They both looked at me to answer, but I was in my own world.
"Eli?"
I looked at her and asked, "What?"
Liana told me what he said before and I looked at him in front of me.
"I'm sorry to make you misunderstand, but I'm also grateful to you," I said with a straight face, trying not to look intimidated or weak.
He stared at my face briefly before smiling and telling us to relax and eat comfortably.
I finished my lunch and was waiting for Liana to finish hers. She was a foodie plus a slow eater. While I was waiting for her, I looked through my phone, calculating the day those two people would come into our family.
"Elira, right?"
I looked up and saw Aiden looking at me.
"Yes."
"I was wondering if we could be friends?"
Liana coughed badly, making me worry that she would puke her organs out of her own mouth. That would be disgusting, definitely. After she calmed down I started to speak.
"Don't you have yours?" Liana looked at me with wide eyes. I didn't speak that harshly, though?
"No, I'm all alone here. Plus, you two seemed like good people."
I stared at his smiling face. Something was weird here.
I stood up and picked up my plate. "Sorry, but I'm not comfortable."
With that, I left with Liana rushing over to my side.
"What was that?!"
"I was uncomfortable."
"But he was so sweet!"
I paused and looked at Liara for a few seconds, making her shut up.
"He was weird."
~~~~~~~~~~~
It was our second day at college. We entered the classroom before Aiden was there. Once he was back with everyone behind him, the class started.
I was focused on my book when I heard a whisper from behind.
"Hey." I looked back and found Aiden lowering his head to whisper to me.
He scratched his chin as I stared at him to continue. He felt awkward for some reason.
"I'm sorry to offend you. You know, the other day. At the cafeteria."
I stared at him for a few seconds before nodding as if to approve of the apology. I did not feel offended by just a friend request, please.
Right then, the teacher caught us talking and sent us both out of the class.
"It's only the second day and this is where I ended up." I couldn't agree more. All of this happened because of his sorry.
"I'm Aiden, as you must have already known." He began introducing himself.
"I'm Elira."
"It is already pretty bad that we are out of the class on our second day of college. Why don't we just ditch the class and run to the cafeteria?"
I listened to his offer and yeah, just listened. I completely ignored him.
He continued to try small talk, but I kept quiet.
"Elira, does your father beat you?"
I looked at my side with a deep frown on my face. What was he saying?
He laughed, "Look at you frowning so deeply! I was just kidding."
He then immediately stopped laughing as if he was faking it. "Anyways, I did succeed in finding some other expression on your face."
I just blinked.
~~~~~~~~~
Days went by and eventually turned into a month. In that month, many things changed.
Aiden had become friends with Liana and had eventually joined our group. He had been trying his best to get closer to me in that month.
At first, I thought that I didn't want to be close to any characters of the book, but his constant persuasion made me think, 'A second male lead is fine since he would only go after the female lead and as a friend, he would also support my safety.'
With a thought like that, I agreed to be friends with him.
We would go to lunch together, and go to karaoke, where only Liana would entertain us two by singing with her horrible talent. And we would always sit the way we first sat on the first day. Though, sometimes, Aiden would exchange his seat with Liana to sit next to me. I loved my seat so I never agreed to change.
I know he was after something by getting close to me. I was just tired of ignoring the only person who has been tagging along with Liana the whole time. I can't abandon my only friend, can I?
A month went by, and I saw my father quite busy looking into different orphanages before settling on one. The day was finally near when the main characters would enter the house and the novel would begin.
And after just a week, the day finally came.