Double Life: Secrets

for some reason this pix makes me think of Nic in her school uniform and no, this is not Nic but I guess it´s the uniform that looks like what I imagine her uniform to be.

A/N: ok, this is a tradition here... NO proof-read... my eyes haven´t been good but my cruel muses have been nagging me to write this one... not that I edit or proof read before posting DL -n I actually started in this one but then it was like bleh... haha -ah, also this one´s twice as long as the other DL posts, I hope is not too strange and if it is... oh well...

that´s it...

***

Natasha closed the window being careful to not lock it, then she went and cleaned Nichole´s boots, the ones she´d let in the bathroom, grimacing at how dirty they were being of an expensive brand, then she put the boots on the girl´s closet and looked  up a shoe box that was in the closet she opened it trying to find something of Mary Ann Ibsen that might have made Nichole be aware of a connection between the woman and the pictures but she only found paint brushes, methodically Natasha looked all over the place, under the bed, all the boxes and all the drawers, she took out the drawers and turned them around, one made a “thud” sound making Natasha grin “found you” she said, when she opened it, she found a black notebook she eagerly opened it and widened her eyes at what she saw.

“Do you think I´m that stupid to leave anything with you in my room?” Natasha shook her head and placed the notebook and the drawer back in place. Then before leaving she took and envelope out of the pocket of her coat and with a happy birthday in the front of it and two tickets inside it, she placed it on top of the girl´s laptop. She left the room locking it behind her.

“I have no time for that” Val said curtly

“Then please let me go up to her room, Mrs. Cioran”

“You very well know boys are not allowed to girl´s rooms, now if you don’t want to get in trouble just go away”

“Please take this to Nichole´s room then, she hasn´t gone to diner”

“That´s her problem, isn´t it?” the woman smirked

“And that´s how you take care of my girl?” Natasha walked toward them; both quickly looked to the tall woman coming to them.

“Go ask Nichole´s mother if she lets you go to her girl´s room” Val grinned mischievously.

“Natasha Strasberg” she extended her hand

“Josh, Joshua Arlington” the boy shook the hand of the model-like woman, Nichole had said her mother was dead but this woman hadn´t denied being her mother and by the way she carried herself she looked a lot like Nichole, the way they walked was pretty much the same, except this woman´s face was perfectly covered with makeup, her hair up in a loose bun, her clothes all black, a jacket and pencil skirt with impossible high heels boots to her knees, she smiled and her pale gray eyes studied him. Was this really Nichole´s mom Josh wondered, she could be though she´d have to have been a teen mom, she looked too young, but then, Nichole had seen pictures of Nic's mom and they were very alike, even her little sister seemed alike and this woman was not her step-mother either, he´d met her.

“It's nice to meet you Joshua. What brings you here?”

“Nichole didn´t come down to dinner, she was upset today I thought I could bring her something to eat”

“I see, walk with me please” she said and then he recognized her voice, this woman was Nichole´s doctor. She let him out and he wondered if everyone involved in Nichole´s life like outdoors and rain, the rain though was very light by now. She opened the and extended her umbrella, it was one of those transparent umbrella´s that people use on the red carpet things, he still had the black umbrella Nic had given him

“I´ll cut to the chase –she said sounding business like once they were out and walking- are you the boy who´s been going up Nichole´s rooms?” she stopped walking

“Twice” he half lied, he´d gone up two times with the dorm´s supervisor knowledge. Natasha half smiled half chuckled unconvinced it had been twice only.

“Val said you´d told her you had her father´s consent with is an outright lie that for some reason she decided to report just today, so I´ll just tell you this myself never go back to her room, never go back to her again don´t talk to her don’t follow her, don´t try to ask her about this, just leave her alone”

“Mrs. Strasberg, I see nothing wrong in being friends with Nichole” Josh started to feel annoyed by his wet jeans the rain was not as light anymore.

“Does a friend lie to go up to a room that is forbidden? Just leave her alone. I wouldn´t want to have to tell you this again” Joshua said nothing but he didn´t back down

“It was nice to meet you, Mrs. Strasberg” he said politely

“Yes, you too”

“Ah, Mrs. Strasberg, may I ask you when´s Nic´s birthday?”

“I just told you not to get close to her and you ask me for her birthday?” she raised her eyebrows

“It isn´t a bad thing to want to celebrate her birthday” he could see her white teeth as she smiled

“she´ll kill me for this –Josh widened his eyes a little and she tilted her head narrowing her eyes- it´s Wednesday” she said almost a purr “don´t tell her I told you” her expression was almost daring “I´m going to take that food up to her” she walked back to the girl´s dorm behind them

At lunch time of Monday Nichole stayed sat still writing something.

“Up for lunch?” Josh was standing next to her holding his bag strap on his shoulder

“Not hungry”

“Come on, Nic, let´s go” lately they usually had lunch only on Art Club days

“Don´t fell like going to the cafeteria” she closed her notebook

“Come –he extended his hand- I´ll go for you and we can eat somewhere else. She took her ID card and gave to him

“That much you want to spend time with me?”

“I actually want to tell you something” they were walking next to the other

“What´s that?”

“What do you want for lunch?” he grinned and she chuckled a bit

“Whatever you want is fine”

“On the wall”

“Nah, remember that time you found me on a tree?” he nodded “see you there?” they walked separate ways. He found her reading a book, sat with her back on a tree.

“You liked lasagna?”

“Sure” she took the food and a can of juice. They started to eat.

“What is it?” you´ve been stealing glances of me the whole morning”

“Ah… let´s finish lunch first” she furrowed her eyebrows and he imitated her, she rolled her eyes. They talked of school matters, Nichole couldn´t help but notice she´d talked of mundane, normal things with Josh and also bordered the less normal ones. He was tough to keep up with her and he still wanted to be there.

“Now, we finished eating. What is it in your mind?” she broke the comfortable silence they were in. Joshua sat up, he´d been lying on the grass. He let out a breath

“I met Mrs. Strasberg” for a moment, she seemed taken aback.

“It´ll rain soon, let´s go” lightly she took his wrist but soon lose her grip. She walked with a quick pace but slow enough for him not to trip with the roots of the trees. She stopped to a halt before entering and they hid behind the trees “wait, the other people sneaking in are about to get in”

“Will –Josh said his roommates name- how did you know they´re getting in?”

“This is Val´s nap time” they saw Will and a girl getting in, then they get in. they were already in the first flier of stairs when Nichole pushed him inside a cleaning cabinet and closed the door

“Did Mrs. Cioran finally give you a proper task?” Josh from inside the cleaning cabinet heard a girl say and some others giggled

“Yeah, I´m here to mop you off the floor and put you on the trash” Nichole sounded matter of fact. Josh heard a gasp and girl´s footsteps stopping down. Nichole opened the door still with a smirk on her face.

“Sorry for pushing you”

“It´s ok, how did you know they were coming?”

“I heard them” she shrugged

Once in her room she took off her shoes and lay on the bed, one leg down on the floor, she fixed her skirt. Josh sat on the desk chair

“So you met, Natasha” the rain started

“How did you know it was going to rain? The forecast this morning said no rain”

“This morning there was not going to rain” she said. Josh had a puzzled expression “Natasha, Josh” Nic reminded

“Ah, yeah… I came to give you the lunch you left and some dinner since you didn´t come down… Mrs. Cioran didn´t let me go up this time…” his eyes were furrowed

“Yeah… Natasha had sort of scolded her about that… bad timing”

“As I was telling Mrs. Cioran to get it up to you, Mrs. Strasberg came down and Mrs. Cioran told me to ask your mom if I could go up. She didn´t say anything about not being your mom…?” it sounded like a question. Nic huffed

“You've seen my mom´s pictures. Natasha´s not my mother”

“She kinda looks like you though”

“oh my God!” Nic grumbled and put her hand over her eyes

“Bad?”

“Very”

“Ok, I take it back”

“Right…”

“Did she teach you to walk and jump and…”

“Nope, she just fixed me when I fell. Did she tell you anything?”

“Yeah”

“Do I have to keep asking, Josh?”

“So impatient…-he chuckled- she basically said to get away from you and not to tell you about it”

“That little…” Nichole sighed and sat taking her phone out her pocket

“No, no, no don´t call her… it´s alright –Nic started to dial- please, please I think she sort of threatened me at the end” he said unsure and she put the cellphone aside

“What?”  He told her all about the conversation with Natasha out on the rain

“She has no right to threat you, she shouldn´t have talked to you!”

“It´s ok… something good came out of it” he smiled, his green eyes with a light sparkle

“And what´s that?” she raised both eyebrows

“She told me the date of your birthday”

“What?!”

“Don´t be mad”

“It´s ok”

They were silent for about a minute, Nichole seemed annoyed but her eyes were not cold like when she was really mad

“So, this Wednesday, huh?” he ventured. She tilted her head

“That bitch!” she shook her head, his eyes widened he´d never heard her use that language before. She got up and paced the room.

“that´s not my birthday, that´s the day of Camille´s presentation, she came here and left me that –she pointed to the tickets on the envelope on her desk- as if she cared, she knew you´d want to do something, she came pretending she cared that I go but no, she went and told you that”

“Hey, calm down, do you really think she did it on purpose, she couldn´t have known I was coming to see you”

“She did it on purpose once she saw you she had to take the opportunity” Nichole threw herself on the bed and once again readjusted her skirt.

“Why do you think so?”

“It was perfect… she saw us having lunch... she didn´t like that”

“She disliked me?”

“I´m much more effective for all of them if I´m alone” she said above a whisper

“hey, hey  -he went to sit on the edge of her bed, she looked up at him- don´t be mad, something good is that now that you pulled out your phone, you can give me your number” he smiled

“Why?” a light blush crept to his cheeks as she said that

“This Sunday we, Aaron, Chris and the rest of the guys went to hand out and Chris was telling me to call you to come with us and I realized I never asked you. As you can imagine my brother mocked me about it”

“You can mock him about it too. He asked me for it as well”

“You guys talk?” josh sounded very surprised

“I find him sometimes on the pool. Unlike you that prefer to listen and ask he prefers to do the talking and flirting”

“You're swimming together?”

“Is Josh jealous?” she reached his hand “when he´s in the water there´s not much talk going on so I rather have that…. You guys are way to persistent” they stayed silent for a bit

“So, you didn´t give him your number?”

“nope, and I´m not giving it to you either” he seemed somehow hurt “I can´t give you this number, you see Natasha and Karl, my father –she clarified when his eyes flickered- always have their records, there’s a tracking device in this, at all times they know how long and to whom I walk to”

“Why would they do that to you? I thought he didn´t care…” he seemed between mad and scandalized. She grinned which he found odd

“I´m more effective for them if I´m not distracted”

“Effective for what?”

“Please don´t ask that”

“But it´s unfair they want you to be alone or something”

“It´s ok, Josh, I don´t mind”

“No, I´ll talk to my father, he´s business partner with your father, maybe we can talk to him about it”

“please, don´t do that –once again she sat up- look, when you were introduced to my family, even though I was in the house, it wasn´t introduced I´m not there to be seen, Josh, I´m there to be unnoticed” she was quiet and resigned

“No, that´s unfair, your stepsisters are there and you deserve all that…”

“Thank you… -her eyes were warm- December tenth” she said right after

“Eh?” she´s always so random he thought

“For the school I was born the day Nat said but the real date is December tenth”

“Why do you have two dates?”

“Long story but I only have one, the one on Wednesday” she sighed

“And December 10^th?”

“A secret, another” she laughed humorlessly

“Jonah knows about the …”

“Real one –she interrupted- but he´d never tell”

“How did he know?”

“Kat knew… Jonah´s Kat little brother” she said with a small voice Josh widened his eyes, she´s been Nic´s roommate, the reason why there were rumors of her killing her roommate “the funny thing is that he´s the only one that doesn´t believe the rumors” she seemed about to cry

“And now you have five minutes to sneak out and get to classes” she seemed amused; she changed her whole posture and mood out of nowhere. She got up to her closet

“Are you not going?”

“No”

“Nichole, we´re in the last days of classes”

“Last week we did the mock tests, what else am I going to learn in one more class that I hadn´t learn so far?” she took out an umbrella from her closet

“You got less than five minutes to go”

“I’m not going if you’re not going –he didn´t take the umbrella, it was like the ne Natasha had –how many umbrellas you have?”

“just two… and that means you´re ditching classes… not responsible Josh” she shook her head and then squatted and searched something when she got up she threw two cans of juice to Josh “now, I´m changing clothes ´cause I don´t want you to keep looking at my legs” he was opening his can of juice and what she said startled him making him pour some of the contents on his shirt, she laughed

“Do you want to show me your abs, Josh?” she laughed

“I was not checking you out!”

She laughed and threw him a hoodie “maybe not, but I will” she laughed again as she went to the bathroom to get changed leaving Josh with a light brush on his cheeks.

“Why do you have this big sweater?”  Josh asked when she came out wearing a pair of dark blue jeans and a white t-shirt, she put on a black sweater over

“They're comfy to sleep. I think that was clean…maybe”

“right… your closet’s very neat I doubt you have dirty clothes in it” she smiled a little sitting on her bed Indian style and took off both her gloves eyeing Joshua, then she took off the bandage and flexed her fingers, she had red marks where the edges of the bandages were.

“Does it hurt?”

“I´m used to it but it mostly itches” she looked at her hands still flexing her hand

“Why don´t you just wear the gloves?” she seemed to ponder for a while

“I´m supposed to have a scar that gives me some kind of trauma stuff I don’t know I should ask Nat to tell me what she said of that”

“You can use the gloves only, right”

“You can use the gloves only, right”

“I wouldn´t like to risk it in case for some reason I had to take the gloves off” she put on the gloves only and lay on her bed again.

“Are you tired?” he asked

“Mmmhh”

After a while they started to do their homework, the day had gone cold and dark as the rain kept falling

“Let´s go down for dinner” josh said around seven thirty

“Dinner time already?” he was still going through her work, he nodded “ok, let´s go” she put on her boots and slid something in them

“What´s that?” Josh asked curious, she took the dagger out and his eyes grew wide “you carry that around school?”

“Everywhere”

“That´s dangerous”

“That´s the idea boy” she ginned as she put it back in her boot “let´s go, Josh”