CHAPTER THIRTY

The first day I saw him, his eyes were the most beautiful that day. Hazel eyes that refused to look away from me, it was like he was seeing every inch of me and every secret I had to hide. It was what caught my attention so I decided to focus on it. I painted what I found, love, kindness, respect and a fierce tenderness. He was fiercely loyal about those he cared about. I found all these in his eyes and it made me melt. When I was done with the painting, I stepped back to admire my work. It was beautiful. I wanted to do it in black and white but I felt like the color would best capture the beauty of the painting and I was right. 'It looks beautiful" a voice said behind me I screamed and turned around in shock splashing paint everywhere, I turned to see the culprit and the breath whooshed from my lips. 'Ben!!! You scared the crap out of me!!!" I held a hand to my chest to stop the erratic beating of my heart. 'Sorry, your aunt told me where you were and when I came you were so engrossed in what you were doing" he said offhandedly 'What are you doing here?" I asked him 'I came to see you so we could hang out like we agreed and is that Rohan?" he inquired 'Yes, I am drawing all my friends as gift to you people" I covered up, it was easier to lie than to start digging up a reason as to why I was drawing his best friend. 'Okay, have you done mine?" he asked 'No, I just started. I will start with the others tomorrow" I told him Great, now I have to start drawing all of them. 'Speaking of Rohan, is there anything going on between you two?" ben asks 'No, there is nothing going on between us" I clarified At least not now anyways. 'Alright, I wanted to be sure before I ask you out" ben said 'Um… what?" I asked 'Well, he seems to tense up whenever we see you or I mention your name. He nearly tore my head off when I told him I was thinking of asking you out" he said Whoa! I definitely did not see that coming. Ben was asking me out, he didn't show any interest at me. Well, except that one time he was checking me out. Well the two times. He has been into me this whole time? How come I didn't know that? Right I was busy ogling Rohan that I definitely missed ben. It was unfair to him if I agreed to clarify that we can't be anything more than friends. 'Listen ben, you know we can never be anything more than friends, right?" I asked him just to be sure. 'Oh, you aren't the least attracted to me?" he asked me I shook my head because I couldn't be trusted to use my words right now. I felt so bad for him. He smiled sadly at me 'it's okay, we can still hang out as friends. No hard feelings" he told me 'Are you sure? I wouldn't want to lead you on or anything" I told him 'That's okay Avilla, I am a big boy" he said and puffed his chest to prove a point. I laughed at that and just like the tension was dissolved, we left the painting studio to go downstairs to hang out. 'So what is up with you?" ben asked as soon as we settled on the sofa. 'You know, trying to get with high school. Thank God I haven't had any drama since I came there." I told him 'Yeah, you are lucky. You should have been there when I was fighting with this guy Kenneth Norway, you should have seen him around school. He was always putting the moves on my girlfriends even while we were dating" he explained 'What?! That can't be true" I laughed as I said, what guy had the nerve to step on ben's toes. 'I mean it, the first day I saw you at the coffee shop, he was talking to Melissa who was my current girlfriend then, I broke things off with her as soon as I heard they slept together" he said as he shook his head like he was relieving some memory. It was funny that he was bothered by that little fact, his human girlfriend was sleeping with someone else who is also human. It clearly meant that he didn't care if his mate was wolf or human as long she made him happy. If only I was mated to ben, things would have been easier for me but no, I was mated to Rohan the grump. 'Hey, I hope things aren't weird between us now?" ben asked when I haven't said a word in a while. 'Of course not, things are not weird between us, I was just thinking back to that day at the coffee shop. I think I remember something like that. You were shooting daggers at the couple standing next to the counter, I would assume that's Kenneth and Melissa?" I asked him I was right, things weren't weird between us, and it was the complete opposite of weird. I was very comfortable in his presence than I was with chandler. Maybe because I wasn't attracted to ben in a way. I saw him like the same annoying brother Camilla saw him as. He would freak if I told him that minutes after he confessed to liking me. 'Yeah, you have a good memory. It took Rohan talking me out of it, I would have roughed him up. It wasn't the first time he was doing something like that to me" ben said with obvious hatred. I wouldn't want to be the Kenneth guy. We hung out for a while before he had to leave for his house, hanging out with ben was indeed fun, but now I had to do his painting too.