DOOMED ATTRACTION

FOUR

"Before I left", Ayla pulled her familiar down-turned mouth move, " what did I tell you?"

" You told me something?", Baron asked, throwing off the blankets.

" You were right Kayla", Ayla chuckled, " he really is dull."

She scoffed, giving her son one last look."I wonder how he manages to have good grades."

" It's a bother to me too", I groan, " I mean, I study way more than he does, I'm more attentive in class, and yet my grades aren't as good as his."

Baron looked at me over the top of the bed. " Shut up." " You're just a few ranks below me."

" That's not the point."

"Come down!", Ayla yelled from the base of the stairs.

" OHH", I grinned, already the smell of Ayla's spaghetti was wafting through Baron's open door.

"Tell me the truth Ayla", I say as I enter the kitchen and make a beeline for the plate cabinet," you were a chef before Baron was born."

" Oh, I was something way cooler."

I smiled into the dark wood. This was her typical answer, just a bit more refined everytime I'd asked her. " You always say this", I smile at her across the island that doubled as a dinning table.

" What can I say?", she shrugged, " I strive to be reliable."

" Baron!!!"

" I'll be down",his voice traveled the short distance from his room to the kitchen.

" Get yourself down here and come help out!"

"I'd prefer going back to my mum vomit free Ayla", I comment, taking the steaming pot of meatballs out of her hands and placing it in the center of the island.

"He's gotten better. Surprisingly."

We continued working in silence, only the steam of the pots sounding in the kitchen and the occasional yell from my house sneaking in through the open windows of the kitchen.

" Aren't you ashamed?", my mum's voice reverberated through the kitchen. I didn't even need half a guess.

It was Xavier.

I glanced quickly at Ayla, and bless her soul she quickly averted her gaze from the house and found something extremely interesting in the way the meatballs were arranged in the plates.

"It's okay." She turned to look at me, as if asking, ' what could possibly not be okay?'. So I nodded in the direction of my house and repeat. " It's okay."

Instead of blushing at being caught and the birthmark on the nape of her neck getting red as the blush crept up her neck, Ayla stood rock still and gaped at the living room. "Baron?"

I followed her gaze..and burst out laughing. I really should have sensed it. He'd been acting strange all this while.

" What the fu..", I stopped,sensing Ayla giving me a death eye, " ..hell have you done to your hair?"

His normal curly hair was gelled into semi perfection, stubborn curls sticking up adorably here and there. " Why do you smell so good?", I asked, dropping the meatball I had in hand to sniff around him.

I grin maniacally. "I knew it."

" Knew what?", Ayla asked.

" He's seeing someone new", I say,crossing my hands and leaning on the island. Eight, five, two.

There it was.

" Not the blue haired girl?", Ayla asked, her delicacy long forgotten. Her hand searched absent mindedly for the rolling pin she'd dropped near the oven earlier, and when her fingers touched it, I watched a satisfied light gleam in her eyes.

I also watched the embarrassment flee from Baron's eyes as he glanced at Ayla's hands.

I wish I had something other than meatballs here , I muttered, munching on my eighth, or eleventh meatball.

" No, not that one."

I smile at Baron's frozen statue."That one was a month ago."

"Wow. That's interesting." Ayla's eyes were frozen on Baron's but her hands and legs definitely weren't thinking the same thing, because they moved to where Baron stood faster than I did when there was spaghetti involved.

And I moved pretty fast.

Just before Ayla caught up with Baron, he yelled. " What the hell are you on?" That earned him a whack on the midriff. " There's no girl." Another whack.

" You're lying to me", Ayla breathed out, her hand hovering over her head.

" I'm not." She glanced at me. The hurt and doubt in her eyes were barely there, but they were there.

The green of her iris slowly became dewy.

Baron saw it too. " I really am not."

" I'm over with that", he said, sending a meaningful look my way.

" I'm sorry, I didn't know it'll get this far", I tried mouthing to him, but the meatball I'd taken just before Ayla's hand found the rolling pin wasn't going to be discarded so easily, so noiselessly.

I began to choke.

If I wasn't about to choke on a meatball of all things, I'd have doubled over laughing at the looks on their faces.

Baron's eyes were wide, the light from the kitchen bulb reflecting in his eyes as they stared at me.

Ayla wasn't any better, she stood stiff like she wanted to be anywhere else, but not the kitchen where her best friend's daughter was choking on a meatball she'd been sneakily eating since.

" Ba..", I let out a high pitched wheeze, managing to stretch out the hand that wasn't grasping at my throat to him. That's not me. My voice isn't tiny.

He shook free and came running to me.

I felt his arms go around me as he placed a clenched fist somewhere between my ribcage and my navel.

"Breathe goddamn you!", Baron whispered, his heart beating wildly.

Well, that's one advice from you I really want to take.

From the corner of my eyes, I saw Ayla rush up to him with a glass in her hand. " Do something!", she shrieked, " she's choking."

I forgot to mention one little detail. Ayla had always been a bit too slow.

He pushed his clenched fist up and down a few times before the meatball flew out of my mouth.

Right into the plate I'd set for Baron.

Well, the more the merrier. I risked a quick look at my hosts. Maybe in this case, the more actually isn't merrier.

Ayla's pale face was stuck in my head, and it wasn't a sight I was going to forget soon.