Forbidden To Love (The Erosians) (18 page)

“
I hear she’s a witch and she’s tricked him into liking her.” These are just some of the whispers Josh is fortunate to be deaf to, unlike me.                                                                                    The only people who aren’t whispering about us are Stacey and Melissa. They’re sitting in the back left corner of the room, glowering at me - not us, just me.                                          “I think I get the phrase looks can kill now,” I mutter.              “What’d you say?” Josh asks, leading me to a seat on the back row to the right.                                                        “Nothing.” I smile at him as I sit down. They can give me all the looks they want. If the skin turned the colour of emotions, I’d be looking at two dismal emeralds right now. They soon quiet down once the teacher starts barking instructions about French grammar.                                                        The bell rings before I know it. “Is that the end already?” I ask dumbly.                                                                                    “You enjoying the vocab that much?” Josh laughs.              “Maybe not the lesson,” I reply as he pulls the back of my chair out so I can stand up.                                                        The classroom has almost emptied and he hooks his finger through one of the loops on the waist of my jeans, pulling me into him. “I’ve got gym now so I’ll see you at lunch?”                                                                                                  “Sure.”                                                                                                  Josh leans forward slightly and kisses me softly. I part my lips, and he responds eagerly. Probably a little too eagerly for the classroom! I pull away slightly as his lips leave mine.

“I better go” he makes no motion of leaving.                            “Really?” I link my hands behind his neck as I press my hips against his.                                                                                    “You know I don’t want to and you’re not making leaving easy for me. I only hold so much willpower, Cacia.” His voice becomes a growl as he nuzzles into my neck whilst reaching his arms around my back, holding me tighter. I lean away from him smirking and putting some distance between us to make it easier for him to go. Josh laughs at my feeble attempts and pulls me roughly into him, crushing his lips hard against mine. He releases me just as quickly and jogs out the room. I throw my hands out to steady myself my legs are a little weak with the force of that kiss!                                          “They’ll never last, Stace. They’ll be done within a week,” Melissa is comforting Stacey.                                                        I didn’t even realize they were still in the room. They both cast evil looks my way as they leave the class. As if my immortal enemies trying to tear Josh and me apart weren’t enough, now the mortal ones are at it!                                                        I set off for history no longer feeling like a total outsider as I walk the halls. I spy Keagan and Cassidy at the end of the corridor. They’ve got their hands interlocked as they stare into each other’s eyes in full view of the rest of the students. That’s amazing; their auras fought back and brought them together. Perfect.                                                                      I get to history. One good thing about this class is even though there’s no Josh, there’s also no Stacey, so I won’t be getting any nasty looks and I can't hear any whispers either. I pass down the rows of tables, and no one utters a thing about me. They all continue on with their conversations. I can relax in here at least.                                          Halfway through the class I hear a buzzing. Looking round, no one else seems to notice it. I ignore it like the rest of the class. Then there’s a vibrating against my leg. I look down to my bag and see the light of my phone going on and off. I look round anxiously, hoping no one realizes it’s coming from me.                                                                                                  Phew it's gone off. Bzzzzzzzz. Oh frick! Some of the class turn around to look at me. I keep my head down in my book and pray for it to stop, but it keeps buzzing. There’s only Josh, Allana and Amora with my number, and I can’t think of a reason any of them would be phoning me.                            “Miss Rose,” the teacher calls, I look up embarrassed. “Is that your telephone?”                                                                      “Erm, no sir, not mine,” I answer sheepishly.                            The teacher looks disbelievingly at me but leaves it at that and goes back to adding dates to the timeline on the board. Teachers here are not allowed to go through bags, so he can’t prove its mine.                                                                      Whilst his back is turned, I reach down into my bag and slide the phone up under the table. Cautiously I peer down under my desk. I’ve got sixteen missed calls all from Allana. Oh no, that can’t be good. Nausea overtakes me. The room starts to spin. I grip onto the desk, trying to get some sort of calm. What could’ve happened? Is Eros back? That ice cold feeling bleeds through my body at the thought of it.

“
Er, Sir, I need to get some air,” I say heading out of the classroom.                                                                                    “Miss Rose, take your seat please and wait until the end of the lesson.” I’m already at the door. I run to the end of the corridor. My footsteps pound the hall floor creating a deafening echo in the empty corridor.                                                        I burst through the double exit doors, gasping for breath as my mind switches into overdrive imagining what could have happened.                                                                                    Then it hits me, it floods back into my mind at super speed. The kiss!                                                                                                  But no one was there. The place was wholly deserted. How would anyone see us? Unless Josh had some sort of spying set-up and that was his plan all along. Shut up! Josh isn’t anything bad. I need to stop going back to that idea every time something goes wrong.                                                        I bet Amora has just been winding Allana up again and now she’s worked up and worried. I hope that’s what it is. I glance back at the school to where Josh is either sitting in one of the classes as a mortal should be or he was only turning up for first period because he knew we had it together and now he’s left because his work with me is done.              I snap open my phone, which has still been constantly buzzing, “Allana,” I almost shout down the phone.              “Acacia, come home now,” Allana demands.                            “I can’t, I'm in school.” I look round me to make sure no one has followed me from class.

“
I don’t care. This is more important than your fake school life. You need to come home now. I'm not giving you an option.” I slam the phone shut. I’m about done with people telling me what to do and not giving me options. This needs to end. I'm not new to all this anymore, and it’s about time they realized it

Depth

~1
4~

Screeching into the drive I brake hard and swerve, so I don’t end up in the back of Allana’s car or the side of Amora’s. Allana comes rushing from the front door before I’ve even stepped out of the car.  

“
Acacia what have you done?” her enraged tone from our previous phone call has given into something else. It’s back to the motherly hue I know so well forcing my rage at her to disappear. Looking behind her to Amora I can see she’s the same as ever, standing there conceitedly just outside the front door.

“
I don’t know what you’re talking about” the words spill into the air as my mind flashes ‘the kiss’ like an enormous neon sign in my head. I don’t take my eyes off Amora.

Allana grabs my arm.
“Hey, what are you doing?” I struggle against her grasp.
“You need to get inside. Eros knows what you’ve done, and he’s furious.”                                                                       “Eros knows what I’ve done? Well would someone like to tell me because I sure as hell don’t?” All my frustration rushes out uncontrollably as I wrench my arm from her grip.                                                         “And whatever crime I’m supposedly guilty of that seems to have pissed him off so much, I don’t care! This is my life, not his. I can damn well do what I want, and if he’s got a problem with it then he can go suck it! I'm done being his puppet” I’m breathless and so wound up I can hear the blood pumping in my ears. I stare at Allana waiting for her to react, but it’s Amora who walks forward.                                                                                     “So are you wanting a double funeral with Josh? Or two singles?”                                                                                     Her laughter fills the air, and I bite my lip so not to react to her even though I’m dying to charge her and do whatever damage I’m capable of to her pretty little well constructed face!                                                                       “And interesting choice of words there - hell. You know you may be coming friendly with hell sooner than you think.” Amora winks at me deviously and smirks.                                                                                                   Allana looks deflated. She doesn’t even curse Amora for taunting me. I push past the both of them and march inside, bored of their cryptic messages and orders about what I should and shouldn’t do.                             “Eros knows about you kissing Josh in that cave,” Allana calls after me disheartened.                                           I stop dead, my worst fears confirmed, but how could he know? We couldn’t have gone to a more secluded spot. There was no one who could have possibly seen us. The only thing we could see was each other, the cave walls and the sea. Josh must be something else. The whole thing had to be a set-up, and now I'm going to pay the price. I allowed myself to walk on the edge of this life, risking everything and for what?                                                                                                                 “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I call over my shoulder back at them both. I know there’s no point in denying it, but somehow I figure if I pretend Josh hasn’t set me up I can believe he did actually love me.                                                                                                                 Amora flounces past me. “Bet you don’t,” she laughs. I turn to look at Allana who is so frail and afraid like I’ve never seen her before. Her eyes are wide and red from tiredness or crying, or most likely both.
              “How did he find out?” I ask quietly. I can’t lie to Allana anymore, not when she looks so defeated. 

Allana looks down at the ground and raises her hands towards the sky. She looks up as if searching for help from someone who isn
’t there. “The merfolk you were in a merfolk cavern. They carved them into the rocks years ago so they could enjoy private liaisons, a bit like you and Josh had.” She raises her eyebrows at me. Red stings my cheeks. “There were two heading up there when they sensed there were Gods already there, they backed off, but curiosity got the better of them. Word spread about what they saw and somehow the message got back to Eros.”                                           Allana takes a deep breath and sinks down onto the grass at the side of the house where the towering oak grows. She allows her back to rest against it while she twists her hands around the violet scarf she has looped casually around her neck. So it wasn’t Josh, it wasn’t a trap my heart lifts only slightly with relief.
“Why did they think there were Gods?” Why would she say 'Gods'?                                                                                     “What?” Allana mumbles preoccupied.                             “You said they sensed there were Gods, plural, as in more than one.” I walk over to where she’s sitting and crouch down next to her.                                                         “I meant you, they could sense you” She rubs her fingers in circles on either side of her temples. If we were in other circumstances I might have pressed her further, but she looks as if she is going to fall to pieces at any second.                                                                       “So what do we do now?”                                           “Well, your kiss happened days ago, and he hasn’t come raging around here yet, so maybe he doesn’t care enough. The word from Olympus is he is furious with how you’ve humiliated him, but if he were really angry, Josh would surely be dead by now, and you wouldn’t be here.” She chokes on the last few words, and I instinctively reach out to hug her.               “Let’s just carry on as normal,” I suggest hopefully “If Eros comes back, we’ll deal with the problem then. Like you said, he would’ve done something if he were really that mad. We know he doesn’t care about me, so maybe he’s just ignoring it.” I hope he is.                                                                                                   “His reaction isn’t about caring about you, Cas. His anger and rage come from the insult of you going behind his back to someone else,” Allana explains, swallowing down her tears as she does so. I nod. I know she’s right, but I can’t change what’s been done, and I'm not sorry about it so I won’t be apologizing to him.
 

“
He’s the laughing stock of Olympus, and I don’t think he’s going to forget about this. I think you should stay home for the next few days, and we’ll see what happens.”                                                                       Allana looks at me for my acceptance. I can see she is genuinely scared, which makes me shiver, so I nod in agreement and stand up pulling her up with me. There’s no chance I'm giving in now though. Things are about to change.                                                                       “Let’s get inside. I’ll stay off school for the next couple of days, ok?” She looks slightly relieved at my agreeing to stay at home, but as she anxiously scans around the front yard I know she’s still on edge, and I know I should be too. Allana walks straight to the kitchen, and I mindlessly follow her.                                           “Anyone for tea?” Amora chirps as we walk in. She’s holding a teapot in one hand, and tea cups are dangling from three of her fingers on the other. “Or perhaps you’d prefer champagne. We are celebrating, after all.” She looks at me with a vindictive smile which is quickly removed as she falls to the floor screeching. I look at Allana for an explanation to what's happened, and I’m shocked to see her eyes are boring holes into Amora.                                                                       “Allana stop!” I scream, terrified something has possessed her. She snaps out of her trance and Amora springs up from the floor fully-healed, snarling and hissing like Eros. Instead of charging at Allana as I expect her to, she takes off upstairs, screaming insults and threats as she goes.                                                         “What was that?” I stare in disbelief between Allana and the floor where just seconds ago Amora was writhing in agony.