The next day after fourth period, me and Emma walked down the hallway as we usually did.
"Do you want to eat together?" The short girl asked.
I was surprised by her question but quickly regained my composure. "...Yeah we can. Where do you want to eat?"
"I know a quiet spot by the library." She said with a straight face.
"Sure. Let's grab our food and then head over there."
We talked about today's class on the way to the cafeteria. We got there and picked up the usual insanely dry sub sandwich. After that Emma led me to her secret spot in silence.
It was a rusty bench with grass growing up and around its four legs. It was on the left side of the library so it faced the forest that surrounded our school. This aspect made the area slightly mystical.
"Do you want to sit down?" Emma asked, looking at me confused.
I must've been staring.
"Yeah. Let's eat."
We took our backpacks off and set them on the bench. We sat in between them and started to eat.
After about five minutes of eating the preppy girl looked at me and spoke up. "So you like Emma...The book! Not me."
I smirked. I could've said something flirty here but I decided against it.
"Hey! Stop smirking. I'm trying to start a conversation here." She blurted, pointing her plastic fork at me.
I must applaud the bookish tsundere for trying.
I moved my body so it was a little easier to look at Emma. She was now facing the forest of course. Remembering our conversation from yesterday I said. "I like Emma and other Romantic era books. You wanted to talk about it yesterday right?"
"Yes..." The short girl seemed to remember something.
"Hmmm, I like the Bronte sisters. Emily is probably my favorite out of the three." I explained as if Emma had given me an energetic response.
After hearing this Emma seemed to get out of her stupor.
Knew that would work.
"If Villette didn't exist Emily would be my favorite too. Have you read it?" Emma asked
"That was one of my firsts actually so I don't remember much." I said and took the last bite of my sandwich.
"It's my favorite! I loved how Charlotte wrote Lucy as a reserved, self reliant woman. When you usually get self-reliant women characters they're usually strong and outspoken. Which is great. It's just refreshing to get a different variation of that. "
Side thought: I wonder what the Bronte sisters would write in 2017. They were pretty progressive back then, so I wonder what they would make now with the floodgates now opened.
I swallowed the last bite and responded. "For sure. I bet Lucy was the one of the first protagonists like that since that era of writing gave a lot of freedom to authors. Charlotte probably used that freedom to make that kind of character."
"Writers, poets, painters, creatives in general were inspired to make art that related to everyone, not just affluent and scholarly people. Nature and human emotion were their inspiration and the facets that allowed them to tell their beautiful, personal stories. Truly a remarkable era of art." She explained sounding a bit more eloquent than me. I didn't mind though. I actually quite liked it when Emma spoke her mind like this.
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"In literature we got some of the best protagonists and characters. Lucy is probably my favorite out of all of them." The preppy girl continued and took the last bite of her sandwich.
I looked over at Emma who looked back at me quizzically. "It just tells you how great those characters are when people hundreds of years later can relate to them."
She swallowed the bite she took and pointed at herself. "Me?"
I nodded.
The sophomore laughed sardonically. "Jocelyn stop joking. Lucy is much more elegant and prettier than me. I can't relate to her at all."
Emma. The way she talks makes it seem like she would be fine on her own. Sure, she does seem like she's enjoying herself when talking to me about Romantic literature but a part of me feels like she doesn't necessarily need other people.
"It's better than having no one to spend lunch with. I know that at least." I remember her saying that with little emotion when talking about the group as if friends made things better but only slightly.
She's content on her own. I'm a little jealous of this trait but that's self-reliance. She is definitely strong willed, I mean she wasn't scared of me when we "fought" under the big tree despite me towering over her with my heels.
Oh god. Cringe incoming.
"Maybe, but I think you're self-reliant and strong willed and those are Lucy's best traits." I was surprised that I actually said that out loud.
Emma got real red after hearing that. She put her hands in her lap. "Th-th-thank you. That means..." She stammered not even finishing her sentence.
" She stammered not even finishing her sentence [https://img.wattpad.com/d86da41da43dcd9e275632d7ee2194f61214d64f/68747470733a2f2f73332e616d617a6f6e6177732e636f6d2f776174747061642d6d656469612d736572766963652f53746f7279496d6167652f744a7031465a37624236754655513d3d2d313331363836343730332e313734346638326537356566613936373238383939303032353437362e706e67?s=fit&w=1280&h=1280]
Hot girls don't compliment you often hm?
A couple seconds passed and she took a deep breath. She looked up at the sky.
"We both have those traits." She said, sounding genuine.
"Thanks." I said
We sat in silence for a couple of seconds until I broke it since I remembered something.
"Ah! I remember liking Ginerva in Villette. She was cool and I liked how the protagonist was kind of attached to her."
Lesbian moment.
The preppy girl looked surprised at first but processed what I said after a couple of seconds. "I did too. I wish they talked more."
Emma then kind of deflated and sighed. "I wish we could read Romantic books in class. All the books on the year planner are from the fifties."
"I know. I wouldn't mind rereading The Price Of Salt or the Narnia series again but no, we have to read the boring cold war inspired books." I complained
"Yeah..." She sighed again.
After a bit of silence I asked a question that's been in the back of my mind since classes started. "By the way, why are you taking English 12 shouldn't you be in 10 or 11?"
The short girl looked at me confused. "What is that supposed to mean? I'm a senior just like you."
What!?! Really?
"Oh. I just assumed you were younger because of your height." I said in a half joking way.
Emma sighed for the third time, this time closing her eyes while doing so.
"You can be stupid sometimes, Jocelyn. You're the tall one. I'm average." The preppy girl said, opening one eye to look at me.
See if this was when we first met I would've gotten mad but at this point I had gotten used to Emma's personality.
"Whatever." I said, shrugging off the remark.
Emma got up and dusted the sandwich crumbs off her white skirt.
"I need to use the restroom. Do you want to accompany me?" She asked plainly.
"Sure. I'll wash my hands."
We walked to the closest bathroom which was conveniently by the west exit where we just came through to get outside.
The bathroom was pretty normal. The walls and the floors were painted in the same dull colors as the school's hallways. A big stall and two smaller stalls stood to our right all painted dark blue. There were three sinks and two silver air dryers on the wall to our left. There were sandwich wrappers and soda cans on the floor too but not as much as I thought there would be.
As I was taking in my surroundings I noticed Emma slowly walking up to the mirror in front of her.
In the upper right hand corner there was graffiti that seemed to be drawn with pink lipstick.
It read "Emma goes out with the demon!"
I guess we have been hanging out kind of a lot recently...
I looked at Emma and her face was unreadable. I'm pretty sure she wasn't happy though.
Come on. Lighten the mood, Jocelyn.
I was trying to think of something funny to say but I couldn't think of anything. With nothing to say I decided to just erase the graffiti. I took a napkin from my backpack, wet it and wiped the it off.
"Thanks." Emma murmured.
"No problem." I said quietly.
There was a bit of an awkward silence afterward that lasted until the bell rang.
The short senior tugged on her backpack strap and dejectedly said. "See you."
She didn't wait for me to respond as she turned around and left right after saying that. I stared at the mirror for about five minutes just thinking how glad I was that the west bathrooms were always empty.