William looked over at Katherine. She had a hard look on her face as if he had just committed some horrible crime. “Hey! Look,” William replied defending himself, “This is the first time that this girl had acted in even a remotely civil way. The only communication between me and her over the past three months has been…well…the word disturbing comes to mind.” William ran his fingers through his wet hair. “Look, I have no intention of leading this girl on. I don’t want from her what she wants from me, and I have tried to make that clear to her but until she tries anything stupid, I will return an act of civility with a like act of civility.”
Katherine arched an eyebrow at him. Charles shrugged and turned around to turn off his shower. Neither of them were sold on his actions and that worried him. He didn’t want to hurt Keva and he didn’t want to lead her on either. This was turning into a huge mess. He had heard once, ‘There are no perfect men in this world, only perfect intentions.’ Perfect intentions rarely worked out in the real world. Why did he suddenly have this huge feeling of dread about going to dinner?
William finished rinsing himself off and turned off the shower. Grabbing his soap and shampoo, he walked around and dropped the items back into their leather bag. Grabbing his towel from the counter, he wiped off the moisture from his body. Katherine spent a little extra time drying her hair, letting it hang over one shoulder and rubbing her towel around it. William’s own long hair was still pretty wet but he wasn’t terribly concerned about it. He pulled back on his shorts. The three walked out of the bathroom and split up once again, going to their respective rooms.
William went back to his place, tossed his towel on the dresser and dropped his hygiene bag on the dresser. He pulled open two drawers and dragged out some clothes. He dropped his shorts to the ground and pulled on some underwear and pants and threw on a shirt. He sat back on his bed and pulled on his socks and shoes. He was dead tired, but the shower had invigorated him somewhat. He stood up and walked out of his room toward the cafeteria.
He approached the cafeteria to find that he was the first person from his pack to get there but not the only person that was there. Keva was standing by herself waiting. She caught sight of him as he strolled up to the building and William could see her brilliant smile from four hundred yards away. The protests from his pack mates crashed in on him and he asked himself if he really knew what he was doing.
“Hey, Keva.” He said politely when he was close by.
Keva made eye contact and held his gaze. Her stunning green eyes were alive with green fire and William couldn’t help but feel really uncomfortable. “Hey, Setford. How are you?”
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
William stepped up to the building and rested with his back against the building wall. “I’m tired, Keva.” He closed his eyes as he rested his head against the cool stone of the building.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” There was concern in her voice but something else that made William instantly open his eyes and look at her. She cocked her head to the side and looked at him sweetly. “What did you have to do today?”
William leaned back again. “We had to clean up a shitty bathroom.” She barked out a laugh. William opened one eye lid and cocked his eye brow at her. She stopped laughing.
“I…I’m sorry.” Keva seemed to be off balance, like she was really nervous about something. William could see in her stance and her speech that she was tense. “Why did the Elders make you do that?”
William raised his eyes to the ceiling briefly, wishing that his pack mates would show up soon, “There was a blockage in one of the sewage pipes that caused a back flow explosion of poop in one of the bathrooms and we got the unlucky task of cleaning it, so Ryan could get in there and fix the blocked pipe.”
Keva nodded, “Oh, that makes sense, but it still sucks.”
“Yeah, yeah it did.” William muttered as he rested his head back on the side of the building.
“That’s pretty good, Will.”
William opened his eyes to see Charles stepping up beside him. William looked at his friend, “What’s pretty good?”
Charles glanced over at him, “Sleeping while standing up.”
William smiled and let his eyes close again. He nodded, “Yeah something I’ve been working on. It comes in pretty handy for times like this.” William opened his eyes and motioned to Keva, “Charles this is Keva. Keva, Charles.” The two reached out and shook each other’s hands. Keva smiled at the tall black man and Charles nodded his head.
Katherine walked up to join them, nodding toward the red-haired girl. “Hello, Keva.” She looked over at William and Charles, “Are we going to eat inside or just stand out here, sleeping.” William glanced at his friend and heaved himself off the building. Charles followed suit and the four of them entered the building.
The place was very familiar with its smells of food and steam. William let Keva step in front of them to get served first. He glanced behind him at Katherine who had a stone expression on her face. William silently asked what the problem was and Katherine shook her head and looked away. William really didn’t know what he was doing wrong here. It was just dinner.
He grabbed his food and sat down across from Keva in the middle of the cafeteria. Charles and Katherine soon joined them. He looked across at Keva who was smiling mildly. Her red hair was loosely pulled back so it spread across her shoulders and down her back. Her green eyes were a lot more awake than he was and he envied that. He hid a huge yawn behind one hand. The faster he ate the faster he could go to bed.
Keva looked over at Charles, who was sitting next to her. “I’m sorry that you guys had to clean that bathroom today. I wish I could have been there to help.”
Charles looked across the table at William briefly before looking over at Keva. “It was just something that had to be done. We were unlucky enough to be tasked with the job.”
“What were you up to today, Keva?” Katherine asked.
Keva looked across the table at the woman. “I was here cleaning the Kitchen area and disposing of waste parts.”