.”

Abby joined them a few minutes after they started talking Japanese. Cory now introduced Abby to Annabelle and all five ate lunch and talked in English.

At the end of lunch, Cory went off with Annabelle and Yuki, who all had math forth period.

Cory once again picked a seat behind Annabelle.

She glanced back at him and smiled; her eyes lit with amusement.

Yuki sat next to him and periodically glanced at him, but he was unaware of it.

Math ended and Cory walked the two girls to their next class, English, while they spoke in hushed Japanese.

Cory wasn’t sure why they were talking quietly but got nervous when both girls glanced and him and giggled.

Since Yuki had English with them, Cory thought against sitting behind Annabelle, so instead sat in front of her. Yuki sat next to her this time instead of him, but that was fine with him.

As the class wore on, Cory chanced a glance over his should and found himself staring into those violet eyes. Cory almost jerked back around but caught himself.

It was quiet and he would have made enough noise to have the whole room looking at him. Instead, he broke the entrancing eye contact, only to see the corners of Annabelle’s lips turn upwards before he lost sight of her.

He heard the distinct sound of a Japanese accented giggle come from behind him.

Silently groaning, he put his head down on his desk. The bell rang and he stood and found Annabelle was at his side waiting for him.

He looked around for Yuki, but she had already vanished.

“Ready?” she asked.

“Sure. Last class, PE. I imagine you could find the gym alone,” he said.

She crinkled her eyebrows together and said, “I probably could, but why would I if I could have you escort me?”

Cory had the fleeting thought of standing here, wearing one of those stickers that said:

Hello, my name is: Stupid

“Then, shall we?” he said, offering his arm to her.

She smiled and took it, and they walked off towards the gym.

Trying to make small talk as they walked, Cory said, “So what did you and Yuki talk about on the way to English?”

“Oh, this and that,” she said with a grin. “Things to do around here, people to do them with, things like that.”

“Oh.”

“So, tell me what sport you play.”

“What makes you think I play a sport?” he asked.

Using her free hand, she gripped his bicep of the arm she was holding. “That.”

Automatically reacting, he flexed a bit. “Tennis,” he admitted. “Do you?”

“Play tennis? No. Balls are too small, and I don’t care for the fuzz. No peach fuzz. I prefer smooth.”

Cory’s mind went in different directions, and he turned a bright red.

“What?” she asked innocently. She punched in gently in the arm. “Mind out of the gutter, Mister. I play volleyball. Can you imagine fuzzy volleyballs?”

“Uh…”

“Well, I assume this is the girl’s locker room since there are boys hanging around, but none going in. So, I guess we part here. Unless there’s something you haven’t told me?” she said raising an eyebrow.

“No, and you are correct. Girl’s locker room. Although if you see me in there, it’s not me in drag. I have a twin sister. Although we don’t look so much alike now.”

“Oh really? Well, this should be interesting,” she said.

“Well, okay. I guess I will see you tomorrow then.”

“Uh-huh, tomorrow,” she said squeezing his arm. “Thank you for being so kind to me today. It’s hard, being new and all.”

“My pleasure. You’ll make friends fast here. You’ve already made several.”

“Yeah, but that’s because of you. They’re all your friends.”

“So? Friends are friends, no? And now they are your friends.”

“Yes. See you for now, Cory Hudson,” she said, releasing his arm and walking into the locker room.

Cory watched her walk away and sighed. She was pretty. No, he admitted to himself, she was beautiful and felt guilty. He still loved Lily and always would.

Forcing himself to go change, he walked away. He had sixth period PE with almost all of his friends but Yuki and Blaine.

Next semester, everyone on a team would have sixth period PE and almost everyone in their group would be there.

Although Kayla and Abby had PE with him, the boys and the girls were separated.

Cory felt good running as it took his mind off of everything. Lily, Annabelle… being stupid.

Running with a blank mind, he kept running and heard something that caught his attention. It was in Japanese, so he didn’t understand it, but it sounded defamatory.

Cory stopped and looked back. Yoshi was jogging raggedly, trying to catch up to him.

“You trying to kill me?” he said when he finally caught up.

“Sorry,” Cory said, “Zoning out.”

“So, what’s her name?”

“Huh? Who?”

“Who you’re thinking about,” Yoshi said.

“Actually, just the opposite. Trying not to think of anyone.”

“Well, can you do it without trying to kill me?”

“It’s not like you really need to keep up,” Cory said.

“Yeah, but if I don’t, you’ll make me look bad.”

“I figured you were in better shape. Yuki looks as fit as Abby,” Cory said with a grin.

Yoshi frowned. “That… is not your business.”

“Easy, Yosh. I’m teasing. What you two do is between you. Let’s head in, class is almost over.”

They were headed back to the locker room when the bell rang. “Perfect timing,” Cory said.

They made their way back to the locker room and changed. Yoshi finished and went to meet Yuki and Cory changed and headed over to the girl’s locker room to wait for Kayla.

Cory had changed back into his school clothes and wasn’t surprised that both Kayla and Abby had as well. They usually did except for after practice or a match. Then they usually left on the PE clothes so they could be washed.

Since the parking lot was near the gym, everyone would meet up there and Blaine would drive the twins and Abby home.

The three stood around waiting for the others and Cory’s mouth dropped open. Annabelle walked out of the locker room in her tank top and gym shorts.

Bring an inch taller than Cory, he knew she was tall, but the gym shorts showed off her long, athletic legs. Dressed in jeans, he hadn’t noticed just how long her legs were. The tank top showed off her long, graceful arms, and slender neck.

Cory thought she looked like one of those models walking down a runway in sports attire.

Kayla had just finished asking, “So, how many girls hit on you today?”

Cory managed to say, “None,” out of his open mouth.

Kayla frowned and said, “Well, I guess you win. Go figure.”

Abby and Kayla were standing far enough apart that Annabelle walked between them up to Cory.

“Good, you haven’t left yet. I just wanted to thank you again for today,” she said, reaching up and undoing the top button of his shirt with one hand. She ran two fingers along one side of his neckline and the top of his exposed hairless chest.

“Better,” she said and bent forward, kissing him on the cheek. “For being my guide today.”

“Ahem,” Abby said, clearing her throat.

“Oh,” Cory said, “I’m being rude.”

“As usual,” Kayla mumbled.

“This is Abigail – Abby. And this is my sister, Kayla,” Cory said, introducing the two. “And this is Annabelle.”

“It’s nice to meet you two. Yuki told me about you. Cory mentioned his sister, and told me you were twins,” she said looking more closely at Kayla. “He led me to believe that you two looked more alike. I was expecting… well, not this pretty thing in front of me. Cory, you led me on.”

“Well, uh, it’s a recent um… crap. I’m not saying any more.”

Abby’s glare quieted him before he said something stupid.

“Thank you,” Kayla said. “You’re very pretty too. I love your accent. Southern?”

Annabelle nodded. “I’m Cory’s Georgia peach,” she said with a sly grin. Cory turned red. “Isn’t he cute when he turns red?”

“Uh-huh,” Abby said, rolling her eyes.

“Okay, well, I best be going. I’ll see you tomorrow Cory.” She took a step and stopped. “Oh, I almost forgot. I have something for you.” Annabelle reached into her backpack and pulled out a small slip of paper, tucking it into his hand.

As she turned, Kayla caught a small flash of light from Annabelle’s neck. “That’s pretty,” Kayla said, putting a hand up to her neck, causing the girl to bend back away from her.

Both Kayla and Abby gave her a strange look.

“Um, sorry. It’s an old family heirloom,” she said, putting her hand up to it. “I’m just overly protective of it.”

Annabelle put her hand under it and held it up for them to see. It was a small gold cross that looked old, but the craftsmanship was excellent. The small cross had very fine scrollwork on the top and sides, causing the sun to glint off the edges.

“It looks old,” Abby said.

“It is. Someone very special gave me this. Then she… died.”

“I’m so sorry,” Kayla said.

“It’s okay. I’ll never forget her. Anyways,” she said dropping the charm, “I should get going.” She turned again and whispered, “Call me,” as she passed Cory.

All three of them watched her walk away. The girls’ eye level was a bit higher than Cory’s.

He kept watching as the two girls looked at each other, both rolling their eyes.

Kayla socked him in the arm and said, “Stop ogling her ass Perv. By the way, I win the bet. You’re doing all my chores this week.”

“How does he manage to get all the knockouts?” Abby asked.

“Who got a knockout? Besides me that is,” Blaine said, wrapping his arms around Abby from behind.

She giggled as he kissed the back of her neck. “Stud boy here,” she said pointing at Cory.

“Really? Find a replacement for Lily already?” he asked, which earned him an elbow from Abby.

“Excuse mister insensitive here,” she said.

“Did you see her legs?” Kayla said. “She could easily be a model.”

“Yeah Blaine, ask Cory what her butt was like,” Abby said.

Blaine waggled her eyebrows at Cory and said, “Well?”

Cory blushed saying, “Um…”

“He stared so hard the image is probably burned into his retinas,” Kayla added.

“Yeah but…” he started in defense of himself but decided against it.

“He’s in love,” Abby said.

“No, he’s in lust,” Kayla corrected.

“Come on, let’s go. I have someo… err, something to do,” Blaine said, and Abby giggled.

Cory and Kayla both sighed but left for the van.

The twins were dropped off and Cory spent the next hour doing chores. Both his and Kayla’s. Once he was done, the family ate dinner and then the twins went upstairs to do their homework.

Sitting across from each other, it was quiet in their study until Kayla spoke. “Cory, I know you care for Lily. But she might not come back. I know you don’t want to hear this anymore than I really want to say it, but you should be prepared to move on. This girl Annabelle seems to like you, so why not give it a try.

“Even if Lily comes back, I think she’ll understand. And I’ll even tell her it was my idea, or I pushed you to do it.”

Cory looked up and her, sadness filling his eyes. He closed his book and said, “I need some air, I’ll be back later.” Getting up, he walked out, with Kayla calling out behind him, “Cory, I just…” but he was already gone.