Chapter 10- Highschool Sweethearts

Lily felt troubled as she was walking home. The young girl had her brows furrowed, deep in thought. As she passed by a dark alleyway, she suddenly felt her arm being yanked. She was pulled several feet, yelping, before falling onto the concrete. 

"What do you want?!" She stared at Iris, horrified.

"Syra? What are you doing?!" Her voice raised. She looked past Iris at the entrance of the alleyway, hoping for a kind passerby. 

"I should be asking that to you. What do you want?" Iris crouched over Lily. Her face hidden by the shadows seemed ominous. 

"What are you talking about? Is this about Annaleigh? I've already told her that she misunderstood! I don't hate you!" Lily looked pitiful as she huddled on the ground, trying to keep as much distance from Iris as possible. Lily looked incensed at the thought of Annaleigh, clenching her teeth. 

"You don't? I don't believe you." Iris leaned closer to Lily, her brown eyes sharp. She seemed to invade Lily's mind, seeing all her thoughts.

"Why would I hate you? You're my friend." Lily forced an ugly smile. 

Iris held eye contact with Lily as her lips formed the smallest smile. Lily felt chills wrack her body. The illusion that she was being stared at by a snake entered her mind. Iris's taught muscles tensed, as if about to strike. 

Iris suddenly grabbed Lily's neck, holding her against the ground. Her grasp was tight and painful but Lily could still talk and breathe. And scream.

Iris clasped her left hand over Lily's mouth, still holding her neck.

"Tell me." Iris leaned closer to Lily, staring into Lily's terrified eyes, tears streaming down her round cheeks. Lily regretted every choice that lead had led her to this moment. She obviously didn't know what she had gotten herself into.

"What do you want?" Iris's hold tightened and Lily started frantically nodding her head. 

Iris choked Lily for a few more painful seconds, looking at her with threatening eyes. She released her grasp and stood up before looking down on Lily, who collapsed on the ground, coughing. 

"I just-I just wanted you to go away!" Lily suddenly yelled with a hoarse voice. 

"I wanted to find out what you did to make him pay attention to you!"

Iris looked at her in confusion.

"Who?"

"Who else! Leon!" Lily yelled at Iris with resentment. Her innocent veil had dropped, all that was left was anger.

Iris stayed silent, confused. As far as she knew, the main leads had yet to meet. She had prevented their initial meeting so Lily wasn't Leon's tutor. But if Lily didn't know Leon, she wouldn't be yelling at Iris right now. It seemed like Lily and Leon's meeting wasn't as coincidental as written in the book. Lily continued yelling, validating that thought.

"If it wasn't for you! If it wasn't for you, me and Leon would've met and he would be in love with me! Tutoring him was my chance! Why did you get in the way?!" Lily was a mess on the ground, tears streaming down her face. 

Iris gained some insight. It seemed that everything written in the book wasn't exactly what happened, just the reader's perspective. She felt silly for not considering that this might be the case. She had just assumed that Lily was as innocent as written in the book. If she hadn't found out sooner, Lily might have caught her unaware and ruined her task. But as she thought more about it, Iris was stuck on one thing.

"Why didn't you just talk to him?" If Lily hadn't tried to find a coincidental way to create a 'meet cute', she and Leon would have met long ago. 

Lily stopped crying, glaring at Iris in anger.

"What do you mean! He would never pay attention to me that way!"

"..." Iris stared at Lily, speechless. Lily was self-absorbed yet completely self-deprecating. Iris started walking away. She didn't feel like Lily would be any danger to her task in that state. 

-

Weeks went by like this, Lily feeling resentment, Leon feeling bitter, and Iris feeling impatient. She was frustrated with her tasks. For example, the task 'prevent Leon and Lily from getting together'. By what standard could that be completed? At what point were they never going to get together? Would she have to stick to them their whole lives, just to make sure they didn't fall in love? That would be tedious. 

Iris frustratedly fell back into her bed, throwing the book to the side. She closed her eyes for a second before being disrupted by her phone. She picked it up and saw a notification from Leon.

He had asked her a question on one of his homework questions. This was one of the days she didn't tutor him. She opened the messaging app and helped him find the answer. However, after he would ask about one homework question he would ask about another. She might as well as be tutoring him. 

She helped him for a while until she saw that far too much time had passed. She frowned and hurriedly bid Leon goodnight abruptly. Leon annoyed her in a way that she couldn't explain.

-

As Iris was walking to school the next day, Lily was glaring at her in resentment, no longer hiding her emotions. Not far from her, someone saw all of Lily's emotions.

"Do you know her?" Finn asked.

Lily quickly swung behind her to see who had talked to her.

"No. Do you?" Lily looked at him suspiciously. 

"No." They stood in silence for a few long seconds before Finn broke the awkward air.

"I do hate her though."

"You do?" Lily seemed even more suspicious. What did he want?

"Don't you?"

 Lily raised her guard, trying to discern his purpose. But she relaxed a bit. When he mentioned Iris he seemed to genuinely resent her.

"Yeah I do. So what? Do you want to do something about it?" She asked flippantly. 

Finn seemed surprised for a moment, but quickly smiled.

"Yeah."