"Elena..." The boy stressed out in a calm voice. His blonde hair brushed back as usual, and a charming smile marked its territory on his face. His fragrance suddenly filled the corridor to the door. Elena stopped in her tracks and looked over. He was dressed in a grey jumper and black sweatpants. He had on a pair of white sneakers.
"Lance..." She answered back in the same stressing way, grinning her teeth in the end feeling unlucky to be caught midway. "What a surprise!" She got down the stairs and walked towards him. She had on a white shirt, blue cut-off shorts that exposed her lower thighs to the most extreme, and sandals.
"Wow... you don't feel the cold at all?" Lance asked chuckling in the end.
Lynn walked past them and climbed the stairs muttering to them, "I'll leave you two to talk. I assume you have a lot to talk about."
"Go mom... don't make this anymore weirder." Elena cried out mockingly. She turned to Lance. "What are you doing here?"
"I had to see you. I needed to know that you were okay." His eyes danced around as he gazed at her body.
"But I texted you that I was fine." She cried out to him in a low sudden voice. It made him laugh. "I should probably put on something more appropriate," Elena told him after she realized his gazes.
"Yeah... you should..." Lance stammered. Elena turned and headed for the upper floor. "I'll be waiting down here." Lance finished. Elena quickly raced upstairs but stopped at her fifth step. She turned around and looked at him. He was still looking at her. He blushed away.
She brushed back some of her hair and smiled at him. "You just can't stop looking at me..." She teased him. Lance tried to gather the words to speak but Elena intervened, "You know what? Screw this!" She started walking downstairs as he looked on, confused. She got to him later on.
"Hey?" She asked him as she gave him a hug.
"Hey..." he still wasn't sure what was going on.
"Come... let's go cook something for you." She grabbed his hand and dragged him to the kitchen as he staggered behind. Lance had been in the house a few too many times, this occasion wasn't that different at all.
Elena took out a frying pan and some eggs from a racket. She beat them up on the pan and lit it on fire. Lance was watching silently as the episode occurred before his eyes, still cushioned with confusion.
"Elena... you missed the oil. You... didn't keep, the oil." Lance told her, his face suppressed by the sudden confusion and the way things were happening so fast. And wrongly fast. It seemed like Elena wasn't paying attention at all to what was going around her.
"Oh," Elena realized and turned off the cooker. She took the pan and threw it over at the sink and it clanked with it affording some noise in the kitchen. She paced up and down the room as if she was thinking of something before Lance grabbed her hand. She was cold. Why she didn't want to put on something warmer was her own doing.
"Elena!" He called out to her in a worried voice. "Elena, what's wrong?"
She looked at him, her eyebrows burrowing in confusion. Her heartbeat slowed down from the ridiculous speed it was operating on. "Nothing... nothing." She told him.
"A minute ago you were all fine and now you're all over the place." Lance shrieked. "I'm sure it's nothing."
"I'm sorry... I guess I was overreacting to your sudden surprise." She breathed out slowly letting all the adrenaline cool down.
"I told you I needed to know how you were doing, and I think I got my answer. You're in a bad shape from what I can see."
Elena leaned on the kitchen sink. "I don't know what's happening to me." She told him. He walked towards her and turned her around so that she was facing him. Her eyes searched his blue ones.
"Is it because of the Ethan thing?" Lance asked her softly. She nodded, eyes closed. "Elena, let go off of all those dirty thoughts about Ethan. He's gone now... it's been two weeks now... clearly, there are more important things that you can turn your attention to."
"Like the way you always turn your attention to your orphan story?" She told him raising a brow.
"Elena, don't." He turned around and faced the cooker below him. "I've been really trying to change after what you told me in that car. You can clearly see that I changed."
"You're literally doing it right now." She told him in a cold voice.
"Because you're making me to..." He squealed as he turned back to her. She felt few of words. "Elena I know I'm not a good person. I will never be perfect, and that's perhaps because of the way I was raised. But I'm here right now telling you that I'm trying to better."
Elena snuffed a bit as she watched him. Lance's words had gotten to her. "I guess people can change over time..." She chuckled as she walked towards the sink's countertop and sat on it. "Lance, I never got to tell you thank you. For standing with me during the trial."
"Never mind..." He wallowed "... it's nothing at all."
"Not to you, maybe. But what you did for me, even after I had abandoned you after we got to the party... really, thank you. I never knew you would be capable of that."
"You really think of me as a villain Elena. And Ethan was your hero by then."
"No, not at all... I mean I have been around you two for a long time. And I know you are a person not to do what you did if you didn't want something in return."
"Really?" His eyebrows shot up.
"Yes, so tell me... what's the catch?"
"Nothing, damn Elena. I want nothing from you. I only wanted something for you. Which was justice. And when you got it I felt contented."
"Wow, that's so sweet to hear," Elena remarked. "Then you really have changed." She scoffed. "Too bad I won't be here to see your magical transformation."
Lance walked towards her at the sink, she was still resting her weight on the countertop. "What do you mean?" He asked her.
"I'm moving over to Mexico. To live with my aunt." She wasted no time in telling him.
"Why?"
"Why not?"
"Elena, why?" He sounded serious this time.
She paused and looked at the figure before him. He was charming in his own tricks of beauty. "Look around Lance. My life stinks here! Every week I have to note down in my diary the countless names I've been called and abuses that have been thrown at me. I know you told me to be strong... but all this is just not working for me."
"Running away from your problems won't help you conquer them," Lance told her.
"Staying here isn't helping with the situation either... this is just a whole pile of trouble on me. I thought I was that strong. Trust me you don't know the power and strength of the public. When they unite to do something good it works out tremendously. When they unite to do bad, you'll lock yourself in your house, just the way I am doing right now."
"I cannot say that I feel your pain, the same way you feel it but... trust me, even if you let go of that part physically... emotionally it will still disturb you." He cohered at her judgmental statement. "Talk to a psychiatrist, Elena. I'm sure it might help than running away."
"I cannot tell my problems to some random guy who went to some academy and got a degree for such a work in hopes that I will be given some good motivational talk." Elena seemed to have every response for every statement Lance threw at her. Lance knew when he was outwitted by her as she was just a smart complicated girl.
"Elena, please don't go..." Lance cried out. "You are needed here more than there."
"By who?"
"By your family, Caroline, and everyone else. I need you here."
"You? Why would you say that? Last time I checked we weren't dating or anything."
"I'm not saying that we're dating. I'm just telling you to stay here, surrounded by the people who love you."
"Lance, there's no way you can convince me otherwise. If you were in my position you would understand my pain. I fought, okay? I lost." She spoke calmly.