The Spirit Seer

Chapter 20

After school, I have another study session with Mr. Echols. It really has been helping me. With any luck I will have an A again very soon. Now that I've had a couple sessions I'm less nervous around him.

We’re sitting at his desk and I'm doing some equations that he gave me. And I can ask him for help when I get confused. I'm slightly ashamed to admit that I keep sneaking glances at him whenever I get the chance. He has a five o'clock shadow. Then any time he stops to think he rubs the top of his pen against his cheek. It's really very endearing. He doesn't seem to notice me checking him out.

I finish the problem I've been working on, and check my work and realize I did it wrong.

Crap on a lap! I don't know what I did wrong.

"Um...Mr. Echols I need help with this problem." It may have gotten easier to sit in class with him and not freak out, but I still get nervous to talk to him. It's like he's going to bite or something.

"Ok, which problem?"

I point to the problem and he leans over to look at the paper. His hand brushes against mine, but instead of pulling it away he keeps it there. I suck in a breath. He keeps touching my hand for a minute or so. Then he picks up my paper.

"I can't see it from that angle."

Ok, that was a little strange. It felt kind of weird. Shouldn’t he have pulled his hand away sooner? Why didn’t he? I glance at him, but he is looking at the equation. He doesn’t seem to think anything weird happened.

I am probably making way too big of deal out of it. He probably accidentally touched my hand, and didn't even realize. It's a simple mistake. It's probably just my nerves misinterpreting something that isn't even there. I was the one who kept looking at him. He hadn’t been sneaking glances back. He's an adult and really good looking. He could have anyone he wants. Why would he want some immature high school student?

I take a deep breath. That's totally it. Laying it out like that really did clear things up for me. I am just being a normal teenager who has a crush on their teacher. I need to relax and not read too much into some ridiculous hand grazing.

I finally tune back in as he explains how to solve the equation. Then we go back to our own work. Even after I figured out what was going on and knew it was my overactive imagination, I still stayed on alert for the rest of the study session. But nothing else odd happened. Clearly, I over reacted. I feel much calmer by the end of the session. It was silly of me to assume anything else.

~~~~~

"Sorry about my mom." I say quietly to Heath. He is over studying and there was this awkward moment with a ghost when he first got here. Shortly after he got here I left him on the couch in the living room. I had gone to get drinks and I don't know exactly what happened, but when I came back with a glass in each hand my mom had her back to Heath and she was having a full conversation with a ghost. I could see the ghost, but I could just imagine what it looked like to him. She seemed completely oblivious and he was watching her talking to herself.

I guess I was shocked because I dropped one of the glasses and soda went everywhere. It made a pretty loud noise. My mom turned around and looked from the glass to me and then to Heath. I could tell she hadn't known he was there.

I didn't know what to say so I kept my mouth closed.

"Um, I see you have a friend over." My mom said quietly.

I nodded. "Yeah we were gonna study."

"Ok, why don't you take him into your room and I'll clean this up...Keep the door open." She added as an afterthought.

I nodded and grabbed Heath and pulled him towards my room.

We didn't say anything about it. I didn't know what to say, and I can only imagine what he must be thinking. Now we're here and I'm freaking out. I kind of wish the earth would swallow me up, but so far, the earth isn't listening. Even though he hasn’t mentioned it I feel kind of weird, and I don't know what to do.

I’ve never been in this situation. He's the first person I've let come over in a while. I tried to ignore the weirdness, but I can't help wondering what he must be thinking. Is he laughing at us in his head? Is he counting down the minutes until he can escape without it being rude? It shouldn't matter this much, but it does. I care that he cares. I don't know why, but I do.

So, I just decided to cut to the point and hope we can move past it without too much weirdness...ok the boat has sunk on this not being weird, but maybe it will be ok?

"It's not a big deal. It's a little strange I guess, but it doesn't really bother me."

I bite my lip. "Are you sure? Cuz I would totally understand if you thought it was too crazy."

I wouldn't really understand, we could probably still be friends, but it would change things between us. I try really hard not to analyze what that means. We are friends, if we will still be friends, then how would it change things?

He looks at me. "No really your mom seems different, but basically nice. Who cares about a little different?” He pauses.

“There are worse things." He continued in a serious tone.

"Like what?" I find myself asking. I'm not sure why but it seems like something that needed to be asked.

"Huh?"

"You said there are worse things. What did you mean?"

He shakes his head. "I don't know, I just meant you know it could be worse that kind of thing."

It seemed more personal than that, could he be talking about losing his brother? We have been getting closer for a while now, and he hasn't once mentioned his brother. Did that mean something? I have been more honest with him than anyone else, but he hasn’t really opened up to me much at all. Could that mean he doesn’t think of me as close a friend as I think of him?

"So how are things with your other friends?" He is clearly changing the subject, maybe that’s a good thing since I’m starting to over analyze again.

"Ok, I've been so focused on my grades."

And helping the ghosts in my life. I add to myself. "I haven't had as much time to spend with them, but things are good.”

"Cool"

Now that he brought up friends, maybe I can discuss something with him that I wasn't sure how to bring up, but here’s my opening. "How's Zoey?"

"She's good, she liked you. You should have lunch with us again."

Oh yeah, she loved me. "Really? Cuz um...she kind of threatened me."

He looks shocked. "What? Why would she do that? When did she do that?"

He seems pretty surprised. Did I mess up by talking to him about it? Is he going to think I'm crazy and take her side? "Threatened is a bit strong really. She just sort of confronted me and told me to stay away from you."

He calms a little. "Geez, I'm sorry. I don't know what she was thinking."

"She seemed to be trying to look out for you. I think she is worried that I'm leading you on or something."

He nods. "That makes sense; we have kind of looked out for each other ever since we became friends."

I believe that, but there's something that I have to ask. It's been weighing on me ever since Zoey confronted me in the bathroom. "Are you guys you know...more than friends? It's cool if you are; I just want to know if I'm getting in the way of something."

“No, not at all. We have only ever been friends. We don't feel that way about each other."

Maybe he didn't, but I'm not so sure she feels the same way.

"I'll talk to her, and get her to back off a little."

"You really don't have to; I just thought you'd want to know." And maybe there had been something I wanted to know as well.

"It's fine; I'll just ask her to cool it. It's no big deal."

I smile at him. It's kind of sweet that he's willing to call off his guard dog on my behalf. What a guy.

He smiles back, and we hold it for a second before I look away and pretend it didn't mean anything.