it's personal discussion

So I guess I'm creating a journal, haha.
Lets see how this goes.



P.S I'm happy for anyone to comment on here.

So I'm like 15000 words into writing my story... and I realise that I started writing in third person, and somewhere around Chapter 3, I changed to first person...

Editing is a B**** so I don't know whether to fix it now, or just leave it to later.

Chapter 1

Average.
Everything in my life could be described as average; my grades, my hobbies, even the sunny weather could all be described as just plain average. I was sitting in a small corner of an average looking coffee shop, people watching instead of studying from the dogeared psychology textbook that was laid flat on the stained table in front of me. Across the cafe, two preppy boys sat together, using the single textbook between them as an excuse to scoot closer together, making me smile as I continued to skim around the room. Shrieks called from a table of five girls who were swapping revision cards and tiktok videos simultaneously; one of them had knocked their latte over in the process.
“He’s cute, isn’t he?” Megan, with her little button nose covered in too-cute freckles and knowing eyes had found her way into the seat by my side, watching intently as Xander started to wipe the table clean for the group of squealing girls. His plain black t-shirt hugged his thin but muscular frame as he cleaned the mess slowly, the spilt coffee less of a priority than the girls talking and giggling with him. “They’ve definitely noticed, even if you refuse to,” Megan’s lips pursed as she studied my face with curiosity. I, however, suddenly became enthralled with my psychology homework. “Alessia, seriously?” Megan closed the textbook, forcing me to finally look at her, “you’re the only one who’s guaranteed to pass that class. Put the book away and go get your man before those harpies eat him alive.” Without looking up, I flicked through the book,
“He isn’t my man, and he seems perfectly fine being devoured to me.” I clicked the ball-point pen in a matter-of-fact way, and started scribbling answers down, still refusing to look up.
“Hey, I’ll devour him if you won’t.”
“Jesus Christ,” I threw the pen down so hard it ricocheted and flew across the cafe and Megan stuck her tongue out, only to be met with daggers, “go and devour him with the harpies then. Just let me revise; we have exams coming up and I’m not failing because of this shit.”
“Technically harpies wouldn’t eat people. They’d use their talons to attack evildoers and carry them to the Underworld…” Caleb’s voice trailed off as we both stared at him, “um, who’s being devoured by harpies?” he asked, as he took the seat opposite, a faint blush crossing his cheeks. Megan waved a hand delicately as if to dismiss the conversation as I rifled through my bag looking for a new pen. He was used to this behaviour; Caleb met us a few years before during an open day for the university, and whilst we’d been friendly and accepted him into the group, our friendship with him came nowhere near as close to that of ours as we had known each other since we were fourteen years old.
“Thanks for the mythology lesson Caleb but,” my eyes met his - halos of warm, deep, dark honey, full of intrigue and concern - “I’ve got to go.” I dropped her gaze to avoid his look of disappointment as I stuffed my books into my bag. As I left the cafe, I let herself look back to Xander once more - only to see a girl with matching red hair and bright lips giggling with Xander, one hand lingering on his arm as she wrote something on his wrist. Rolling my eyes, I let the heavy door slam shut behind me, cutting off from any conversations inside the cafe as I stepped onto the busy street and headed towards home.

***

Within a few hours, I had changed from my cute university acceptable outfit into a comfy hoodie and joggers, and was slowly sweeping dark hair into the bin, listening to the high whistle of the boiling kettle.
“Do you want food before you go?” I shouted up the hall, after hearing the shower upstairs shut off. I was anxious to be doing something, rather than just being sat, doing nothing. Waiting. I looked in the fridge but there wasn’t enough to make a meal, so I made a mental note to get some groceries in. The kettle had finished boiling, so I carefully made two cups of tea whilst listening to the floorboards above creak under the weight of being walked over.
“I’ll order a pizza. Usual?” Xander appeared in the doorway, shirtless, his newly cut hair damp from the shower, and his perfect smile as dazzling as ever. Awkwardly, I managed to smile and nod, before returning my full focus back to stirring the cups of coffee - refusing to get caught staring at his abs. I’d known Xander since we were kids; I don’t think either of us could actually remember how we met if you asked us, we’d just been around each other for as long as we could remember. We’d grown up together, seen awkward phases as we tried finding ourselves , going through puberty, family drama, and everything else in between. Growing up, we’d fallen out with each other frequently, for one reason or another, disputes that created tension, or awkward feelings that couldn’t be understood at such young ages. But we’d always come back to each other eventually. It was just who we were. Our friendship came first, and mattered far more than a stupid disagreement that could be forgotten within a few days. Megan knew of our friendship to some extent, afterall, she’d patched me up after I was convinced my life would fall apart after a crush I had on Xander when we were fifteen. But Megan assumed the unrequited teenage love had been enough to tear our friendship apart forever, and part of me enjoyed having a part of me that she didn’t know about. I smiled to myself, thinking about my past with Xander. By the time I brought myself back to the present, Xander had his shirt on, and I turned to sit with him on the couch, both our drinks in hand. His long legs stretched across the floor made my small living room look even smaller.
Like the growing Alice trapped inside the tiny house.
The thought made me smile to myself again as I curled up on the other side of the sofa.
“What are you smiling at?” Xander looked puzzled, as if he hadn’t seen me smiling to myself for the majority of our lives.
“Thinking about Alice in Wonderland, it’s nothing.” Nervous, I shook my head and smiled again, knowing Xander probably thought I was going crazy. “Your hair looks better, by the way.”
“Thank you for cutting it for me,” he continued smiling, studying my face for answers to questions that no one had asked, “I assume I’m sexier than ever?”
“Don’t pretend you didn’t check yourself out in the mirror to make sure you’re looking hot.” I retorted quickly, sipping her coffee.
“Oh, so you do think I’m hot then?” he quipped, watching me intensely for a reaction.
“Course I do. I’m just so utterly in love with you because you’re so sexy and amazing,” I smirked as I gave him my most dramatic eye roll.
“Don’t break my heart Allie.” Xander muttered. Somewhere in the exchange, we’d started leaning in towards each other, and I could feel his breath on my face as we stared intently into each other’s eyes.
Bbzzz
Suddenly, we jumped apart - startled by the electronic buzzer coming from my door.
“That’ll be the pizza then,” I said as I got to my feet and headed to buzz the delivery person in, as Xander picked his drink up off the table. When I got back, I noticed a black smudge on his wrist.
“Careful, you’ve nearly lost the grunge siren’s number.”
“Oh, I thought you said she was a harpy, not a siren?” Xander watched as coffee came out my noise and I started choking. I hadn’t realised earlier that he had overheard the conversation my friends and I had had this morning. “That reminds me,” he patted his pockets until he found what he was looking for, “I think you dropped this in the cafe.” He handed back the pen that I’d basically thrown across the cafe before making my quick getaway. Nonchalant, he picked up a piece of pizza and took large bites as I tried to compose myself. “I had already put her number in my phone before I showered.” he said it as a matter of fact, without looking at me, and it made my stomach curl. I threw my curst down, and curled my legs under me, trying to create as much distance between us on the couch.
“So you’re going to call her?”. I don’t know why I asked; I knew the answer.
“Do you have a reason for me not to?” Xander’s words almost felt like a dare, but I couldn’t work out what he was getting at. I shook my head, refusing to meet his eye, so he continued. “Tell your friend that if she wants to devour me, I can take her out next week.” His sapphire eyes burned into me, and he smiled smugly at the daggers in my expression.
“We both know Megan, my friend, will have better things to do next week.”
“Well what day do you suggest, as, I’d really love for your friend to do me.”
“Go fuck yourself Xander.” My cheeks burnt with anger.
“Come fuck me yourself Allie.” Xander was close enough that I could feel his breath on my lips, and I wasn’t sure when either of us had closed the distance between us. The distance I’d purposefully put there to stop something like this from happening. I felt bewildered as I stared into his smug, smirking eyes. I wanted nothing more than to tilt my head slightly so that our lips would meet. It would be so easy to do. Until he broke the spell by speaking.
“I’m gonna go, I have a date with a hot blonde tonight, and I need to get ready.” Xander stood, but didn’t make any other movements, as if waiting for a reply.
“I thought you were seeing the redhead from today?”
“Well I just got her number so haven’t called her yet. I met Kayla last month so I’m seeing her again tonight at the bar.”
“Manwhore.” I gasped and pulled my lips together, feeling guilty as I’d meant to say it under my breath instead of loud enough to hear. I dropped my gaze to his feet to avoid Xander’s glare as he stood over me. He muttered something under his breath, and then stormed out of the door.
Out of nowhere, my cheeks felt wet and I lifted a hand to feel tears starting to fall endlessly, as if they’d been building up for days. I let them fall.

***

Unaware of how long I’d been crying, I finally picked myself up and reached for my phone. 3 missed calls and 5 missed texts from Megan, 2 messages from Caleb, but nothing from Xander. I decided it would be easier to reply to Caleb first.
Megan called looking for you

And then thirty minutes later:

Hey! Are you ok?

Hey, yeah I’m good! Turned my phone off to study and lost track of time.

Sending the text reminded me that I did actually have to spend some time studying to have a chance of passing finals next term. But, for now, I needed to answer Megan.

Let me know what you wanna do next week. You’re only 21 once x

Hello…? x

Earth to Alessia…? x

Please tell me you’re not answering because you finalllllyyyyy jumped Xander’s bones x

Don’t tell me you’re actually studying? x

All sent within fifteen minutes of each other. Typical Megan. Just then, my phone started to buzz in my hand, Megan’s face appearing on the screen.
“Yes, I was studying and not jumping anyone’s bones. It’s not like that and you know it. As for my birthday, I genuinely don’t care about it and I need to study more for our finals. I recommend you study too, that is, if you want your degree.” I jumped straight into answering her messages; we rarely wasted time greeting each other’s calls anymore.
“Degree, not for me,” giggled Megan on the other end of the line, “I’ve got us tickets to the Crypt next week, because we are celebrating your birthday.”
We spent some time catching up, researching the bands playing at the Crypt, planning ideas for outfits that we could wear, and swapping answers on our homework, until we finally ran out of things to talk about, and hung up the phone on each other. After the call, I got ready for bed, cursing myself for it being so late and having gotten nothing done since Xander left. My thoughts were of Xander as I fell asleep.

If you want to read more, I'm posting on Wattpad

https://www.wattpad.com/myworks/34765...

The story is going to be a fantasy romance, for a mature audience.