Her Absolution

Chapter 7

“This must be the seventh time we see each other in a day? Definitely more than before. When we used to see the other only in games once a month or something.”

You have got to be kidding me! Is he stalking me? What is he doing here?

“What the f**k Ashton? Are you following me?”

“Now. Now. Autumn don’t go biting my head off. I am not following you. I came to pick up my cousins.”

    I see a boy in one of the backseats of his car looking at us with a questionable expression, it must be Mason. He has ivory skin tone; yellow eyes and his hair is brown. His hair reminds me of chocolate.

“Cousins? Yeah right. You don’t have cousins.”

    As soon as I say that I hear multiple footsteps running towards us. I turn and see Ruby running to me with the triplets behind her. The triplets go straight to Ashton and jump on him, squealing and laughing their faces off. No, those are his cousins? Mason gets out of the car and hugs the three little girls taking them from Ashton. The smirk on his face is as big as mount Everest. Ruby is in front of my smiling, and she goes and jumps too, on me. She is making me laugh and I hold her tightly not wanting for her to fall and hurt herself.

    She starts kissing my cheeks making me blush. I kiss her back just as much. I let go of her and put her on the floor. She holds my hand not letting go. I go to the car and take out her iced passion tea lemonade. I gave it to her, and she holds it for dear life, like someone would dare take it from her. She takes the straw out of her mouth, and she looks up seeing Ashton and Mason with the triplets.

“Hi. I’m Ruby. Who are you?”

“Hi Ruby. I’m Ashton, the girl’s older cousin. This is Mason my little brother. You must be Autumn’s little sister, right?”

“Nice to meet you. How do you know I’m Autumn’s sister?”

“I’m her friend.”

“No, you not! I know all of my sister’s friends. I have never seen you before.”

“Who is Autumn?” One of the triplets ask us.

“Ruby be nice. I am Autumn, one of Ruby’s older sisters. He is more of an acquaintance. He knew Asher, sweety. And who are you girls?”

    The last question I directed it to the triplets and scrunch down to there level. They look at me with curious eyes. Moving from me to Ruby, trying to see if we were really sisters because of our different features. But even if our hair or eyes colors are different, we still look like sisters. The girls then look at Ashton and he nods at them confirming to them that I'm Ruby's sister.

“I’m Cirilla, this are my sisters Amelia and Brooke. Nice to meet you.”

    The little girl with brown eyes, a few freckles in her cheeks and dark blonde hair almost brown responded. The other two sisters who’s names I just get have more similarities, hazel eyes, blonde hair and they two have a few freckles in their cheeks.

“Nice to meet you, Autumn. I am Brooke and this is my sister Amelia. We may look alike but I have a little scar above my right eye. See? This way you don’t confuse us.”

“I see. Amelia has a little scar on her right eye and Brooke does not have one.”

“Exactly. By the way I like your name is pretty like the season. And you are pretty too.” This time it was Amelia who spoke.

“Yeah. I was name after the season because I was born in it. My mama name me.”

    These three little girls are just like Ruby, polite and cute. I mean where are the babies coming from? Cuteness factory? And they are so pretty talking one at a time, telling their differences so I don’t confuse them. They must not like it when people think they are the other. I never had that, my twin was a boy. 

“She sure is pretty Amelia. You girls have a good eye.”

    I gave Ashton a look that says shut up. I notice that Mason is quiet and when I look at him, he was seeing Ruby. Don’t tell me he likes her. Ashton must also realized that Mason was quiet and turn to look at him he saw that he was watching Ruby to much. He told the girls to go play while we talk for a while. I don’t mind since the girls will have more time to play with them. Ruby gives me the rest of her drink and tells me to finish it.

“I told you I was picking my cousins. That pretty mouth of yours thinks first.”

“Shut up Ashton. I’m sorry. Okay? I can admit when I'm wrong.”

“Yeah. She’s feisty like you. I can see that is a family trait. How is Jen? I remember her being like that too.”

“Shut the f**k up, you perv. I don’t remember you father having siblings.”

“They are my cousins from my mom’s side. My aunt, my mom’s sister, she had an artificial insemination since her and my uncle could not procreate normally. And then the triplets came. They move here about two years ago.”

“Oh. They are beautiful, unlike you.”

    That was totally a lie but he didn't have to know that. I drink from Ruby’s drink and Ashton is looking at me, intensely, it seems he is memorizing my every features. I ignore him and put my attention to the girls. Mason is also playing with them, it’s funny, he is two years older and the only boy among them. He is so going to be manipulated into anything if he starts hanging around them. I smile at these thoughts. I look at the time on my phone and see that 20 minutes has pass. I’ll give Ruby a few more minutes and then were leaving, mom must be worried.

“I think your sister has a new admirer. We Mercer boys are a lot to handle.”

“We Maverick girls can deal with it. But Mason is to old for her now. Maybe in a few years. And why are you picking up the triplets? Why do they go to this school? Don’t you guys live in the next town?”

“For someone who ignores me you ask a lot of questions. To answer your question we live in Crestfall, but their parents live in this town. And they are out of town so; we are taking care of them. I take and pick them up to school. That’s why I was late this morning.”

“It wasn’t because you were fighting with Megan near the administration office?”

“You saw that? Well yeah. Since I’m in charge of taking the girls to school I told Megan that I wasn’t going to take her. Also the girls didn’t like her, they said she was a meany thing. I was on my way to the entrance of the school, thinking that I only had a few minutes to get my schedule since I couldn't pick it up yesterday. When I saw a couple having s*x in a car. I was like go get it, until I realize it was Megan and a guy. I broke up with her, she got mad, I call her a slut and then she slap me.”

“Wow. That was bold of her to do it there.”

“I don’t really care anymore. I don't know if to beat the guy up or thank him, I better not bump into him. I didn’t even know that she liked older guys. The guy wasn’t old in it’s 30’s or 40’s but he look like he is in his late 20’s I think. He had a tatto on one of his arm it look military.”

“What did you do to her? For her to fight you again at lunch?”

    Ashton doesn’t say anything, he just stares at the kids not answering my question. A lot of things comes into perspective and know that I now his side of the story I understand his reactions and behavior. I know I would do the same things as he did or worse, I mean I did it. The light in my head is on ever since he mention the guy that Megan was having s*x in the parking lot, I know it’s not Parker because he was at home and he would not do that to Glenda, but I think I have an idea who it was, Benjamin. We know him as Benji, his one of Parker's friend, likes to have casual s*x. He just got back from a tour from Pakistan. Leave it to Benji to hook up with a taken girl and in the mornning. 

“That’s something I like to keep to myself. Thanks for listening to my rambling. Come on girls, Mason we have to go home; grandpa is waiting for us.”

    It seems like he didn't want to talk about it. We sees the kids coming over, Ruby runs to the car after waving goodbye to everyone. The triplets and Mason do the same. Ashton and I are still in front of our cars when he gets close to me. I can feel his breath on my right ear giving me shivers in all my body and with the sexiest voice ever he says:

“I forgot to tell you at lunch. Don't worry, I won’t tell anyone that you smoke. We can keep secrets, right? See you tomorrow, Autumn.”

He gives my cheek a kiss and moves away from me heading towards his car. As he starts the car, he looks at me one more time and winks at me and then driving out of the school, leaving me there in shock. And he is back people, the eccentric, jerk, playboy and bad boy is back.