"two souls don't find each other by simple accident."

Chapter 3

"Israel?"

I slap my face with a palm. "My God, Lou, I'm so sorry."

"It's okay." He waves it off, squinting at up at me with a grin.

"It's not okay. We almost killed you!"

"'Killed' I'd say that's an exaggeration, don't you think?"

I narrow my eyes at him, "b-but you just said so yourself."

"Aye, Exaggeration, I'm a fan of it."

"Why are you grinning?"

"I am grinning?" He touches his face like it's not his own. Then he frowns. "Sorry, I don't know what's happening."

I rush to his side, kneeling besides him. He had his school uniform on which was a rare site on days he swims with a red hoodie over it that had 'LEGACY' written boldly in white on the pouch. "Are you okay? Did you hit your head?"

"No," he drops said head on my shoulder, sighing heavily. "I sucked at swimming today, coach yelled at me. Said I've been slacking over the holiday, I swear I wasn't slacking."

I look at him, unsure what's going on and what to do. Carefully turning my neck around, I call for Jamal who is still hiding out in the car. "Jamal, come out here you coward."

He comes out with a rush, "take that back. I'm no coward."

"Says the guy hiding out in the car." I roll my eyes.

"I wasn't hiding out. I was waiting for you in case you came back and we urgently had to drive off."

"Yeah right," I beckon him over. "Come help please."

"What's wrong with him?" Jamal kneels on Lou's other side. "Is he dead?"

I look at Lou and his eyes are closed now like he's asleep. "No, but I don't know what's wrong. He was talking gibberish, I think he hit his head. All your fault, by the way."

Jamals ignores the last bit and presses his hands on Lou's face. He touches him some more and leans in to sniff him.

"What the-"

Jamal burst out laughing, "oh man."

"What?"

"Man's high as a kite." Jamal explains confusing me the more. "Smell him."

"No way," I make to recoil but Lou's head on mine stops me.

"Do it pussio ain't hard. I just did it." He is laughing and I'm suspicious of his agenda but I lean in to do it anyway.

There's a funny smell on Lou, not a bad one though and one that I recognize. I've smelled it in his car more than once, although the one in his car is a bit sweeter. I screw up my nose, "what's that?"

"Weed bro, weed and probably nicotine."

I sigh, "he smoked."

"Yeah, why do you think so?"

I shrug, "maybe today wasn't that well for him too?"

Jamal shrugs and I sigh some more. "And to add it up, you had to hit him."

"It was a mistake."

"You're never driving the car again. Do you even have a license?"

"I do, I just didn't expect it to go that fast."

"If he was another person, we'd probably be in trouble. Big trouble."

"Well thank God it's him, right?" He smiles. "And he's so high, he won't remember shit tomorrow."

"Let's get him up," I hold on to his arm. Squatting and waiting for Mal to grab his other hand. When this is done, we both stand up at once pulling him up with us.

"Ow, fuck my leg hurts!" Lou groans, head rolling back as his eyes open and he takes his right leg off the ground, relying on us and his left leg.

"He wouldn't remember, huh?" I glare at Mal and he smiles sheepishly, shrugging.

We successfully drop him into my car, then go in search of his. Unfortunately or fortunately we don't see it, guess he didn't bring it to school today. I smirk at Mal, "it's settled then, you're on your own Mal."

"What?"

"There are only two seats and I have to take Lou home." I explain, walking back to the car.

"So you'd abandon me here?"

"I'm lacking choice in this Mal, you see it right?" I pat him, holding in a smile. "You can still catch a bus or the train."

"Issy no."

"Think of it as a small price to pay for almost killing someone and driving reckless," I open the car and flash him a smile. "Bye."

"Issy, you have no heart!"

I laugh as I put the roof back on and start up the car, carefully driving off and leaving Jamal behind. He caused it on himself. Glancing at Lou, Jamal disappears from memory and I find myself wondering what I've got myself into and unable to ignore the worry at the pit of my stomach regarding why Lou got this high.

I risk it and look at him some more, switching between the road and his face. His head is facing me, slanted with his eyes closed as he sleeps. His hair— which he decided to grow out over the months— was a wavy dishelved dirty blond that's sticks out with some like bangs falling over his forehead, not quite reaching his eyes but scanty enough that one could still see his sharp brows. His face has to be the most angled face ever and I'm sure Jamal could measure out the straight forms and angles of his spectacular bony face. Then there is his perfect straight nose and lips that can look full at some point and thin at another.

Lou has the softest eyes and I wonder how they looked high and behind the lids. Were they still as blue? I've never seen him seen him so high, he lost his wits. I know he smokes, I've caught him a couple times and it's something he does when he's on edge or worried. I also know he adores the swim team coach, so whatever happened today must have really hurt it that he choose to forget.

My jaw ticks as I stop at a traffic light, I am angry on his behalf. He's a wonderful swimmer from what I've heard, couldn't the coach cut him some slack on the first day?

It's funny how time has passed, slowly or fast, it passed and over the months I've come to know Lou almost as much as I know Jamal. We weren't best friends that's for sure and we didn't hang out all the time because he's usually so busy but on the days we did hang out, we talked and chatted about our lives like we were each writing a chapter of each other's lives.

Ever since him and Nile invaded our table last year, we all have become good friends and honestly it's because of them I've been doing fairly good. Without Lou, Nile, Jamal and Darcy, I don't think I would have made it this far into the year. And now I feel as if Lou needs me and I want to be there for him, anyway I can.

The drive to Lou's house takes about thirty minutes and it's in a complete opposite direction of my house. While we don't live in a poor environment or super rich, Lou lives close to the outskirts of town and his house is kinda surrounded by trees and lots of green. His house isn't a mansion per se but it's really big, time two of mine and it's expected with his super large family.

I pull up at the gate that just happens to be wide open, defeating the purpose of a gate and I just drive in, making a turn at the little make shift roundabout at the centre and packing my car next to his. Turning off the engine, I turn to look at him wondering if this really was a good idea of if I should've just left him in school.

"Lou?" I call him and proceed to tap his shoulder, then shake his shoulder then lightly slap his face but all I get is a little grumble and nothing else, he doesn't shake. "For God's sake."

I get out the car and run to the front steps of the house and up the large porch to the door. The porch is really wide, taking up six lounging chairs and still having space to walk around and for flower pots. His grandmother spends most of her time sitting on one of the chairs and sewing. I press the door bell and wait. My foot starts tapping and I press the bell again and again and even pound on the door. "Charlie!" I shout but get no response. Charlie's one of Lou's stepbrothers who is really lanky and tall for his fourteen years.

When there's no response after five minutes of knocking, I run back to the car, opening Lou's door and trying my luck again at waking. "Lou, wake up please there's no one at home." I plead, squatting down because my leg is starting to hurt. "Lou! Louie!"

"Ow," he finally reacts to my slap on his cheek and I sigh relived thanking God. "Israel? For what reason did you slap me?"

"Sorry, I had to wake you up somehow."

Lou squints at me, then looks around and at the car. "What the hell happened?"

"Well," I glance at and away from him, standing up to explain breathlessly. "Jamal hit you with the car and you fell to the ground. I came out to check on you but then you were grinning and talking gibberish, I thought maybe you hit your head with the fall so I panicked a bit and called Jamal out to help. Then you fell asleep on my shoulder and Jamal made us both smell you concluding that you were high. After that we got you into the car and I drove you home leaving Mal at the parking lot."

When I look back at Lou he has a small smile on and I blush, walking away from him. "Are you going back for Jamal?"

I shake my head, "Nope, before I go back to school, pick him up, drop him off and then go home, it'll be dark and I'd be terribly late."

"Right," he gets out the car, stepping on his right leg and screaming bloody hell before relaxing back on the car. I rush to his side to hold him off. "Fuck, I did not expect that."

I apologetically smile, "sorry, it's all Jamal."

"Permission to kill him tomorrow?" He asks, I don't know if he's joking or not.

"Granted," I nod and grab his hand to put over my shoulder.

Lou chuckles. "It's fine Taylor, it's not that bad. I just wasn't expecting it."

"Oh," I release him and take a step back. Then I watch him cautiously place the leg back on the ground, wince, take it off and do it again. The third time it stays on the ground and he slowly shifts his weight to it and smiles at me but it comes out more like a grimace that almost made me laugh.

"See? All good."

I nod and watch him carefully walk away. "Are you going to have that checked?"

"Nah, I don't think so. It'll subside."

"If you say so."

He stops walking and turns to me. "Um," his hand goes up to his head and he touches his ear. "Are you in a hurry?"

"Um," I look back at my car, and back at him, unsure of what to say. "I should get home before it's dark."

He looks up to the sky, "how long before that?"

I almost smile, "well, barely another hour."

Lou nods, looks at his shoes and back at me. An amusing thing about him is how easily red he gets— like now. "D-do you— want to have breakfast with me?"

Now I smile, I can't help it and I'm not even surprised he said to have breakfast by this time of the evening. I think I've had more breakfast in my life since we became friends. "It's evening already, mister."

Lou smiles, "remember what I say Taylor?"

I jog up to him and he slings his hand around my shoulder and we both say, "'There's no specific time for breakfast except anytime."

He reaches under the pot plant by the door and collects the spare key while I say, "but that's totally wrong, like I always say. The word itself says there's a particular time for it."

"That's bullshit," he opens the door for me. "Like why's there lunch and dinner when there's breakfast."

"You can't eat one particular order every time. It goes against the law."

"Where's the law?" He walks backwards, smirking at me and heading to the kitchen. "Where, where?"

I roll my eyes, "it's hopeless with you."

"Thank you for understanding." We enter into the large kitchen, there's no counter at the center, it's an L shaped kitchen with the counter at the sides. But there's a kind of dinning table at the center with stools for sitting around it.

I sit on one of the stools and watch him get two bowls out, then move over to his shelf dedicated solely to cereal boxes. I watch him whistle to himself as his finger dances over each box and I can't help but smile. "Don't you have some kind of hangover?"

He settles on a cornflakes box. "Hangover?"

"Yeah," I relax my chin on my hand. "Isn't there one for smoking?"

He winces, pausing a bit on the cornflakes descent to the bowl and looking at me with another grimace. "Are you mad?"

I slowly shake my head, "just curious."

"There's this after effect but you can't call it a hangover."

"Not about that," I correct. "What happened?"

He pushes my bowl to me with the milk almost pouring over. "After breakfast?"

I nod in agreement and when he sits across me, we hit our spoons together.

"Bon appetit."

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