Winters Night - Chapter 3

As Jack gets out of bed the next morning around six so he could get cleaned up, after he realizes that he stinks, so he walks into the bathroom and turns on the shower. He waits to get in till the water is hot. As he steps in he begins waking up immediately as the piping hot water hits his bare skin. After he washes himself he gets out and dries off. By this time it was now almost seven, so he walks back into the bedroom, where Grey is still sleeping, pulls out fresh clothes and puts them on. once he is dressed and has everything he needs he rushes out the door slamming it behind him, making Grey fall out of bed.

—————-

Jack reaches the female dorms three minutes early and he turns around as the scent of a beautiful girl passes by his nose. Standing in the doorway to the dorms is Liz in a cute blue sundress.

He smiles, his heart pounding in his chest as he walks up to her. “Good morning, beautiful.” he says as he reaches her.

Blushing she looks up at him, “Thank you.” she says quietly, in the sweetest voice he had ever heard.

“Are you ready to go, my lady?” holding out his arm.

She giggles, “Yes I am, my good sir.” taking his arm. They head down the path that lead back to the park as she leans into him a little. Once they get to the park he asks “Would you like something cold to drink?”

She looks up at him and says “That would be nice.”

They head back to the little coffee shop that they went to the night before. As they walk up to the counter of the coffee shop he ask the guy at the counter “Can I get ” starts Jack but Liz interrupts him, “We would like two strawberry banana smoothies please.”

The man at the counter let’s out a soft chuckle and says “I will have them right out for you.”

A few moments later the man walks back up to the counter “These two are on me, you both have a nice day.”

Liz looks at the man and says “Thank you, thats is so kind of you.”

He replied “It’s my pleasure now run along and enjoy your last day of vacation.”

Liz and Jack both thank him one last time then they hurry out of the shop and headed to the park to enjoy their smoothies in peace. They pick a bench that has the most shade from the sun to sit on, just as the start to settle in Jack hears four very distinct voices, turns around and mumbles “Oh shit, not now.”

Liz looks at Jack with confusion and concern “What’s wrong?”

All of a sudden four guys come running over to them, stopping next to Jack.

The one closest to Liz says “So this the reason you ditched us today.”

Jack looks up trying to keep his cool “First off,Damian, watch your mouth, second, yes, it is. So leave us be. If you want an explanation i’ll give one to you later, so run along before something happens.”

With that Jack turns back around.

“You sure smell good.” Damian smiled devilishly at Jack as he touched Liz’s shoulder “common man, we’re not finished.” said Damian, still trying to mess with Jack.

Jack looks at Liz and says “Can you hold this for me please?” holding out his smoothie as he stands up and turns around to face them.

She takes it from him without a word and watches a Jack walks around the bench and gets in Damian’s face. “What were you going to say?” asked Jack through clenched teeth.

As Damian opens his mouth to talk Jack punches him hard across the face. Liz screams, and dropping the smoothies she was holding she jumped up and pulled jack away from Damian as the rest of the pack took one step back.

“Are you crazy?” Liz asks Jack, while she helps Damian up.

Laughing Jack responds, “Yes.”

Liz looks at Damian, “Are you okay.”

Damian brushes himself off, “I’m fine.” he says as he glares at Jack.

“Damian I told you not to interfere when I’m on personal time, now you know what will happen when you do.”

“whatever Frost. I was only messin around man, you didn’t have to take it so serious.” he said still glaring.

“I have told you once now leave my sight.” barks Frost.

“um, hey.” Liz says quietly. “I just remembered that I, um, promised my roommate that she could take me to the mall. I need to head home.” Liz lies, trying to remove herself from the situation, before things get worse.

“Don’t make excuses if you don’t want to be here then you can leave, but I would like to explain what’s going on later if you would allow me.” says Jack pissed off and disappointed.

“Sorry.” Liz mumbles. “and maybe you can explain it later but honestly I don’t like the tension. There is too much anger here and it’s scaring me. I’ll talk to you later.” Liz says distantly as she starts walking back to her dorm.

———

Once Liz is out of sight Jack turns to the pack, furiously “Follow me.” and walks into the forest as the pack follows him.

As they get deep into the forest he turns to the pack and takes the throat of Damian and throws him into the nearest tree. He then turns to the rest of them and says “I know that Damian has been giving orders behind my back, and none of you even thought to tell me!”

The pack without taking off their clothes transforms into the true beasts they are. Frost drops Damian and steps back with a smile “Come at me i dare you.” he taunts.

Frost looks at them and without even trying, moves out of the way of the incoming attack so fast that all that’s seen is a blur. Once the fight is over, there is not even a scratch is on his body, whereas the other four need some time to do a little healing. Jack smiles at himself noting that didn’t even have to transform himself.

——

“You’re back early.” Crystal says as Liz walks into the room.

Liz still in deep thought falls face first onto her bed, startling Crystal who had not even look up from the tv.

“Are you okay Eliza?” Crystal asked as she turned off the tv and walked over to the side of Liz’s bed and sat down. “You seem upset. Wanna tell me what’s going on?”

Liz rolled onto her back so she could see Crystal “Well, i don’t even know where to start.” she sighed.

Crystal smiled, “Well sugar, let’s start at your tour, how did that go?” she asked joyfully.

“Actually we got smoothies and were about to start when a few of Jack’s friends showed up. Apparently they weren’t talking or had some kind of agreement that Jack had the day off. I can only assume that they are in a club or have a lot of classes together or something but they started talking and he got upset that they were disturbing him and he handed me his drink and punched one of them in the nose.” liz sighed.

“I don’t know Jack just doesn’t seem to be the violent type he’s always kind to me and he looked sorry when I made him step away from the guy but it scared me. Then I may or may not have told him that I had plans to go to the mall with you to get out of the situation, which i honestly think made things worse.”

“Wow.” Crystal said taking in what Liz had just told her. “Well maybe there was a reason behind it. No one punches anyone without a reason.”

“Well, the guy touched me on the shoulder and said I smell good but he wasn’t messing with me i don’t think.” Liz said realizing that maybe Jack had been trying to protect her.

“Maybe he was jealous.” Crystal giggled.

Liz smiled, “Yeah, maybe.”

“Well,” Crystal said, “Since you said I was dragging you to the mall. Let’s not make a liar of you. I needed a reason to get out of the house and now I have one.”

———

After about ten minutes both girls were ready.

“Hey,” Crystal says as they walk out of the dorms, “I never asked what stores you like to go to.”

“I actually don’t go to the mall much so i don’t really have a favorite.”

Crystal laughs as they reach the mall. “Okay then, we’ll go to my favorites.”

Liz follows Crystal through the mall and listens to her go on about some guy she met that is apparently super sweet.

“Okay here we are.” Crystal says joyously as they stop in front of a small boutique.

They go in and look around finding a few things that they like they decide to try them on.

Once each of them has tried on their clothes they both walk out with multiple bags full of clothes.

“That was fun and you should definitely wear the blue top that is form fitting and those dark jeans the next time you go out with jack. I get the feeling that he likes the color blue on you, plus it matches his eyes and it would be so cute.” Says Crystal giggling.

“You think?” Liz asks her smiling

“Definitely.” Crystal says as her stomach growls. “Man i’ve worked up quite the appetite wanna go over to the food court and grab some lunch?” Crystal asks already walking towards the food courts.

Liz smiled and followed her, “Sure, I’m getting hungry too.”

After deciding to eat at the chicken palace and ordering their food they sat down. Liz got a chicken sandwich and Crystal got a chicken salad.

“So this guy you were talking about before we got to the boutique, what’s he like? Do you even know his name.” Liz asked Crystal as they sat down.

The mention of Crystals crush had her dreamy eyed and Liz watched as the biggest smile she had ever seen appeared on her face.

“His name is Grey, I think, but I don’t remember exactly.” She giggled. “And he has the most amazing forest green eyes that I think I have ever seen.” Crystal said smiling. “He’s tall too. You know, I think he’s almost as tall as Jack, he’s also tan so he must spend a lot of time outside.”

As Crystal was going on about her crush Liz burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” asked Crystal confused.

“Well he could also go to a tanning bed. I think I saw a place earlier in the mall.” Liz said smiling while taking the last bite of her food .

“Well, yeah, I guess that’s a possibility.” Crystal said as they dumped their plates and trash into the trash can.

———–

Talking to Crystal as they walked towards the exit, Liz ran straight into a wall and falling she was caught by a strong pair of arms.

“Woah, are you all-, Liz?” Asked an all too familiar voice.

“Jack?” Said Liz looking up into the blue eyed boy that she was falling for.

“What are you doing here?” He asks surprised to see her.

“Um, well, Crystal brought me out to go shopping.” Liz said holding up her bags as proof. “I didn’t think that I’d run into you.”

“Oh, okay. look about this morning I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me, it’s just that when he touched you.” Jack said trailing off as he thought about it.

“Hey, it’s okay, don’t worry about it. I just didn’t understand why you hit him. I don’t blame you. ” Liz said smiling at him seeing that his eyes were getting hard as he recalled the incident from earlier.

Jacks posture got a bit more relaxed when he realized that she didn’t reject him. “Are you sure? You don’t hate me?” He asked her nervously.

“Nope not at all.” Liz said smiling.

“Jack, did you get lost or what.” Said a voice as a tall lanky guy walked out of the store.

“Oh great.” Liz mumbled upon seeing the guy that was supposed to be her guide on her first day.

“That’s him.” Said Crystal grabbing Liz by the arm excitedly.

“That jerk is your crush?” Liz asked looking at Crystal with shock and then she turned to Jack, “and you are friends with him?”

Jack looked at Grey. “Grey is kind of my wing man, he’s always there for me. I consider him to be my brother”

“He’s not a jerk.” Crystal pouted defensively. “He’s just a little bit mystifying.” She said batting her eyes at a very bored looking Grey.

“He left me at the dorms my first day, and told me to use the map to find my way around.” Liz said glaring at Grey who didn’t seem to mind it one bit.

Liz looks away from Grey and turns to Jack.

“Can we go some place else to talk, we can give these two some time to.”

Grey looks at Jack then to Liz, back and forth multiple times.

Jack gets a little smile on his face and says “Yeah we can do that, how about we go to the coffee shop and then we can all met up at that little Chinese restaurant on the edge of campus.”

Crystal is beaming overjoyed at this suggestion “Yeah let’s do that!” taking Greys arm and pulling him away.

Liz looks up at Jack who has a cocky little grin. After a moment she says “Let’s go.”

Jack looks back at her and nodes and they start their walk to their coffee shop.

———

After both couples arrive at the restaurant they walk in together and are seated in a booth at the back of the restaurant.

Three minutes pass before a old little Chinese woman walks up to the table, Jack and Grey look at each other expecting a hilarious attempt of her speaking english.

The waitress then say “Good evening what can I get you to drink?” in a perfect english.

Liz looks at the waitress and says “May I please have a sweet tea.”

Crystal then says “Sweet tea for me too please.”

Grey and Jack looking very disappointed that the the old chinese lady didn’t speak with an accent both order hot tea.

After a few minutes of sitting in an awkward silence their drinks get brought out to them. “Are you all ready to order?” The waitress asks.

“Yes we are.” Jack responds motioning for Liz to start them off.

“I would like some beef and broccoli.” Liz says looking up at the waiter.

Crystal smiles when the waiter turns to her “I would like the sesame chicken.”

Grey and Jack still disappointed both order the general tso’s chicken.

The waitress nodded “I will have your food out to you in a few minutes.”

When the waitress walks off Liz looks at Crystal and asks “So how was your day with Grey?”

Crystal smiled at her then looks at Grey who gives her a nod. She turns back to Liz and says “Grey asked me to be his girlfriend!” Still giggling she says “And guess what.”

Liz already knowing the answer and not too surprised by it replys “What?”

Grabbing Grey and pulling herself closer to him Crystal smiles “I said YES!”

Grey looks at Jack and asks “So how do you feel about this?”

Jack looking dumbstruck says “Dude I never thought you had the balls to ask a girl out in the first place, but all of that aside I’m happy for you two. If you want me to stay out of the dorm tonight I will.” With a little chuckle.

Crystal looks at Grey confused and asks him “Why would you want him to stay out of the dorm tonight?”

Grey gives Jack a evil look and whispers what it meant in her ear. Crystal face turns bright red. Liz turns to Jack and says “If she stays with him you can come stay with me.” knowing her roommate would most likely say no.

Crystal smiles and says “Ok I will stay with Grey and Jack will stay with you. Just remember not to get caught. We have school tomorrow.”

———-

Ten to twenty minutes later after the waitress has brought the food to the table Liz looks at Jack, “So do you want to stay the night with me?” She asks him.

“Would you like me to?” He asks her sincerely.

She looks down at the food in front of her shyly. “Yeah kind of but we just met and I think that would be kind of fast.”

After finishing the first bite of his chicken Jack responds “We have till the end of the meal to decide, ok?”

“Ok.” Liz says smiling happily.

After the meal the four of them walk out of the restaurant. Liz turns to Crystal and asks her “So what are you doing?”

Crystal looks at her and says “I’m going to go with Grey tonight, ok?”

“Yeah that’s fine with us.” Liz replied looking at Crystal and smiling.

——–

As Liz leads Jack into her dorm room she begins to realize that she has no idea where Jack should sleep.

Jack knowing what she is thinking says “I’ll sleep on the couch, we don’t have to sleep together. Don’t worry.”

Liz looks at Jack and smiles “Thank you. Goodnight sweet dreams.”

“Goodnight.”