Comfy Closets - Chapter 9: Chapter 9

“So, Woods- do people ever call you that, by the way?”
“Yeah, my teammates mostly. You can call me that if you want.” I said, brushing a hand through my hair in an attempt to tame the remaining strands that stubbornly stuck up. “Or you could call me anything else. Most people call me Aly, or Al, or sometimes A. But that gives off a bit of PLL vibes, don’t you think? Or you could-“
Before I could continue on with my nonsense rambling that seemed to go nowhere, Leah was able to cut in, saving me from further embarrassment. “I think I like Lyssa. Suits you, ” she stated with confidence, a charming smile stretching across her lips.
I quickly looked to the side and out the window, trying to mask the effect she, in general, had over me. It’s like my mouth was using my anxiety as fuel to keep on running. I did not appreciate it.
She seemed to have lost her previous nervousness, now appearing more relaxed and self-assured than before as she sat across from me in the restaurant. We decided on a good burger place that was close by for a snack, which was convenient for us as we only needed to walk a few minutes to reach this place.
In the duration of that short walk, all we talked about was school and the work we just received for homework. However, the majority of the time was spent with me texting Ashton, trying to explain the situation to him as fast and as simple as I could. He obviously saw how I left with Leah by my side and expressed his curiosity through a multitude of texts that contained a lot of caps and exclamation points to clearly convey his incredulity. Thankfully, Leah was also preoccupied with texting someone as we walked, making this less awkward than it would’ve been.
I was very glad practise was cancelled today because I would’ve felt awful if I had to say no to that face of hers.
Speaking of her face, it was currently still holding that charming smile as she awaited my answer. “Um, yeah, Lyssa is fine,” I replied as I felt a genuine smile grow on my face. I’ve never heard anyone give me that nickname before, and it was a nice change. “So, what did you want to ask?”
She seemed to remember she had a question prepared for me as she lifted her eyebrows slightly in acknowledgement. “Right, I was going to ask why I’ve never talked to you before until last week. I mean, we’ve been in the same school together for a while, but we’ve never met. Although, we knew of each other this whole time. I was just wondering why...” she trailed off, hazel eyes focused on mines as curiosity filled them.
I pursed my lips for a second, looking out the window again to gather my thoughts before I responded. “I guess... I guess it’s because I’m just naturally shy. I stick to the people I’m comfortable with and don’t venture out of that bubble much, ” I said honestly, playing with my fingers under the table as I just realised how true what I said was.
She sat back and stared at me, letting a thoughtful expression take over her features. It was almost like she was processing what I had said and was trying to think of something to say back as a response to the candor that I left on the table. I knew I should be feeling vulnerable, but I wasn’t. Instead, I stared right back at her, our gazes locked in an unintended staring contest.
Before either of us spoke up again, the waiter interrupted our stare down by placing our ordered food onto the table. That definitely brought my attention away, as the smell coming off the burgers was irresistible.
We both gave our thanks and dug in, biting into our meals with accompanying moans of satisfaction and delight. After a couple more bites, I decided to lead the conversation into a different direction. “So, Ms Popular, ” she rolled her eyes at that, but nonetheless gave me her attention. “Let’s play twenty questions since we’re getting to know each other, ” I said, and she hummed her agreement. “I’ll start. Tell me about you. Besides the whole class president thing, what do you do?”
She chewed and swallowed her bite, wiping her mouth with a napkin before she answered. “Well, besides the class president thing, ” she jokingly mocked, “I’m also in the drama club. I liked doing debate, but I’m not in it anymore, and I’ve always kind of been into music but I never joined the school club. I never had time. What about you?” she asked before taking another bite of her burger.
“Besides soccer, not much else really. It takes up too much of my time and adding on my job at the coffee shop, I can’t really do much else,” I paused to take a sip of my smoothie. “I was into music too, y'know, but that was a while back.”
“Oh, what happened? You didn’t like it anymore?” she questioned.
“No, I just lost interest.”
She must have sensed there was much more to it, but she didn’t press me. All she did was slightly nod then moved on. “Okay, my turn, ” she announced, a mischievous smile creeping onto her lips. I knew I wasn’t going to like this. “What was the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you?”
“Damn, getting straight to the hard-hitting questions, aren’t we,” I laughed, scratching my chin as I thought, a cheeky grin resting on her lips. “Well, there’s so many, but I think I got one.” I took in a deep breath to prepare myself before I started. “I was playing a soccer match, maybe around nine or ten years old. My parents were in the stands, as well as a crush I had at the time.”
Leah was listening intently with anticipation as I continued. “I wanted to impress my crush, so I tried to play the best I could. But instead, I was so distracted by them that one time I unknowingly ran the wrong way. All I remember was a lot of shouting from my teammates, but somehow, I didn’t hear it then and ended up scoring on my own team,” I cringed, still so embarrassed by that moment to this day. My parents never let me live that down either, and so that story always comes up whenever Thanksgiving comes around.
Leah burst out laughing, the sudden noise drawing the attention of some people sitting by, not helping my growing blush any. Leah either didn’t notice or didn’t care, as she tried to speak in the midst of her laughter. “How- does- that even- happen?!” she wheezed out, almost choking on air.
I tried to defend myself. “I was nine, okay! Things happen, I was just too busy staring at her...” I mumbled towards the end. Leah had calmed down from her laughing fit, but I wasn’t done yet. “The worst thing was when I celebrated for about ten seconds afterwards. My teammates had to stop me as I was jumping around to explain to me that I made an own goal. EVERYONE was staring at me. It was the most embarrassing moment of my life!” I groaned, covering my face with my hands. That started up Leah’s laughing fit again.
Taking my hands off my face and looking at her, I realised then how her laugh brought out the dimples in her cheeks. It was actually adorable to see her so unapologetically gleeful, and it brought a smile to my own lips, happy that I was able to make her laugh like that. When she calmed down, I still had a painfully obvious blush on my face. So to draw the attention away, I directed the question back to her. “Okay, so what’s your most embarrassing moment? Can’t be as bad as mine, but you can try.”
By now, we had finished our burgers and was just sipping on our leftover smoothies. She rested her chin on her propped up arm, tapping her cheek as she pondered. “Hmmm, I have one moment that stands out, but I don’t know if I should say it. I’ve never told anyone about it because it’s just that cringey.”
Now, I really wanted to know. I leaned forward on the table eagerly and nodded my head earnestly for her to continue. Chuckling at my childish behaviour, she relented. “Okay, okay. So, I was on a date at a movie theatre with this boy. I think I was fifteen at the time?” she said unsurely.
“We were sitting at the back of the theatre watching this really bad action movie and the boy started leaning in.” I didn’t like where this was going. “I haven’t had my first kiss yet, so I was obviously very nervous and had no idea what to do. I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to do it with him, but before I had time to think, he was already kissing me.”
She scrunched up her nose as she told the story like it was reminding her of bad memories. “To say the least, it was awkward as hell. Very sloppy, kind of disgusting because his breath didn’t smell so great.” I scrunched up my nose too just hearing that. “Of course, that wasn’t the embarrassing part. The embarrassing part was when one of the theatre workers was walking up the aisles with a flashlight and caught us at the back in the middle of our lovely kissing sesh. Apparently, he was from the UK because he yelled out something like, ‘AY! YOU BUGGERS STOP YOUR SNOGGING FEST OR GET OUT!’, but I might’ve just imagined his accent. Who knows, ” she shrugged as she did a very bad imitation of what I thought was a cockney accent.
I couldn’t stop my giggle from bursting through, laughing more at her bad accent than anything else. “What happened after?” I asked, leaning further towards her in anticipation. She was about to continue when her phone buzzed a couple of times on the table. She decided to take a glance at it, before she rolled her eyes and ignored it, putting her phone back down and answering my prompt.
“Well, everyone stopped watching the movie and stared at us. The worker at his flashlight pointed straight at us, and we kind of just froze. In the end, we slipped out of there, both of us blushing like crazy. He walked me home afterwards, but after that date, we never spoke again. I guess that’s for the better,” she said with a resigned sigh.
“Well, he was a bad kisser and had sh*t breath. Forget about him, ” I said bluntly.
Leah let out a short abrupt laugh at that, sounding more like a shout mixed with a huff. “Well, he was my first kiss, but you have a point.”
Just then, her phone buzzed a few more times, and a look of annoyance took over as she picked it up again. This time, she tapped a few buttons before putting it back down. There was no more buzzes after that, so I could only assume that she put her phone on silent.
“Sorry about that, he won’t stop texting.”
“It’s alright,” I reassured. A question popped into my mind then, and I debated whether I should ask it or not. But what better time was there to ask a question than now, while we were playing this game and getting to know each other? I decided to just go for it.
I pushed my finished milkshake cup to the side and leaned forward, my arms resting on the table.  “Okay, my turn. I have a question for you. You don’t have to answer, but I just wanted to ask what did you mean by ‘maybe’ when I asked you about your sexuality in class?”
Once the question left my lips, I regretted it. That was such a bold question for me to ask, something that was so out of character for my timid self. I was also never so open about this topic, but here I was, asking Leah about her sexuality so casually like I was asking her when her birthday was. You’re doing such a great job, Aly! Not.
Before I could take my question back, she started to reply. “I guess what I mean by that is I’m bisexual.” Now that got me to shut up. “I date guys and girls, but not many people at school know about the girls part because I like to keep that fact to myself. At least for now.”
Huh, I guess Gia was right after all about sensing Leah's non-straightness. Now, I was curious about her boyfriend after what she said. “Does Blake know about, you know...” I asked hesitantly, feeling like I was intruding.
She shook her head slightly, looking out the window to our side thoughtfully. “No, he doesn’t. I’ve only been dating him for a couple of weeks, and he doesn’t seem like the type of guy to react well to that, anyways. I don’t tell many people about that in general, to be honest,” she admitted, gazing at me with a sense of vulnerability in her eyes that I wasn’t expecting.
Seeing that, I thought it was only fair to admit it to her myself too. “I’m also not open about being.. gay, ” I confessed, finding it hard to say the last word so openly.
“Have you ever dated anyone before? ” she asked curiously, canting her head to the side.
I paused before I spoke, my mind automatically conjuring up memories from the past that brought me to another time. “Once. A while back. It ended badly,” I responded curtly.
She hummed in sympathy, gazing right into my eyes, her warm hazel orbs bringing me back to this moment. “I’m sorry to hear that.” I only nodded back, unable to find the words to respond. Sensing that I wasn’t going to reply, she decided to take control of the conversation. “So, it’s my turn to ask a question. Do you have any siblings or pets?”
After that, the conversation turned lighter. From hobbies and pets to friends and funny stories, we kept jumping around from different topics and got to know each other. Too soon, it was time for us to head home, and so we split the bill and started our walk back to our cars that still idled in the school’s parking lot.
When we almost got there, she suddenly changed the topic. “Did you hear about the party happening this Friday,” she asked, walking with her hands in her pockets as she looked over at me.
“Yeah, I think I heard about it from Ash the other day. Why?”
The dirty blonde focused her gaze on her black boots for a second, almost in a nervous manner, before turning her gaze to me.
“Do you want to go to the party with me?”
“Yes,” I answered straight away, not even letting my mind think it over. Clearing my throat to try to compose myself, I tucked my own hands into my jacket pockets before I answered more calmly. “Yeah, I think I’d like that.”
She flashed me a dazzling grin as her hazel eyes brightened in delight. “Okay, cool. Well since I’ll be going with you, I think having your number will be useful. You know, to text you about the details, and stuff, ” she added casually.
Wow, she is smooth, I thought as I looked at her, impressed and flattered at the same time. “Right, of course.”
We exchanged phones and typed our own numbers down, and by the time that was done, we had arrived at the school's parking lot and was nearing my parked car.
Before she left and we said our goodbyes, I wanted to ask her something. “Leah, I have one more question for you.”
She looked at me curiously as we stopped by my door. “Shoot.”
“Why did you choose the nickname Lyssa? You’ve called me that a few times already before today, so I was just wondering why.”
Her lips spread into a small, genuine smile as she answered. “The first time I talked to you, I called you Alex. I decided on Lyssa then so I would never forget, or call you the wrong name ever again.”
I didn’t know how to answer to that, so instead, she made the first move and started walking backwards in the direction of her car, her smile the only thing I could see. “Thanks for today, Lyssa. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
With one final wave, she turned around and headed to her own car, leaving me with a stupid, but a happy grin on my face.
I can't wait for tomorrow.