chRISTMAS

Misery // Indie + Asher

Hearing him say okay, she smirked upon remembering their previous conversation. “Okay? Isn’t that flirting, Asher?” She still didn’t understand the reference, but she hoped that she was using it correctly. Otherwise, she’d just feel completely stupid. Indie watched as he stared into space. His eyes were pretty. Not only was it pretty because of their color, but because of what was in them. Pure happiness. She hadn’t seen that in anyone’s eyes since they were little kids. She had never seen them in her own eyes, though. Even when she was a kid. Maybe she had been happy, but it ended so quickly that she didn’t have time to realize it. She sucked in a deep breath. Asher was this enthusiastic little shit, her basic opposite and it just irked her that a few minutes with him made her so happy. It kind of pissed her off, though. She hoped that someone like her true love would give her this feeling. Not some boy from high school that she might start to like as a friend? Hell no, she wasn’t letting this happen. She was too good for this. “This friendship shit is hard,” she thought to herself. Friends were just hard for her. Friends always left her. Indie gasped to herself upon hearing him speak. She felt flattered at first, but then she got mad. “Don’t.” She said sharply. “It’s been five and a half minutes,” she whispered quietly. Just like that, the light had gone from her eyes, She was flattered, she really was. But she was just worried. If she ended up liking him and he might like her, then they would date and then she would lose her happiness. There were all these what if’s and whatevers and goodness, she wanted it to stop. “Asher,” she whispered, her brown eyes looking up at him, “please.” 

"Ah! The grasshopper has been paying attention all along," Asher answered happily. That had to mean that their conversations meant something to her. Or at least she remembered their conversations for a significant reason. Hearing her take a deep breath, he glanced at over at her. Shit. Was she alright? Did he say or do something? "Ind-" he didn't dare continue. He figured that it was something she'd open up to him with later on in their friendship, when they could talk about anything in the open, he'd bring it up. He furrowed his eyebrows at her. "It's been six, actually," he answered calmly, looking at the time from the clock on the wall. He held the hot cocoa in his hands and put his arm down. "I'm not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things, Miss Martinez," he quoted. Maybe she would get it one day. Maybe she would get that Asher fell in love with little things of people, but not the person. He could fall in love with Indie's giggle, but it didn't mean he fell in love with Indie. She spoke again and that's when he knew something just wasn't right. "Ok-Alright, I won't," he said. He avoided the "o" word. But he knew something was up. Did she have a really low self-esteem or did she just hate compliments? Maybe she had a boyfriend and he said she was pretty and then she didn't like being called pretty because that was what he called her. "Fuck," he thought to himself. He wanted to apologize, but he didn't really know what for. Realizing that he might've made this really awkward, he handed her the hot cocoa. "Here you go," he said in a cheery tone, "last one to the bottom has to give the winner a piggyback ride." 

Misery // Indie + Asher

"Okay," he muttered in reply to her brushing off the fact that he had forgotten his book. He couldn't believe that she didn't care about it. Maybe she would finally understand why he felt that she really needed to read it when she finished. He could already see her in tears, screaming and cursing John Green. Then she would call him, she would call him first and caps lock text him four or five times. Indie seemed like that kind of person to him. But he didn't even know her. How could he even think of- "Shut the fuck up," he thought to himself. Why did he start doing this thing whenever it was Indie? Two, four minutes and he was already screaming on the inside. Asher only laughed at her attempts to reach her hot cocoa. He felt a spurt of new found happiness in his heart, even if he had just started to really befriend her. Asher knew of her existence in high school, of course, but he never really talked to her until their trips to Colorado. And even then, it was pretty insignificant small talk. He loved these memories. Simply because they were full of laughter and happiness and there was another feeling, too. He couldn't quite explain it, but it felt like, like butterflies. He didn't think too much of it, though. After what happened with Lizzie, he figured that diving in too soon was something he should learn from. There was that little giggle again, the little giggle that could cure cancer and stop wars. "You're so pretty, Indie," he whispered to her. He hoped she didn't hear him because he didn't mean to say it, it just was one of these things that slipped.