kiss the sky

@nvalenti

Andrew was all about sniffing out people that looked as if they would be down to do anything. He was even more about finding people that weren’t aware of it until he talked to them. It was in his nature to be a social butterfly, that much was certain. However, he was also a bit, or a lot, of an asshole. So he never actually got his point across the way he wanted to sometimes. Phone in hand typing away and cigarette in mouth, he looked around the quad to see if there was anyone he hadn’t particularly talked to before. He had seen most of the people before, but he didn’t care to know any of their names. Then one caught his eye. He couldn’t say he had seen her often, but he had seen her around campus before. This time, he decided he would actually go and talk to her. Walking over to where she was sat, he made his presence known by sitting down next to her and leaning in slightly. “You look like you’d like to go to a party.”

She’d been sitting in the same place for over an hour now, back straight, ankles crossed, and a book held open in her lap. She’d been reading the same page for what felt like years and each time she came to the end she’d stop to realize she hadn’t taken in a single word. Her mind was elsewhere, lost in no place or time, struggling to focus in on a single thought. It’d been that way for the better part of her day, a mixture of feeling anxious and bored, made worse by the dull hue of the sky. She could make out the chatter around her, but  no one seemed to demand her attention until her hour turned to two. “What?” Her brows furrowed in confusion as she turned to face whomever had chosen to sit beside her. She glanced around, wondering if maybe he were talking to someone else instead. After all, she was never allowed to be much of a party type. “How so? Was it the pained look of boredom or are you attempting a good dead?”

“Remind me to start a countdown until summer break. Honestly, I can think of lesser reasons to hit the bottle than a dissection. If I’m queasy tomorrow with any luck I’ll puke everywhere and they’ll send me home. Then you’ll have the gift and honour of nursing me to health.”

“I’ve already started one on my phone. It’s the first summer where I don’t have family obligations to worry about. My first summer of one hundred percent freedom and while I don’t know what I’m doing, I do plan on taking advantage of it.” Naomi pushed herself up from the chaise in her walk-in and began to sift through dresses for a night out. “If you puke I’m not going anywhere near you. I’d make a terrible nurse.”

“If it was that dire,” Bertie noted with a wry grin, “She really should have gotten out of bed earlier and made it to the cafe on time.” He had almost completely drained the cup and was seeking out a place to toss it; feeling not even the slightest flood of guilt for his prior actions. If he hadn’t of been behind in the morning, he certainly wouldn’t have snatched it away, but no one had protested as he waltzed out the door. “Don’t be melodramatic–” Bertie squinted at the cup in her grip, attempting to decipher the name. “Natalie.”

"What for? So you could’ve taken her drink a lot sooner? Nice try Bertie, but we both know that a dick move.” She knew her lecture was lost on someone like Bertie, even more so when there was no actual bite behind it thanks to her amused expression. “Me? Melodramatic? I’m not the one who saw his morning end unless he stole a drink, Lucie. All I’m trying to say is that if you end up taking my drink by mistake some day I plan on coming after you will full Arnault force.”

“Hold on. If you’ve crashed a house party and not a wedding, we should definitely be heading to a wedding,” she said. “It’s fun. You show up, eat their food, cross stories about being from the grooms side and then the bride. Make up wild extravagant adventures that never happen and then run out when you’re discovered.”

"Why would I though? Their food is never guaranteed to be good, the bride is almost always awful, and most of the time they’re filled with those over 30.” For a romantic Naomi wasn’t as fond of them as she should’ve been. “I’d much rather go to that party.”

“Yeah, there’s something that could help me but I know how to do it on my own.  don’t mind the time…keeps my mind off of stress.”He shrugged.“Not too awful, better now that I have my book back.” He replied with a soft laugh.”I really need to study for this class though. I easily get behind.”

“Who needs a Xanax when you’ve got a guitar, yeah?” She teased. “Glad I could help. Do you have a study guide? I could go over it with you if you’d like.” While she wasn’t consider one of the smartest around, Naomi kept her grades up without problems. Offering her help only felt natural.

There was a familiarity tugging at the corners of his mind, quickly working to try to place her face to a place other than the campus. Even if he could not figure out where he knew her from, it was a good sign as it meant they likely ran in the same crowd and held a common denominator that he could use in the future. In a world where things were not always what they seemed, James had learned to tread carefully into situations that piqued his interest. Jokes like the one he had made often laid groundwork, the girl’s retort telling much more of what he wanted to know. From what he could already gather, it seemed if she were in a relationship, it wasn’t very serious which was all the better for him. “It’s James, James Vanderwaal.” His introduction was accompanied with a laugh as if the very thought of kissing someone without knowing their names was preposterous. “One hundred percent. In fact, I was seriously considering walking slow on purpose just so I could get a few more minutes with you, unless you really have some place to be right now.”

Beautiful boys were a dime a dozen in the state of New York, they flocked to the city with the twinkle of mischief in their eyes and false promises hanging loosely from their lips in search of brag worthy encounters. Naomi lived for chance encounters, meetcutes that made her stomach flutter and brought a tint to her cheeks, they littered the pages of leather bound diaries kept secret under her bed. With a name like James Vanderwaal it was impossible not to accept his offer, not when his laugh flowed through her with enough warmth to make her forget the chill in the air. “James Vanderwaal.” She liked the way his name felt on her tongue. She would’ve kissed him if he asked. “Naomi Valenti,” she extended her hand out to his. “Who am I to argue with one hundred percent?” She laughed with a nod. “I don’t really think you’ll get more than a few minutes either way, my place isn’t far.” She said, looking towards one of the high rise buildings that over looked the park. “But in this rain five minutes could feel like ten, shall we?”

“God Naoms, just bleed me dry. It’s bad enough I’m doing bio on a Monday and then to get an I told you so is just more nails in the coffin, salt in the wound, whatever the saying is. Let’s go for drinks after this, I’ve got a lab dissection and I’m probably gonna need it.”

“What else am I supposed to give? We had a full conversation about this just before the semester started. If I don’t get to say I told you so now then when will I? Do you really think you should be drinking the night before a dissection? What if you’re queasy tomorrow?”

His heart thumped a little harder when his eyes laid upon the girl in front of him and it took a couple seconds for him to process what it was that she had said. “Oh, no! No, just grabbed the first table I could find,” He explained, scratching the stubble on his cheek as he did so. Having not seen the girl for a while Charles couldn’t stop the smile which had grown on his lips. “Want to sit?”

It was only a split second of hesitation, one that Naomi hoped went by unnoticed as she accepted the seat in front of him with a smile. “I’m surprised you were even able to find an empty one. I don’t think I’ve ever been that lucky in this place.” It was crowded, the hum of low chatter present from the moment you stepped inside to the moment you left. It made things feel more intimate that way. “I don’t think I’ve seen you since before winter break, how was it?” She asked, making an attempt at a casual conversation.

“There was a saint that delivered pizza to my dorm for me. I need to know who did it, and why they did it. They sent two pizzas if you want some. It’s so good. I’ve never felt this blessed.”

“Is that really all it takes these days to be considered a saint? To have pizza be delivered? Remind me to do it sometime next week, I need to make sure my soul gets saved without having to attend Sunday mass.”

“Have you ever crashed a wedding before,” she asked, shaking her head. “We could find a house party. Crash someone else’s place instead. Could be fun,” she agreed, moving for the door. 

“No, have you? ─Wait don’t answer that, of course you have.” She was no stranger to Evie’s antics, often envied her for her ability to just do as she pleased. “Now house parties I have crashed before, you thinking west or east? ”

“Oh, no. Don’t worry about it, Naomi. I was only tuning it. But thank you, that’s very kind of you.” Bastille said with a friendly smile, taking back the book and shoving it into his backpack.“How’re you today, love?” He asked as he continued to tune his guitar.

“Isn’t there a machine, or a small object that can do that for you?” Naomi asked, taking a seat next to him. “It takes so much time to tune a guitar, or so I’ve seen.” She didn’t know much about it either, other than a majority of the time songs covers sounded better with just the acoustics. “Today’s could be better, a bit slow but can’t expect anything else from a Tuesday afternoon. Is your day any better?”

“Have you never heard of a song that’s made you want to vomit before? Perhaps my crazy frog song are these Omi songs. I just can’t stand them.” It also didn’t help that she was hearing the song everywhere. Layla was developing a personal grudge to whoever was running the campus radio station. “Although the crazy frog song would definitely be a second placer on the list of songs I think are pointless.”

“You mean besides the crazy frog song? There’s also the gummy bear song, anything with the word ‘song’ in it really just doesn’t sit well with me.” The fast beat and high pitched voices attached to it made her head spin, like nails on a chalkboard. She was glad people had quickly moved on from either of the songs in questions. Apparently the same couldn’t be said for Layla. “Consider wearing headphones more often? I can’t see anyone playing Omi’s music all the time. It’s been a year since it came out.”

Irene nodded, smiling at the female. “Yes, I do need someone to help out… just for a few hours in the morning, would you be able to do that? Just from 8 am to 11 am?”

Having to get up so early wasn’t appealing to Naomi in the slightest, she liked her sleep and sometimes took too long in getting ready. She thought it over, taking a long pause before sighing and pulling a smile on her face. “Okay, yeah. Fine, I guess I can help. I don’t have any classes tomorrow anyways. Just tell me what I need to do.”

“It is exactly that one. Isn’t it just the most annoying song to have ever existed? Although, his other song about hula-hoops was pretty useless, too. I just–” the girl groaned in frustration, obviously worked up about the particular music. “I hate it. I hate it so much.”

“Not really, no.” It wasn’t her favourite song, not by far, but it was catchy, it was light, pointless fun in her eyes. “What’s so wrong about it anyways? I think it’s kind of catchy. The kind of songs that make a person feel happy in the summer. Annoy to me is something more like the crazy frog song, now that was the actual worst.”

Any other day, it would have been easy to ignore the girl and laugh about her misfortune at a later time, but James had found himself awfully bored today with his usual entourage busy. In those fleeting moments where his schedule was not filled with inconveniences, it was easy for his mind to stray and the best way to remedy the situation was a distraction. And the girl by his side? She was, at the very least, a very pretty distraction from the rest. The look on her face spoke volumes of her surprise, a good-natured smile falling into place as if to reassure her that he was not someone to be scared of, but someone who just wanted to help. “If I had forgotten my umbrella, we’d both be out here looking like a scene straight out of The Notebook and I’m not exactly ready to declare my love for you yet.” His smile morphed into a grin at the thought, finding humour in his ridiculous statement. “It’s a good thing I didn’t forget, though. Let me walk you to where you need to go?”

Rainy afternoons had all the makings of chance encounters and the boy before her stood before her like a paperback hero complete with boyish smile and hazel eyes. Naomi had seen him around once or twice, but in her time at Astor their paths had never crossed directly much to her disappointment, even his name was fuzzy, lost somewhere in her mind. Not once had she imagined it like this with a look of tousled curls and blush stained cheeks, miles away from the perfection she so often chased. “And we definitely wouldn’t want that.” She paused to meet his eyes.  “I like to know someone’s name before we make out in the pouring rain.” Her destination wasn’t far from where they stood, a short walk across the park and she’d be home to the penthouse shared with a California native. “You sure? I wasn’t going much further and I’d really hate to keep you away from the next girl in need of a hero.”

“I would be the math tutor.” Margo motioned to the person looking lost in the library. She’d let them wonder around for a bit but grew bored of the pacing.