the voice inside my head - - •

[adam kumar]

don’t waste your time on me
YOU’RE ALREADY THE VOICE INSIDE MY HEAD

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This summer sucked. Adam was positive of this as he meandered through the aisles of Shop n’ Save, grumbling to himself quietly. It was the summer of 2009 – the summer before his senior year, the summer that would close a chapter and begin a new one – and his parents were making him go grocery shopping. Ordinarily, Adam wouldn’t have minded doing errands for his parents. He had a decent relationship with both of them, and he figured that if they were paying for his education, his food and clothing, and arguably his life, he owed it to them to do errands and work around the house. Usually, he’d do these tasks without being asked simply because he felt them necessary. This time, however, Adam was a bit peeved. Apparently, his parents were throwing an extravagant party this weekend that was accommodating some hundred guests, and apparently Adam was expected to know about it and prepare the groceries and items needed to make the party a hit. Stupid parents and their lack of communication.

It wasn’t Adam’s fault and he knew it. He was a perfectly social person, and he could communicate well with others, including his parents. They had an odd relationship where Adam usually knew what to do before he was even asked. Things worked well between them. This was different. Adam’s dad had come home from work, looked in the fridge, noticed the absence of party foods, and had yelled at Adam in Hindi, asking him why there was no food in the fridge and how they could ‘possibly throw a successful party if the guests had nothing to eat’. Adam, being quite the rational and persistent little bugger, had asked when his father had ever told him about this party. His dad then proceeded to kick him out of the house with a few hundred bucks and demanded that he go to the store at once.

He easily could have spent the money elsewhere and infuriated his parents even more, but Adam was a responsible young man. Well, he was responsible and scared shitless of his parents when they were angry. With this in mind, the boy had ambled down to Stop n’ Save with list and money in tow. Entering the store quietly, he’d checked the list and was now in the cereal aisle with a basket of goodies at his side. Why he’d chosen a basket to store his items in instead of a cart, he didn’t know. Carts just seemed so… big and old lady-ish. Every time he used a cart, he felt like the old lady from Superbad. She was pretty much the antithesis of everything Adam stood for. (Not really, though. He just didn’t like picturing himself as an old lady who wished people good luck with engaging in sexual activities.)

And then Adam was stuck amongst Captain Crunch and Count Chocula, wondering why on earth he was comparing himself to old ladies. He never did random, odd stuff like that. That was Audrey’s forte, not his. Ah, Audrey. Just the mentioning of her name brought a large, toothy smile to Adam’s face. Gosh, she was just so perfect. This summer, Adam had admitted to himself that he did indeed like Audrey, and that he couldn’t tell her at any costs. His constant infatuation with her had almost never been reciprocated. There’d been times when he’d sensed some tension between them romantically, but that was when his feelings for her weren’t very strong and he wouldn’t bother to make a move. He knew it would never work out between them, simply because she tended to live by a strict dating policy where each boy lasted a few weeks before she moved on. It was either that policy or one-night stands for Audrey, and Adam wanted neither. But he’d wait until she grew and realized that there was a boy good enough for her love and that she was good enough to be loved and treated with the utmost respect. He’d wait by her side for however long it would take. He could always dream.

For two best friends, Adam and Audrey spent an awful lot of time apart over the summer. Adam’s dad had taken the family to Australia this summer, and though Adam had enjoyed it, he was surprised by how much he longed to see Audrey. He loved her hugs, and her bright red hair, and her infectious smile, and he sincerely missed her. There were times when Adam wondered how much Audrey actually thought of him, or if she really cared about him as much as he cared about her. He’d always try to brush those thoughts aside, just in case she really didn’t care about him like he cared about her. He didn’t want to hear that in a year, they’d be heading to different schools and different futures. He didn’t want to hear that she’d probably go through many other boys within the next year, all of whom Adam would have to meet and tolerate. That was one thing he hated the most about Audrey’s boyfriends – meeting all of them and having to deal with them around the person he cared about most. Jealousy and Adam had become good friends within the past five years.

Sighing, Adam ridded his mind of the thoughts of Audrey and continued down the aisle, swinging the basket absentmindedly in his hands. Why was he in the cereal aisle when his parents were hosting a party? It made no sense. The guests are all going to be eating Lucky Charms, duh. That is the clearly the answer, Adam thought to himself, rolling his eyes. Perhaps his parents had thought it would be funny to mix in the regular grocery items with the plethora of party items needed to be purchased. Leave it to the two busiest parents in the world to forget to buy food, he thought, absently placing two boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios in his basket. Do they even like Cheerios?

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TAGGED ?! audrey (andi)
STATUS ?! complete
WORDS ?! 1,000
OUTFIT ?! shirt // shoes // jeans
LOCATION ?! supermarket!
LYRICS ?! I miss you – blink 182
PLAYING ?! casey’s song – dallas green
NOTES ?! blehhh. >w<
CREDIT ?! _and_heartsxx and HAY ALISON?! of caution[/center]

[audrey patton]

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Audrey smirked at herself in the mirror before walking out of her room, slamming the door behind her, and clomping down the stairs in her pointy tie-up black heels. She strutted into the kitchen and posed, one hand on her hip and the other limp at her side. Her father sat at the dining room table, eating a quick bowl of cereal as he read the morning’s New York Times. She paused there in front of him, waiting for him to take notice of her arrival, to look up, or grunt, or something.

This was exactly what she expected. It was like this every morning; her father scarfing down a quick breakfast and reading the paper before slipping off silently, her mother showering and casually using up all of the warm water. They didn’t pay her much attention, especially not in the mornings. So now she was pushing her limits, wondering just how outragesouly she could act before her parents took notice. Apparently, the bar was set high.

She cleared her throat, running a hand through her long red locks. Nothing. She frowned. “Morning,” she greeted him, waiting for him to look up. He didn’t. He grunted some sort of reply and nodded his head without removing his eyes from his paper or slowing the incredible rate at which he was eating his cereal.

Most parents would have taken notice and sent their daughter back to her room. But no. “I’m going shopping,” she added, but still no response. Audrey scowled. She was standing in front of her father in three-inch heels, a lace black bra with enough underwire to make her Bs look like Cs, and matching lace boy-shorts underwear, complete with a fake dragon tattoo on her exposed stomach, her black and white pearl choker, and her white stackable bangles. She looked like she was about to star in a porno, quite frankly. And her father sat at the table before her, taking no notice.

“Just kidding. I’m actually going to go post nude photographs of myself online,” she amended. Gregory nodded absently, muttering something that sounded like ’have fun.’ “Asshole,” Audrey murmured under her breath as she stomped back upstairs, more out of anger this time than trying to call attention to herself. And still, she elicited no response.

Audrey marched into her room, again slamming the door behind her. Grumbling all the while, she pulled on a short white skirt over her underwear and a black top, leaving on her shoes, necklace, and bangles. Then she grabbed her silver purse, deciding that she needed to get the hell out of her house. So for once that summer, she beat her father out of their large mansion of a house, but found that her car was blocked into the driveway by his. “Fucking cunt,”

[/color] she cursed under her breath, leaning against her car and waiting for her father to finish his breakfast and lug his lazy ass out to his car.

She hated her parents, but Audrey had always felt a greater disdain towards her father. Her mother had a few redeeming qualities – she had a job Audrey rather admired, even if it was nothing she would ever want to do, and she had a terrific fashion sense (Audrey had to have gotten it from somewhere, after all). Gregory was just a jackass and an unobservant prick. But lately, her mother had been the one getting on her nerves. She’d been growing more and more forgetful, and more and more prone to random angry fits than every. Annabeth had always been temperamental, but it was just getting ridiculous.

So she needed out of her house like she had never needed anything before. But there was no where for her to go, now that she stood outside her BMW convertible and weighed her options. But her mother had stopped going food shopping, and her father was too blind to realize that they needed food. So she would go and get food, but not for them. No, Audrey would just go and get she liked, and just enough to stock the mini fridge in her room. They could deal for themselves. After all, they were the adults, weren’t they?

Audrey sighed, crossing her arms over her chest. It seemed her father was, for once in his sorry life, taking his sweet time with breakfast. And what impeccable timing; the one time she was waiting on him, he moved a mile an hour. She pulled the keys to her car from her silver handbag and pushed the button that unlocked her door. Sitting in the firm leather seat, Audrey started the car and turned on the radio, blasting it loudly enough that she was sure her feather could hear it from inside. That is, if he was listening. Then she leaned her head back against the headrest and waited.

When it came to relationships, there were many aspects that scared Audrey and turned her completely off of the archaic ritual. She was afraid of being objectified, of being some buy’s accessory. She was afraid of forfeiting the control she asserted over every make-out of sex partner she had ever had. She was afraid of making it so easy for one person to hurt her.

But Audrey had one main fear, greater than all the other; one she would never admit, and barely registered herself. She was tough, braver than she gave herself credit for. If everything listed above had been the sum of all of her fears, she might have taken the gamble and put her feelings and he self-esteem on the line; that is, of course, if she found someone worth the potential pain. But she wouldn’t now, not ever. The main reason behind her fear of relationships came from watching her parents. She didn’t want to end up like them, so consumed in their unhealthy relationship that it affected every thing they did and every decision they made. She didn’t want to let anyone dominate her whole world like that, control every aspect of ber being. She didn’t want to fight through the day in anticipation of the sex. She didn’t want to be so blinded that she could make her own daughter hate her like she hated her parents.

Speaking of which; three songs later, Gregory ambled out the front door and to his car. He took no notice of his daughter glaring at him from her seat in her car. He backed out of the drive way teasingly slowly. Audrey raced and was down the road in the time it had taken her father to start the car.

The only question that remained was where she was headed, and she didn’t have the vaguest idea. She drove a few minutes in the direction of down town, wondering where she should go to get some things to stock in her fridge. Of course; Shop n’ Save. She parked effortlessly in the parking lot moments after the thought occurred to her, wondering how it could have possibly taken her so long to dream up. Then she climbed out of the car, locked it, and walked into the store, grabbing a basket as she entered.

Audrey wandered up and down the aisles, looking for anything that appealed to her. And quickly, she realized that the adage was true; never shop hungry. Her basket was overflowing, and she had only been in the store a matter of mere minutes. She hesitated outside the cereal aisle, wondering if she dared to enter. She was a cereal buff, and knew that if she walked in, she would exit with more boxes of cereal than she could hope to carry. And today, she didn’t have daddy’s credit card. Whenever she got into a fight with her parents or they hit her, she would quickly be given her father’s credit card. Then, as revenge, she would buy expensive clothing and jewlery she didn’t need and treat her friends to meals. And her father got angry, but didn’t do anything or say anything about it.

Yesterday, however, had been a quiet evening. She had gotten home late, and her parents had already moved on to the ‘rough sex’ portion of the evening. She had gone to bed, blasting her stereo loud enough for the neighbors to hear and dance to, and gone to bed. Then she had woken up and found her father at the breakfast table. So she only had her own credit card, which had a daily limit of one hundred and fifty dollars. That shouldn’t be an issue for a snack run, but if she wanted to go shopping later, she would have to keep her food expenses to a minimum.

So she started to walk past the cereal aisle and put it from her mind when she noticed a familiar boy walking down the aisle, swinging a basket identical to the one she held dangling at her side in her left hand. That was when she realized she should have gotten a cart; there was no place for her bag, which was slung over her other shoulder. She was starting to feel lopsided as more and more junk collected in her basket. The boy took two boxes of cereal and put them in his basket before continuing down the aisle.

Audrey wanted to sneak after him, but her heels were too loud. The sharp points clanged against the tiled floor with every step, announcing her presence. So instead, she scurried to the next aisle and speed-walked down it, planning on beating him to the end of the aisle and surprising him. He would turn and start up the next aisle, only to run head-on into his favorite red head. At least, she assumed that she was Adam’s favorite red head. It wasn’t like he had very many to choose from.

She skidded to a halt at the end of the aisle, a grin lighting up her freckled features as she stood, waiting for Adam. Then she realized that she was standing next to a display of gummi products. Without thinking, she grabbed a box of gushers and tossed it into her already overflowing basket, then turned towards where Adam would be coming from and commenced waiting.
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TAG alyssaaaa! (adam)
LYRICS this providence by my beautiful rescue
WORDS one thousand seven hundred and five words.
OUTFIT clickie here
CHARACTER audrey jenna louise patton
NOTES YOUR FACE?!
CREDIT sophielizabeth of CAUTION 2.0.

[adam kumar]

don’t waste your time on me
YOU’RE ALREADY THE VOICE INSIDE MY HEAD

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Grocery shopping, Adam was slowly beginning to realize, was infuriating. A second glance at the list – or, rather, novel, that his parents had thrown him – revealed that not just Honey Nut Cheerios were needed from the cereal aisle. For some reason, Count Chocula, the Trix Rabbit, Tony the Tiger, and Lucky the Leprechaun were invited to this party. Adam didn’t understand his parents’ reasoning behind this – since when would the most esteemed doctors and lawyers be consuming cereal at a party? The one party he’d been to with his parents – a lavish firm party thrown by one of his mother’s good friends – included the stereotypical tiny sandwiches and cocktail wieners on sticks. No self-respecting cardiologist was going to feed his guests cereal. Besides, the Kumars didn’t even eat any of the aforementioned cereals. Adam himself had never been much of a breakfast person, and his parents usually only ate “old-people cereal”. His mom liked Special K, his dad liked Raisin Bran, and Adam was extremely original by liking Cheerios.

A twinge of annoyance sparked within him and he angrily dumped a few more boxes in his cereal. As the boxes began to add up, Adam scowled. He really should have gotten a cart – no, a tow truck, or perhaps a ferry – to transport all these groceries to his car. He wasn’t quite sure how his Honda Civic was going to lug fifteen million years worth of food back to his house. His parents clearly hadn’t chosen their housing arrangements with a map of the city at their side, either. They’d somehow managed to choose a house in the part of the city farthest away from Shop n’ Save. While most Stewart students took a maximum of five minutes to get to the supermarket from their houses, it took Adam fifteen on a good day. It was almost as if his parents were trying to kill him with the bad radio, abundant air pollution, and road rage that ensued. Adam loved his parents, there was no doubt about that; he just sometimes wondered how they would ever survive without him. He could honestly say they hadn’t been to the grocery store once this year.

“This fucking cereal. Goddamn,” Adam muttered, grumbling to himself. It was only then that he heard the faint clicking of heels down the next aisle. Who on earth wears high heels to the grocery store? he found himself thinking, a faint trace of Lollia Breathe #19 tickling his nose. His lips inadvertently curved into a small smile and he turned, ready to embrace is favorite redhead in as tight of a hug as he could. He never wanted to let her go, never wanted to see her bright red hair disappear or her big, energetic smile fade. Right now, all he wanted was to hold her tight and see her smiling face. His smile twitching up into a grin, Adam spun around, only to face a row of cardboard boxes and her scent still lingering in the air.

His smile immediately faltered; shortly after, it collapsed completely, the lines of his usual facial expression etching themselves back into his skin. It was just dawning upon him how much he really cared about Audrey. When he wasn’t around, she was the typical partying, alcohol-buzzed wild child. When he was around, she seemed like a completely different person – someone more mellow, more genuine, and at certain times, more vulnerable. Adam loved the fact that Audrey could trust him, and that he was worthy enough to learn about her history. He was one of the few people who knew why she was so wild. He loved both sides of her, though. Her mellow side was psychological and more intricate, and her wild side was beautiful in a young, spirited way. Everything about her was absolutely perfect, and he hated that he’d just narrowly missed her. Or had he? He wasn’t very sure to begin with, but he could almost sense her there. Audrey was the only girl he knew who wore Lollita Breathe #19, and the only one with a distinct clicking of her heels when she walked. It had to be her.

She’s hiding from me, he decided, smirking slightly. Instantaneously, his shopping list had become the most obsolete part of his trip to Shop n’ Save. Finding Audrey in the maze of aisles and products was superior to buying groceries for his parents any day. She has to be close if I can still smell her, Adam mused, not actually realizing how insanely creepy he sounded. Pondering f or a moment, he was set on turning to left, which contained plastic cups and containers. That was until he saw the sign hanging above the aisle to his right, which read “candy and snack foods” in bright red letters. Well, a little snack never hurt anyone. Plus, she could be in that aisle, right? Right. Here we go.

Turning to his right instead, Adam entered the snack aisle. His entrance had worked to his advantage, he realized, after spotting Audrey a few feet in front of him, turned in the opposite direction. His smile slowly made its way onto his features again, and he could almost picture the simper on Audrey’s face as she waited for him to enter from the opposite end of the aisle. Taking a note of her outfit, Adam smiled. Typical Audrey, dressed perfectly from head-to-toe even when making a simple visit to the supermarket. For a moment he felt frumpy in his simple jeans and band tee, but he brushed the thought off and focused on how he’d approach his best friend. He had to do something different, something that would surprise her as much as she wanted to surprise him.

After a moment of thinking, he slowly advanced toward Audrey and wrapped his arms around her from behind, embracing her warmly. “Now, tell me – what’s a beautiful girl like you do all summer long? Avoid her favorite Asian like the plague?” he asked, grinning from ear to ear. Ruffling up her hair slightly, he added, “I missed you. Where the hell have you been this summer?”

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TAGGED ?! audrey (andi)
STATUS ?! complete
WORDS ?! 1,023
OUTFIT ?! shirt // shoes // jeans
LOCATION ?! supermarket!
LYRICS ?! I miss you – blink 182
PLAYING ?! boom boom pow – black eyed peas
NOTES ?! lame.
CREDIT ?! _and_heartsxx and HAY ALISON?! of caution[/center]

[audrey patton]

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This was taking far too long. Audrey frowned, reaching for a box of Fruit Roll-Ups and dropping it hastily into her basket. She was getting bored waiting for Adam, and that could only end in desperate need of a cart – or a much larger basket. She crossed her arms in an attempt to restrain herself from plucking more helpless food products from the shelves, but the movement was awkward. Her basket was hanging from her left arm and her purse from her right, marking her attempt at arm-crossing a failed one. She huffed in frustration, setting both her basket and bag on the floor between her and the closer of the two aisles on either side of her, which happened to be home to the fruit/gummi products such as the Gushers and Fruit Roll-Ups she had already helped herself to. Bags of more commonplace candies lined the adjacent shelving unit, the items ranging from bags of Tootsie Roll pops to Hershey chocolate bars. She was vaguely certain that she spotted a Wonka Bar as well, and tearing her attention from that took all of the petite redhead’s willpower. Which, admittedly, is not much to being with.

Just as Audrey righted her posture and set to straightening her short white skirt, a pair of arms caught her from behind. She emitted a noise somewhere between a yelp and a squeak and a “fuck” before looking down at the arms of her attacker.

Even before she looked down at the arms encircling her waist, though, Audrey was fairly certain of who had grabbed her from behind – assuming, of course, that she was not being sexually assaulted/raped. But if she had not been perfectly certain before, she was now, as she looked down at the arms around her and felt the firm grip around her middle. Was it weird, how safe she felt in his arms? No one looked out for her like he did, no one else wanted to protect her like he did. And she never felt so safe or so comfortable as when she was with him. Her best friend.

And, if it was at all up to her, Adam would continue to be her best friend. Audrey might have considered him romantically before they were so close, but now the idea scared her. It wasn’t that it seemed ridiculous, her and Adam, or that she didn’t think of him that way. She did think of him that way, sometimes. But she knew how her relationships tended to go. They were brief, sexual, hot, and then over. And unlike some more romantic girls, Audrey rarely if ever stayed close with the guys she dated. Hell, she typically wasn’t close with him while they were dating, and she rather disapproved of the term “dating” at all.

Dating usually refers to two people who go on dates, who like each other, who may or may not be physically or sexually involved. But Audrey’s relationships tended to be purely sexual, and that was how she liked them. So they weren’t really “dating,” and she never called anyone her “boyfriend.”

But if she were to get at all involved with Adam, it couldn’t be like that. She couldn’t fuck him and walk away. If she did anything with Adam, it would have to be more romantic, and romanticism made her cringe.

Yet even that would be simplifying the issue. If anything between her and Adam took the course of her typical relationships, it would be over quickly, and the end would complicate their friendship. She loved Adam; he was the one person who was always there for her. She was closer to him than she was to her parents or any other friend she had. But if they ever became anything romantic, that would change. He wouldn’t be her best friend anymore. And when it ended, as it inevitably would, it would be awkward and forced. And she wouldn’t have him anymore. She wasn’t sure if she could do that.

Audrey laughed once she was sure of who had accosted her. “Now, tell me – what’s a beautiful girl like you do all summer long? Avoid her favorite Asian like the plague?” the familiar voice asked, causing her to grin. She turned in his arms, careful not to break his hold. ”Always,”

[/color] she teased, flashing a toothy grin. “I missed you. Where the hell have you been this summer?” She let her grin fade into a smile before answering. ”I could have sworn I told you,”[/color] she started, shrugging. ”’rents dragged me to London for the whole effin’ summer,”[/color] she complained. She loved travel, and she did particularly like London. But for the whole summer? Besides which, she found that she had far more fun in South Africa, although there were far less shopping opportunities there.

Her parents often took her to the places she had used to live for the summers. They didn’t go to Brazil often, perhaps because Douglas had had an affair while they were living there, so Annabeth had more or less barred her husband from the country. She had lived in London recently enough that she still had friends there, which made going there far more bearable – she spent virtually no time with her parents, really. She really did like it there. But South Africa was far more exciting, even if she was far more likely to get mugged. She liked saying that she’d spent the summer there, and trying to learn the obscure dialects there. She liked languages, but in London it was just boring English. Though she would admit, the inflection was far more interesting there than in the U.S. But she loved all the countries she had lived in. They made up her accent, which she frequently got comments on, and her random language fluencies. She loved cursing at people in Swahili. Nothing was as much fun.

”And I missed you, too,”[/color] she added with a wide smile, running a hand through her hair. Then she pulled out of his arms, which made it far easier to slap his shoulder playfully. ”By the way, you’re so lame!”[/color] She frowned. ”I was trying to surprise you! Where do you get off surprising me, huh? After I put forth all that effort, waiting her for you all sneaky-like. I really don’t know what I’ll do with you,”[/color] she concluded with a weary sigh. Then, of course, she grinned at Adam, grabbing her basket and bag from the ground. ”Fruit Roll-Ups or Gushers?”[/color] she asked, unable to make the decision for herself.[/font][/size][/blockquote]

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TAG alyssaaaa! (adam)
LYRICS this providence by my beautiful rescue
WORDS one thousand and ninety-one words.
OUTFIT clickie here
CHARACTER audrey jenna louise patton
NOTES YOUR FACE?!
CREDIT sophielizabeth of CAUTION 2.0.

[adam kumar]

don’t waste your time on me
YOU’RE ALREADY THE VOICE INSIDE MY HEAD

[/B][/color][/size][/font]
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If physically possible, Adam’s smile widened as Audrey let out a yelp. Score! he thought with a grin, laughing. He felt content as she turned in his arms and smiled up at him, explaining her summer plans. For a moment Adam simply stood there, holding his best friend tight and watching her beautiful face. If only things could be like this forever. If only he could hold onto her, keep her safe, have her giving all her attention to him and him only. This feeling was perfect; it was the kind of butterflies-in-your-stomach, head-over-heels feeling that one only sensed when they were truly in love with someone. If only it was reciprocated.

Adam had known for awhile that he was in love with Audrey Jenna Louise Patton. There’d been a certain spark to her when he’d first met her, and that spark continued to grow as he stuck with her. Every laugh she emitted was contagious, every smile became infectious, every twirl of her hair or blush made him love her even more. There was nothing at all wrong about her, and he knew that. She didn’t, though. Adam was one of the few people who could see Audrey for what she truly was – vulnerable. She’d been vulnerable ever since she’d been cheated on by that prick Matt Cohen years ago.

The thought of Matt Cohen made his grip tighten around her waist slightly. It wasn’t enough to crush her, but it was enough to keep her safe. That was all he could ask of her right now. Every day after Matt Cohen had been an uphill struggle to gain Audrey’s affection. He hadn’t truly realized how attached he was to Audrey till she’d left him this summer. And this summer, by far, had been one of the worst he’d experienced for that reason only. He could tolerate his parents’ bitching and moaning; he could tolerate his guy friends being busy for a few days; he could tolerate the scorching heat and the boredom that ensued. But he couldn’t tolerate not having her there. It was odd, how strong his love was for her when he knew his love was unrequited. His love would have probably been reciprocated if Matt Cohen had never been in the picture.

God, how he hated Matt Cohen.

He hadn’t realized how much of a mistake it’d been not to beat the living daylights out of Matt Cohen the day he found out Audrey had been cheated on. Now he did, and it killed him more than anything. He’d promised himself, and Audrey, to always be there for her. And if there was one thing Adam hated more than Matt Cohen, it was seeing Audrey cry. Adam had seen her at her worst when she found out. He’d seen her tough façade crumble and the tears creep in through the corners of her eyes. He’d seen her fall in front of everyone while Matt Cohen triumphed like the pompous ass he was.

That night, he’d held Audrey close and had told her he’d never let her get hurt again. He’d felt her cry on his shoulder and he’d seen her completely broken. Then he’d watched as she morphed into something completely different – someone who partied constantly, someone who was intelligent and could wrap anyone around her finger, someone who used boys and ditched them just like she’d been ditched. He knew she did it because of Matt Cohen, too, and because of her parents and their unloving relationship. In a world full of love, Audrey was surrounded by distance and cold relationships, and Adam hated that. He wanted her to know that she was loved, that she was the most beautiful girl in the world in his eyes – and that she didn’t have to sleep around to get attention. But she was resilient and independent, and she would sleep with whoever she wanted to exert her control over the situation. He didn’t know how he was going to get around that, but he had to.

Adam listened to her intently as she explained where exactly she’d been over the summer. London. All this while Adam had been melting of heat in Pittsburgh and Audrey had been in London. “Dev Patel lives in London. People tell me I look like him,” Adam commented, laughing. Usually he’d feel slightly embarrassed to relate himself to Dev Patel in actual conversation. With Audrey, it was different. He could act like a total idiot and she wouldn’t care. He enjoyed that immensely. “So, you’ve been in London the entire summer while I’ve been in Pittsburgh? Ree Ree, dear, why on earth didn’t you tell me about this? I could’ve stowed away in your suitcase,” he added with a chuckle. Just the thought brought a smirk to his face – Adam was relatively tall, standing at 6’1 ½“, and though he was a bit on the lanky side, there was no way he could fit even an arm in one of Audrey’s suitcases.

“I missed you, too.” Audrey’s words wandered into Adam’s mind and he smiled. His smile faded and he frowned slightly, though, as she pulled away from his embrace. Said frown deepened as she slapped him playfully on the arm. “That stings, Robin. Stings like… like a thousand bee stings to the face!” Wait, what? Adam pondered, raising a brow. Where did that come from? And why was he getting the feeling that in some alternate universe, a Danish girl and Michael Jackson were bickering?

Brushing the thought from his mind, Adam examined her two choices. In an instant, his eyes widened and he swatted the two boxes from Audrey’s hands. “Fruit Roll-Ups? Gushers? Have I taught you nothing?!” he exclaimed, shaking his head slowly. He passed Audrey and grabbed another box. Pressing it into her hands, he grinned. “Fruit by the Foot. No competition. It’s the snack food of champions,” he informed her, nodding. “And,” he began, wrapping his arms around her in a hug, “I didn’t give you a welcome back hug. Sneaking up on you doesn’t count, clearly.” Still holding her, he added, “How was London? Let me guess. ‘Not as fun as Brazil.’” It was true – the numerous times Audrey had been out of the country, she’d come back with the same remark – ‘it wasn’t as fun as Brazil.’ He was almost tempted to take her there himself, just so he could see what she thought was so damn great about Brazil anyway. Then again, it did sound a lot more appealing than rainy, boring old London. Everyone knew that the only cool thing in London was Dev Patel, and who needed Dev Patel when Adam Kumar was around?

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TAGGED ?! audrey (andi)
STATUS ?! complete
WORDS ?! 1,118
OUTFIT ?! shirt // shoes // jeans
LOCATION ?! supermarket!
LYRICS ?! I miss you – blink 182
PLAYING ?! creedence clearwater revival
NOTES ?! my name is alyssa and I am a block of cheese.
CREDIT ?! _and_heartsxx and HAY ALISON?! of caution[/center]

[audrey patton]

-------------------------------------------------------------

Audrey didn’t know when she had changed, but she knew that she had. She remembered being in middle school; everything had been so much more simple then. Her idea of a party was four girls sleeping over in her living room in sixth grade. In eighth grade, she started going to “real” parties, with alcohol and mass amounts of people. But she was a virgin, and she didn’t drink. She didn’t even kiss. She was a good girl then, and she had planned on staying that way.

But freshman year, she met Matt Cohen. He was cool. He was gorgeous. He was seventeen; a senior. And she was fourteen. She met him at one of her first parties as a high school freshman. She had gone to a few as an eighth grader, but middle schoolers were a joke there. And to be honest, she had been intimidated by all the high schoolers. Nothing intimidated her now, but then she had clung to her friends like life preservers and hadn’t made contact with a single high schooler. Matt was one of the first upper classmen she came in contact with at all, really. He had offered her her first drink. She had taken it. Once Audrey was sufficiently trashed, they had made out. It went quickly from there. Suddenly they were a couple. They didn’t hang out that much, though. They had no classes together, as he was three years older than her. He drove her home from school some days, and took her out a few nights. It was mostly casual.

After a month, he invited her to his house. His parents weren’t there. She still remembered how confused she was when she walked into the empty house. The only times she had been to guys’ houses, they had been crammed with high schoolers partying their brains out. She had never been totally alone with any guy, especially not her first boyfriend. It took awhile, but he eventually got her up to his bedroom. She remembered making him turn of the lights, because no one had ever seen her without her clothes on. She remembered apologizing because she had never done it before and was sure that she was awful. She remembered him kissing her and telling her that she was the best he had ever had. She remembered being surprised that she wasn’t his first, too.

The next day at school, girls were looking at her awkwardly in the locker room. As she left the changing room and entered the gym, a group of guys her age were making kissy faces at her. One asked her to come home with him. One of her friends had told her later that day that Matt had told virtually the whole school that he had screwed Audrey Patton; that she was the slut of the freshman class. After school, a junior girl had come up to her and yelled at her for sleeping with her boyfriend. She passed Matt in the hall the next day. He winked at her and walked away without saying anything. He never talked to her again.

She remembered crying herself to sleep that night. Most of her friends were the casual type, the ones laughing about the whole ordeal behind her back. Only one person had been there for her, and he was the same person holding her now. He had held her then, too. He had sat with her on her bed with his arms around her and let her cry into his shoulder. He had stayed until she fell asleep against his chest, her head on his shoulder. He had comforted her. He was the only person who cared about her that much. She didn’t know what she would do without him there; without her Adam Kumar, because she couldn’t stand the thought of him being anyone else’s. She couldn’t date him, because she couldn’t lose him. But the idea of losing him to another girl was just as scary, maybe because she knew that he deserved someone perfect. And when he found her, Audrey Patton would fade into the background of his life, and she would lose her best friend anyway.

She was told that that was when she began to change, but she refused to believe that one sour relationship could so thoroughly change her personality. But sometime around then, her innocent persona had been twisted. Audrey started partying more and more, drinking more and more. She started doing drugs, but totally casually. At first, her virginity had been something she had prized, something she was saving. But now that it was gone, she had no problem having sex again and again. What did it matter, now that Matt had taken her innocence from her anyway? She’d be the girl who lost her virginity at fourteen no matter how many people she fucked afterwards. And if nothing else, Matt Cohen had taught Audrey that sex was fun. It was awkward at first, but she got the hang of it quickly. Apparently, she was a natural.

But there was no way Audrey would let Matt take the full credit for her transformation. No one person could possible control her life, her future, so thoroughly. No, she preferred to believe that it was her destiny all along, that Matt Cohen had simply pushed her on her way to a life of parties and sex. And as long as she was having fun, what was the harm? And it gave her what she needed most in life – control. She dominated every man she had sex with or made-out with. She controlled the situation. Half of the time, she would initiate the relationship literally, or via lots of flirting. She made sure every guy she was with used a condom. She said what she would and would not do, though the latter list was a short one. And she ended it, each and every time. It was her world, baby.

“Dev Patel lives in London. People tell me I look like him.” Audrey laughed, shrugging one shoulder as she looked up at her friend. “Only a little,”

[/color] she replied, squinting as she studied Adam’s face. He was clearly more attractive than Dev Patel. She would never confuse the two. “So, you’ve been in London the entire summer while I’ve been in Pittsburgh? Ree Ree, dear, why on earth didn’t you tell me about this? I could’ve stowed away in your suitcase,” She rolled her eyes subtly, thought still grinning at Adam. “I clearly did tell you,”[/color] she insisted. “It’s not my fault that you have an awful short term memory. Besides, if I brought you, I would have had to clear out my shoes. And I don’t know that I would be willing to make that sacrifice,”[/color] she teased.

“That stings, Robin. Stings like… like a thousand bee stings to the face!” Audrey cocked a brow. “Adam Kumar, who are you?”[/color] she demanded, shaking her head as if he had just wildly disappointed her. “Fruit Roll-Ups? Gushers? Have I taught you nothing?!” She laughed as he swatted the boxes from her hands, sending them clattering to the floor. “I hope you intend on picking those up, because I’m sure not,”[/color] she informed him in a very matter-of-fact tone, watching as he grabbed a box of Fruit by the Foots from the shelf.

“Fruit by the Foot. No competition. It’s the snack food of champions,” he said as he handed her the box. Audrey rolled her eyes, but took it and dropped it into her overflowing basket. “What is it with you and these things?”[/color] she asked with a chuckle, running her free hand through her long red locks. Then, with a sigh, she grabbed her basket and bag from the polished tiled floor, suiting up to meander further through the grocery store. That, of course, simply entailed slinging her bag over her right shoulder and clasping the bright red handles of the shopping basket with both hands before her. This, however, was interrupted as Adam pulled her into a death hug. “And I didn’t give you a welcome back hug. Sneaking up on you doesn’t count, clearly. How was London? Let me guess. ‘Not as fun as Brazil.’”

“Or South Africa,”[/color] she amended, beaming. Her basket was now being held awkwardly at one side, so she let it fall to the floor and wrapped her arms instead around her best friend. “And of course, sneaking up on me doesn’t even begin to count.”[/color] She laughed, pushing her face into his shoulder. “It’s rather disconcerting how you always know what I’m about to say,”[/color] she observed, though she clearly wasn’t actually bothered. It was fun teasing him, though.[/font][/size][/blockquote]

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TAG alyssaaaa! (adam)
LYRICS this providence by my beautiful rescue
WORDS one thousand four hundred and fifty-one words.
OUTFIT clickie here
CHARACTER audrey jenna louise patton
NOTES YOUR FACE?!
CREDIT sophielizabeth of CAUTION 2.0.

[adam kumar]

don’t waste your time on me
YOU’RE ALREADY THE VOICE INSIDE MY HEAD

[/B][/color][/size][/font]
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The night Audrey had cried on his shoulder had been one of the hardest nights of Adam’s life. There was nothing worse than feeling your best friends’ tears soaking through your shirt at such a rapid rate. Well, scratch that. There was something worse: seeing your best friend, and the girl you loved, crying at the same time. That night, Adam had felt like he was in A Walk to Remember, or something of the like; only Jamie was Audrey and he was Landon. In the movie, Jamie had made Landon promise never to fall in love with her. He didn’t know what was worse; watching that movie on Audrey’s couch as she cried and ate chocolate ice cream, or knowing exactly how Landon felt. The thing was, Adam had truly fallen for Audrey when she was breaking apart. Before he’d met her, he’d been like any other teenager. He’d liked girls, but he’d skipped from girl to girl, never really caring about their feelings.

The night he saw Audrey cry, Adam had seen the pain girls experienced every day. It was worse when something as precious as a girl’s virginity was stolen from her. That’s what Adam saw it as. There was a difference between enjoying sex and being coaxed into doing it when you didn’t want to. Perhaps Audrey had wanted to give it up to Matt; that was what crushed Adam the most. He didn’t care that she wasn’t a virgin; that was her decision, and he respected that. It just hurt him that she innocently gave herself to Matt when he was clearly a bad person. There was no way he could justify spreading his night with Audrey everywhere. Adam had also promised himself never to become someone like Matt. No matter what he did, or how much he hated a girl for doing something to him, he would never hurt them like Matt had hurt Audrey. He never wanted to see anyone cry like that.

To see someone’s innocence shatter was a horrible sight. It was even worse when their innocence shattered right then and there in your arms. It’d taken Adam more strength than he’d imagined not to admit his feelings to Audrey right then and there. It’d be hard not to confess his love and cradle her face in his arms. He’d wanted, so bad, to tell her that someone loved her for everything she was and not just for her body. But she was in an extremely fragile state and Adam knew that if he’d said that, it would break her heart into a million more pieces. She couldn’t handle what Matt Cohen had done and she surely wouldn’t be able to handle Adam’s news on top of that. So he’d held her as tight as he could, listened as her breathing quickened and her sobs grew so loud he was sure they’d pierce a dagger into his heart. He’d kept her hair out of her face, he’d gently kissed her forehead, and he’d promised he’d never let go of her. He’d never let a monster like Matt Cohen get to her again.

Partying with Audrey after Matt Cohen had been odd, to say the least. She clearly wasn’t the same girl. She was wild, rambunctious, without a care in the world. All she wanted was control, and Adam could sense it. In the long run, Adam had realized Audrey had control over him, too. Without her, his world would fall apart. Both of them knew that. Of course, if he left her, she’d be hurt too – to some extent. The thing was, she wasn’t in love with him. She would move on with her life, fall in love, make a new best friend and Adam Kumar would be dead in her eyes. That was partially why he wanted to stay with her as much as she could, even when they were at parties together. He’d wait for her. Countless times he had waited outside houses for Audrey to finish her business and drive her home. He’d held her head above the toilet while she puked from all the alcohol she’d consumed. He’d punched the living daylights out of guys who tried to force themselves on her if she was too drunk to punch them herself.

It was weird to know his heart wasn’t his anymore. It was even weirder to know how big a part of him she had become. Tracing their friendship’s roots back to the eighth grade when they’d met, Adam couldn’t even remember who he was before he’d met her. He was just another face in the crowd, the lanky little Adam Kumar who no one really cared about or paid attention to. He was really good at science and he played drums for the school band. That was all Adam Kumar had been to anyone in the seventh grade. Then he’d met Audrey, and all of a sudden, he was someone. He wasn’t someone to everyone like Matt Cohen was; he wasn’t the star quarterback or the heartthrob of the junior class like Matt Cohen was. He knew he would never be that. But he was Audrey Patton’s best friend. He was someone to her, and he could easily say that now he was as much a part of her as she was of him.

Adam didn’t think he could detest senior year more. Sure, it was his last year of high school, the last year before the beginning of the rest of his life. But it was the last year he’d continually see Audrey, unless they went to the same college. As much as he wished that would happen, he knew it wouldn’t. He’d try hard not to let that stop him, but he knew it would eventually. There were only so many times he could call her, so many times he could text her, so many times he could video call her till she wanted him out of her life. And if she didn’t want him out of her life, there was no doubt he’d fade away slowly, painfully, till there was nothing left of him in her life. Adam knew that Audrey was going to go far and he knew it well. Audrey wasn’t one of those people who took no for an answer; she was a fighter and she wouldn’t let anything get in her way, including Adam.

The thought made him sick – sicker than sick, even. He was positively nauseated at this point. Flashing back to the year of Matt Cohen was clearly not a good way to start their summertime off together. “Only a little what?” he asked, his voice distant and slightly confused. He realized then that she was talking about Dev Patel and their resemblance. Quickly snapping back to reality, Adam shook his head. “I think it’s the smile. We both have really big smiles. Only… I’m hotter than him. Clearly. Jamal Malik ain’t got nothin’ on me,” he chimed, grinning toothily. “Anyone ever tell you you look like that one model? Cynthia Dickens, I think her name is. Or something like that. She’s from Brazil too!” he added with a chuckle. He’d seen Cynthia Dickens – also known as Cintia Dicker – and she did bear a striking resemblance to Audrey. Audrey was ten times prettier, though.

“I clearly did tell you. It’s not my fault that you have an awful short term memory. Besides, if I brought you, I would have had to clear out my shoes. And I don’t know that I would be willing to make that sacrifice.” Adam sighed, shaking his head. “I swear on my gerbil’s grave you never told me,” he insisted, trying to think back to when he’d ever had a gerbil. Nope, nothing registered. He smirked as she mentioned how she’d have to leave her shoes behind to fit him in her luggage. “Aw, ReeRee. Haven’t you heard? They have these new things called Adam Kumar Shoe Closets. You put them in your luggage with all your shoes and when you open up your luggage again you get an Adam Kumar and all your shoes color-coded. You could’ve gotten one of those. There is clearly no excuse,” he teased, laughing. Where he’d come up with that, he wasn’t sure, nor did he care. Audrey and he had a way of taking every stupid thing the other said in stride. It was nice.

He laughed heartily when Audrey asked who he was, seemingly flabbergasted. “Little lady, I’ll tell you who I am,” he began, clearing his throat and motioning to himself in a flamboyant manner. “I am Adam Prakesh Kumar, best friend of Audrey Jenna Louise Patton, mathematish and scientish extraordinaire. I would like to thank my producers, and the rest of the cast… they are just the bee’s knees. And I want to thank my mom – hi mom! And I want to thank Jesus Christ, the Lord Almighty. Thank the Lord. Everyone, pray pray pray and stay in school! I love you all, thank you so much for this award!” he announced, grinning. “Hope that answers your question, Miss Patton,” he added in jokingly.

Adam sighed at her next comment. “Of course I will pick them up, Miss Patton. I am not a litterbug. Plus, who would want to litter Gushers and Fruit Roll-Ups? I mean, they’re no Fruit by the Foot, but they’re still pretty awesome,” he noted, nodding and picking them up. After a moment, he dropped them in his overflowing basket. “They’re on me. They’re like the fallen soldiers who died so we could realize the epicness of Fruit by the Foot. They need a proper burial. Or something,” he tacked on with a grin. He couldn’t care less about the candy, but he knew Audrey liked them so he’d get them for her. After all, she was getting Fruit by the Foot, which he’d suggested – or, imposed – in the first place. The least he could do was get her favorite candy for her. They could always eat them together.

“What is it with you and these things?” Adam simpered, patting Audrey’s head as he enveloped her in the ‘death hug’. “Haven’t I ever told you this story before?” he asked, looking down at her. When it was clear he hadn’t, he chuckled. “Well, back when we lived in Topeka, my parents would always get me Fruit by the Foot. I’d tried all the other ones before but I didn’t really like them as much as I liked Fruit by the Foot. It was great. I had it all the time. I started getting sick of it really easily, though. When we moved to Vergennes, the closest supermarket was really basic and they didn’t have the awesomeness that was Fruit by the Foot, so I wanted it all the time whenever I got any other kind of fruity gummy thing. It was kind of like the macaroni and cheese phase that every kid goes through, except I was deprived of my crack called Fruit by the Foot and I didn’t get it till we moved here. I get it all the time now. I don’t know how I never told you that before when my pantry is full of these things. I’ll probably end up working for them when I’m older. Not really, though. That would be horrible. No offense to people who work there right now or anything.”

He grinned at her next statement. “It doesn’t. You always sneak up on me, anyway. I don’t have the same ninja powers. I can’t do that. So this time was a novel opportunity,” he explained, nodding as if it was law. “It’s rather disconcerting, eh?” he repeated, attempting to imitate Audrey’s accent to no avail. Instead of that eclectic Brazilian-South African-British-Boston accent he’d come to love, he ended up sounding like a cross between the Crocodile Hunter, Borat, and Larry the Cable Guy. It wasn’t a very accurate accent, to say the least. “Just so you know, it’s really hard to imitate your accent. You should do voiceovers for commercials for makeup and stuff. Then people would be like, ‘woah, that’s Audrey Patton. I know because of her beastly voice that is really distinct and no one can match it’,” he commented. Well, it was true; he’d never heard someone with a voice like Audrey’s. She could be the next Don LaFontaine if she wanted… even though he did movie previews and not makeup ads. Perhaps she’d be both. There was no doubt in his mind that she couldn’t be. Hell, Audrey was the only person in the world he knew who could pull off both and then some. She was a modern-day Superwoman.

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TAGGED ?! audrey (andi)
STATUS ?! complete
WORDS ?! 2,263
OUTFIT ?! shirt // shoes // jeans
LOCATION ?! supermarket!
LYRICS ?! I miss you – blink 182
PLAYING ?! dallas green & fleetwood mac
NOTES ?! my name is alyssa and I am a block of cheese. and sorry this is so rambly. I got really into it. xD
CREDIT ?! _and_heartsxx and HAY ALISON?! of caution[/center]

[audrey patton]

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“Only a little what?” Ah, he had spaced out on her. Audrey laughed, working her face into a look of hurt and disappointment. “I’m that interesting, huh?”

[/color] she quipped, shaking her head. Of course, staying mad or even mock-mad at Adam Kumar was an impossibility. She was normally pretty good at that sort of thing, keeping up some sort of act to see another person’s reaction. But she couldn’t help but smile around Adam, and she could never actually be mad at him. She liked him too much for that.

Audrey opened her mouth to drag Adam back to the conversation when he shook his head, meandering his way back all by himself. She wondered for a moment what had entranced his mind so thoroughly. She was usually the one getting distracted or losing her concentration on a conversation. She grinned as he went on, comparing himself to Dev Patel.

“No, he doesn’t,”[/color] she agreed with a shake of her head. She bent down a moment as he started about some model she looked like, moving the stuff around in her basket. She made a fair bit of room, then managed to slide her bag into the empty space. She took up the basket in one arm, effortlessly looping her other around Adam’s as she righted her posture again. “I’ve never heard of a ‘Cynthia Dickens’,”[/color] she laughed, unsure of to whom her friend was referring. “Is she prettier than me?”[/color] she asked teasingly.

She pulled lightly on Adam’s arm. “C’mon, I need ice cream,”[/color] she remarked, starting to walk down the aisle. She raised one slender brow at his next remark, smirking slightly. “Go ask the gerbil, man. I’m sure he-slash-she will tell you that I did indeed tell you, and then proceed to gnaw off your hand for having the audacity to swear such a falsehood on his-slash-her behalf.”[/color] She giggled lightly. “That would be the coolest pet. A zombie gerbil. And name it like, Sunny,”[/color] she went on, laughing between sentences.

“An Adam Kumar Shoe Closet?”[/color] she asked slowly, clearly questioning her friend’s sanity at that point. But of course, in the best way possible. “But you see, I have my shoes sorted into style. Color coding would totally fuck my system up. And you wouldn’t want that, now would you? So I really had no choice in the matter,”[/color] she rebutted in the most matter-of-fact tone of voice possible in so silly a conversation. She turned away slightly, concealing the wide grin that would give her seriousness away.

She stopped walking for a moment as Adam went on his introduction, smirking and raising one brow in a look somewhere between amusement and disbelief. “I love your middle name, in case I haven’t told you enough,”[/color] she commented, her smirk fading into a smile. “And I’m pretty sure bees don’t have knees. I never understood that saying.”[/color] She paused. “And what award have you won?”[/color] she demanded, eyeing him curiously. Then she grinned, tugging on his sleeve slightly to start him walking again. “Actually, I think that only raised more questions,”[/color] she murmured, shifting her basket to the hand of the arm entwined with Adam’s for a moment. She ran her free hand through her long red locks, pushing some stray strands out of her face, then took the basket back in her free arm. “By the way,”[/color] she added, “if you call me ‘little lady’ again, I will make up some equally distressing pet names for you. Consider yourself warned.”[/color]

Audrey laughed to the point of snorting as Adam dropped the two unwanted boxes into his own basket.“Then I suppose we do have to honor their efforts,” she agreed with a curt nod of her head. “Hey, what are you getting all this food for, anyway?”[/color] she asked suddenly, eyeing his basket, which was even more full than her own.

She listened to him go on about Fruit by the Foots, smiling lightly to herself. “You probably have told me that before. I just wasn’t listening,”[/color] she teased, sticking her tongue out at Adam. She chuckled, reaching over and patting his closest shoulder. “No, just kidding. That is a very good story, Kumar. And yeah, I don’t think working for Fruit by the Foot would be really living up to your potential. Not when you could be working for Gushers!”[/color] she commented teasingly, grinning up at Adam. “They don’t have Fruit by the Foot in London, I don’t think. At least, I didn’t see any… Hm, I’m not sure.”[/color] She shrugged, letting the subject drop. It didn’t really matter, and she wasn’t the type who would let it bother her for hours until she finally got around to Googling that shit. It was much easier and less stressful to just let it go.

“It doesn’t. You always sneak up on me, anyway. I don’t have the same ninja powers. I can’t do that. So this time was a novel opportunity.” Audrey laughed then shrugged innocently. “Because I am clearly a ninja,”[/color] she agreed with a serious nod of her head. She snorted as he attempted to imitate her, clearly amused. “I really hope that you weren’t just trying to do my voice, Adam Kumar,”[/color] she chided. She laughed as he went on. “I should patent it,”[/color] she added, smirking slightly. She leaned to the side, pushing her shoulder into Adam’s. Though she was a bit shorter, so her head was closer to his shoulder, her shoulder more at his side. Nevertheless, she pushed into his side lightly, sending the pair of them off of their straight course and veering a few inches toward Adam’s side of the aisle.

It was times like these that Audrey realized that she really had no idea what Adam was to her. She knew very well what he had to be – her best friend. But now, she found herself resisting shifting her basket to her other arm and untangling her arm from his, instead snaking it around his waist. She wanted to lean into him like this more than playfully sometimes. She wouldn’t say that she loved him, per se. Well, she would – she loved him as her best friend. She didn’t want to date him. That wouldn’t be fair to either of them. But then… she did want to, sometimes. And she didn’t want him to date anyone else.

She realized that she was being selfish and immature. If I can’t have him, no one can. What kind of immature mantra was that? She knew she couldn’t date him for real, and knew that he was a dating guy, not a hook-up guy. She knew that if there was ever anything between them, it would automatically be something. She knew that, and she didn’t want that. She didn’t want to hurt him. She didn’t want to hurt herself. She didn’t want to lose him, more than anything else. But she knew that eventually, he would find someone out there that deserved him, though she didn’t believe that anyone could ever be good enough; that she could ever be good enough. And that scared her.
[/font][/size][/blockquote]

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TAG alyssaaaa! (adam)
LYRICS this providence by my beautiful rescue
WORDS one thousand one hundred and eighty-five words.
OUTFIT clickie here
CHARACTER audrey jenna louise patton
NOTES shortttt. D= i sorry. and man, lotsa pink. xD
CREDIT sophielizabeth of CAUTION 2.0.

[adam kumar]

don’t waste your time on me
YOU’RE ALREADY THE VOICE INSIDE MY HEAD

[/B][/color][/size][/font]
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Adam stared quizzically down at Audrey at her question. “Audrey Jenna Louise Patton, is that even a question?” he asked, smirking down at the shorter girl. “You are positively riveting, my good sir,” he tacked on, grinning toothily. Well, there were two things wrong with that statement – A, it sounded like he was being sarcastic, and B, Audrey was a girl. He was being completely serious, though – Audrey was one of the most, if not the most interesting person he’d ever met. He couldn’t offer an unbiased opinion on that, though. Clearly he thought she was the most interesting person he’d ever met; he was in love with her. The two went hand-in-hand.

A swell of pride rose within him as Audrey agreed with his statement. She was probably only kidding about Jamal Malik having nothing on him – but it was nice to think, maybe, Audrey appreciated his goofy smile, or his prominent ears, or his thick hair. In a way, Adam could understand why Audrey didn’t like him – in the looks department, he was clearly out of her league. There were times when Adam thought he looked good, but he knew he was around average at best, and probably only cute in the dorky way. Audrey, on the other hand, was stunning. He knew that was a fact, no matter if he was her best friend or not. She got double-takes when he walked her to class and she still looked perfect without makeup. Well, maybe that last part was his opinion. He still didn’t understand why a girl as gorgeous as Audrey would even hang out with him. Some things just couldn’t be explained.

Chuckling at her next comment, Adam shook his head. “Of course not, Red,” he reassured her. He watched as Audrey shifted her basket from her right arm to her left arm and then to her right arm again. At least, that’s what he thought she’d done; she made so many different movements that Adam pretty much lost track. Then, all of a sudden, her items were back in her basket and so was her purse. He felt stupid for a minute, wondering if he should have offered to carry her basket for her. Mentally face-palming himself, he brushed the thought from his mind. That would be such a boyfriend-ish thing to do, and he wasn’t her boyfriend. Another thing he didn’t get was how the heck she even pulled off a maneuver like that. All girls seemed to have Grace 101 encoded in their brain.

Ice cream? Alrighty then. Adam headed down the aisle with her and listened to Audrey’s next schpeal about his dead-zombie-aka-non-existent gerbil, Sunny. Well, that was certainly a weird topic to meander off onto. He raised a brow at her odd train of thought. “Audrey Patton, you never cease to amaze me,” he commented, unable to conjure a single witty comeback to her clearly thought out process. He didn’t even know how she could formulate such explanations, and explain them in such an eloquent way, in a matter of minutes. Adam sounded like a four-year-old compared to Audrey when she spoke, even if her ideas were more far-fetched.

“Shoes have styles?” Adam asked in all seriousness, cocking his head to the side slightly. He really didn’t know how girls managed, what with all their flats and pumps and sandals and wedges and whatnot. The only flats he had were tires, the only pumps he had were for reinflating that tire, the only sandals he had were for the beach, and the only wedges he had were cheese at his parent’s parties. How those were turned into shoes, he hadn’t a clue. Looking down at his weathered Vans, he smirked slightly. Adam was different from Audrey in many ways, but one of the most apparent was that they had completely different senses of style. He preferred everyday clothing like jeans, t-shirts, and sneakers to dresses and heels and makeup. Then again, he couldn’t really change that unless he was a transvestite… which he wasn’t. “But you’d get Adam Kumar with it. Plus, if gay Smurfs raided your suitcase and threatened to kill you if your shoes weren’t color-coordinated, you’d live because of me and my amazing product. I think that the pros outweigh the cons in this situation,” he stated matter-of-factly, not entirely sure of what he’d just said. Oh well. It was a nice little tangent in response to her speech about Sunny the zombie gerbil.

“You have, and you always pronounce it wrong. Prah-kaysh, sweets. Prah-kaysh,” he reiterated jokingly, beaming. Adam wasn’t particularly fond of his middle name; it was his father’s. There wasn’t anything bad about the name Prakesh or anything; he just didn’t enjoy that his father had had the nerve to stick his own name in a completely different person’s name. “I’m pretty sure in Lithuania they do. I won the Nobel Prize for Lithuanian Bee’s Knees Discovery, duh,” he remarked, eying Audrey mockingly. Again, he wasn’t quite sure what the heck he had just said, but he knew he had to say something completely out-there to keep up with Audrey’s unique remarks.

He grinned when Audrey laughed heartily at his comments. Well, he was doing something right! At her next question, he rolled his eyes. “My parents are deciding to throw some stupid party tomorrow, and apparently I was supposed to know about it and buy the food for it, even though no one told me about it. They also took the liberty of sticking in our normal grocery items so I can make five thousand trips here and waste all my gas,” he groaned, shaking his head. “They’re such dicks sometimes.”

Adam gasped, feigning sadness. “It pains me that you think my highest potential is working for Gushers! Blasphemy!” he exclaimed, grinning and ruffling her hair up a little. He literally gasped at her next comment. “Are you serious?! You poor, deprived woman!” he commented, eyes wide with shock. How could a kid go through their entire life not eating Fruit by the Foot?! It was madness! It was Sparta!

“Yes, I did. I did a damn good job. And then you wouldn’t be Audrey Patton, You’d be Audrey Patent! Ha, ha, ha, get it?” he joked lamely, losing his balance slightly as they veered off to his side. It was such an Audrey thing to do; she didn’t ask to turn, she just pushed in that direction.

As they turned the corner, Adam shared Audrey’s urge. There was nothing more he wanted to do than hold her hand as they walked down the ice cream aisle, or to keep his grip around her waist and make sure she was safe there. That was something he hated the most about being with Audrey – he knew she didn’t love him back, and probably never would. He hated the guys she slept with, too. They were all douchebags – extreme douchebags – and they only wanted her for sex. Adam hated that. Of course, he wouldn’t reject to the sex if he was with her – what guy wouldn’t? – but he knew she was worth so much more than just that. Ultimately, all her partners were weak, and she controlled them. She decided when she wanted to leave, what she wanted to do, how much fun she wanted to have. Adam knew that if they ever entered a relationship, she wouldn’t have that control. She’d constantly be looking out for his feelings, as would he for her, and he knew she didn’t want that. Well, a boy could dream…

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TAGGED ?! audrey (andi)
STATUS ?! complete
WORDS ?! 1,260
OUTFIT ?! shirt // shoes // jeans
LOCATION ?! supermarket!
LYRICS ?! I miss you – blink 182
PLAYING ?! JAI HO! dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun. and lagaan. YEAH INDIANS.
NOTES ?! my name is alyssa and I suck.
CREDIT ?! _and_heartsxx and HAY ALISON?! of caution[/center]