Author's note: The following chapter is in Aiden's POV. The important events of the whole story is written in his POV. This could be a little disoriented if you are reading just this chapter for judging purposes but I'm sure you'll find Aiden's character sketch, his intentions and the flow of the story crystal clear.

Aiden's POV

I'M HAUNTED

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"This is Margo Fawn and Electra Withers." Irsia Bookman introduced her friends. I was washing my mom's car when she dragged her friends over to me. Her merry attitude was hospitable. I had moved into Ostonn Newvale not too long ago and had to redo my sophomore year because of all the moving around my family had to go through because of the onslaught of CONMISDUM. Though Irsia Bookman did give me a luminously friendly smile, she did keep her distance for the first week I moved in. I was supposed to be in quarantine for a week to prove the neighbors and the school board that I wasn't infected with CONMISDUM.

"Nice to meet you, Aiden. Irsia tells me you are a sophomore." Margo Fawn stretched her hand.

"Wet." I didn't shake her hand. "I'm redoing actually."

"Miss congeniality here," Margo Fawn addressed Irsia Bookman, "will help you. You don't have a choice in the matter."

"Can we leave?" One look at Electra Withers, I knew she had a natural animosity for boys.

I missed my old friends, but I was thrilled that my mom had found a house for us very near a secluded lake and a school with the finest swim team. I made friends with Edric Bookman, older brother of Irsia. He was a senior and was the captain of the swim team. That was all I had to do, become friends with Edric Bookman and everyone knew me. I hung out with Edric Bookman, the guy almost every girl wanted and every boy who checked out his sister earned the right to pay a visit to the hospital. Edric made sure no one dared to even so much as look at his sister. Rumor had it that he drove a guy to the hospital himself for asking his sister out and that the guy switched school after that. Electra hated him. There was a long rivalry between her boyfriend -Miles Harmon and Edric. I was surprised that Electra even had a boyfriend.

It wasn't a comforting jaunt in Acadia High redoing Sophomore year, but something made it interesting. I thought it'd be just a short-lived enamour that I had for Margo Fawn. She had olive skin, black hair that always made bad hair days look worse, a good 3 heads shorter than me, a smile that would make her a beauty pageant and overrule her riotous hair, her attitude askew to introversion and blithesome disposition. She was refreshing. If I did not outgrow her, even after knowing she had a boyfriend, I definitely had a problem. A serious one that required me being around her all the time.

Margo had no idea I had been basically stalking her, but Irsia and Electra knew. Electra already had a reason to hate me and I made sure I gave her one more.

"I'd say don't fall for the wrong guy, Fawn, but you won't listen, would you?" Edric put it subtle. He had a knack for that, but he looked at the wrong girl when he tried to kill two birds with the same stone. Elec didn't even acknowledge Edric and Margo tossed a shrewd look at Edric, completely unaware of the alternate information. Irsia made a retching reaction and Margo laughed, pitching her head back a little, a sound that clinked warmly.

When Edric told me that Kyle had been hooking up with Sophie Garcia, I knew I would have to be generous to drive Kyle to the dentist myself. I just had to wait for Margo to find it herself. I could say to her, but I didn't want to watch it all blow up. When there came a time when she'd know about my feelings and if she recounted that I was the one who lit up the fire to the smoke she choked on, that would not be right. I didn't know how Edric was so sure that Kyle had been hooking up with Sofie, but I didn't want to push it. Edric had been rooting for me the moment he saw me, with a dense, pining look that I couldn't curtain seeing her with a self-absorbed prick like Kyle. He probably had her because she added value to him. Everyone knew she was a friend of Electra Withers and Irsia Bookman. To me, she was the demure goody-goody who had a bright-eyed attitude blending with her introversion. I would never understand how that combination worked for her, but it did. It really did to the point that I couldn't wrench my eyes from her.

The small details made everything. I lived vicariously out of those details. How she fiddled with the turquoise pendant in the middle of math tests and how she walked hugging that raincoat, which she had outgrown a lot. It made me want to laugh. I could mentally hear her eyes roll whenever she saw Fiona. She had names for the four stray puppies that she fed every morning and evening for a fortnight until they were taken to a foster care. She really liked that one-girl puppy more because she named her fiction -the rest were summer, autumn and winter.

I was out with the swim team and all the senior boys. It was Edric's birthday. We were at the Wild Hall. As the name it was going to be wild, but not the party. Just something far more igniting came along. Just when we were screaming, not singing happy birthday, Bookman, I saw through the slightly opened window. Margo! What was she doing here? I made it to the window through the ruffian-style birthday song, to see her go into Dress Tress. Maybe she was there to get her tresses done.

"You are pathetic, Wilder." I heard Edric howl at me as the DJ blared the song need you 100 percent by Duke Dumont.

I walked back to the black cake with white words on it -Bookman and Withers sitting on a tree. If only she knew about this. I could only imagine the lightest version of the repercussions.

"Am I?" I asked, jerking my chin at the words on the cake. Only those words were left of the cake now.

"At least Withers knows." Yeah, he got me. Margo had no idea.

"Is that Fiona?" I squinted

"Self-invited?" He hedged.

"She is the only one in a skirt here."

"You call that skirt?"

She reminded me of Bridget in unpleasant ways. "What is she wearing?"

"Safe to say just heels." Edric's thoughtful tone was brimming with derision. Others were getting busy with beverages, certainly inappropriate.

Her walk to us could have been a plain sail, but she had to stop to answer her phone. "Why is she always around you?"

"Around me?" Edric gave a dry laugh. "She's around me when you're around me."

"Say what?" Edric just gave me an insipid look. "I thought she was after you."

"She used to be, but now she's caught a second wave and the second wave has ebbed away from my shore."

"But she still has eyes on you?"

"I'd say one eye on each prize."

No wonder she made me uncomfortable every time she batted her eyes. "Bloody Mary of my nightmare..." I muttered under my breath as I saw her ambling over.

Edric thought it'd be funny to steep my face in the cake and he sniggered. "Now she can lick it off your face."

"Do you know your sister makes similar innuendos?" I wiped the icing off my eyes. Bloody Bookman got it on my hair too.

"What?" he was bewildered. "I'd never want to know the innuendos my sister makes."

I plunged quick enough to wipe half my face on his shirt. He shoved me back. "That move was a total waste, Wilder. You know I'm into girls and while you were at it why didn't you smear it on my dick too? Could have made appealing than necessary."

"Take care of her?" Came out more as a question as the inches between us receded.

"Gladly." He sauntered toward Fiona and dragged her along in a playful dance. "Oops..." he faked for getting the icing on her dress and his look said -you owe me one. I definitely owed him one for this charade.

I scurried to get the icing off my hair and face. It was icky. I washed off the icing from my hair and it only made it greasier. The sudden drop in the loud music steered my attention off my hair in the mirror. It was Irsia and Electra.

"I need your car," Irsia shrieked.

Marcus Brown sprinted to the cake in an attempt to hide the words from Electra. He pushed the cake off the table. A sweet relief flooded his face with a smile and a sigh. The words were already illegible with my face print on it, but Marcus was driven by fear. The words were Marcus' idea.

"What a loser," Electra muttered at Marcus. She was near the loud speaker with the plug wire at her hand.

"Give me your car, Ed. Margo just took off after a biker."

"What biker?" I waded to Irsia in a really impulsive haste.

"Some biker who ran over Desiree's dog." Irsia's voice peaked in the tumult.

I was out of the hall in less than two seconds. Elec hopped in the passenger seat.

"I cannot believe I'm doing this. I'd rather get in your car than Edric's. Don't mistake this for a truce." Her calm voice was poisoned for a time like this.

"Shut up and drive." Irsia got in the back seat.

I drove in the direction Irsia pointed. That road would lead to the Rochdale Park. It was going to be dark at this hour. What was she thinking?

"Ed, if you don't help Desiree and her dog -" Irsia screeched into the phone.

"Piano is dead." Irsia's voice teetered"

"Where'd you go Margo?" I murmured, looking at the gloomy evening rising. Elec threw a warning look at me. It's something I had gotten used to in the past few months. "Just how fast did she drive?" I was nearly 100mph.

"There she is." Elec spotted her.
"There's my best friend." Elec howled on her way to Margo.

What I saw next changed my whole perspective of Margo Fawn. The biker was Mason Campbell, a friend of her narcissistic boyfriend. I halted my car next to hers and hopped out. Mason looked like he was about to pounce on her, but Margo was lightning. She sprayed something at his eyes and his scream was girly. She pushed him down and it got scary. She trespassed her features and sprayed it on his pants. That must have hurt in tonnage and his girly screams got more convulsive. She fleet-footed to the helmet lying by and gave a hard smack across his face. I just stood there watching her go all wild. Elec and Irsia snagged her back. I shook my head out of the trance and decided to help Elec and Irsia.

"How's Piano?" Margo growled.

"She's..." Irsia did not complete the sentence.

Margo swung the helmet once more with the strap in her fingers and if I didn't duck at the right moment, I'd have ended up at the dentist. "Oh God! Sorry, I'm sorry, Aiden." I watched her agape. I really hoped that I masked my real feelings. It was very askew to dirty. She went on and gave him another smack. Elec pulled her back by her armpits. She had a few spectators. None of them would cheer on her, I would.

I had to wait outside the cop station with Edric. As soon as I heard Elec's mom had her back, I sighed, exhilarated.

"I always knew she was a little crazy, but I did not know she could get wild. Not like this. Beating up a boulder like Mason Campbell in the middle of the road, speeding, spending three hours at a cop station... damn... she is a little scary," said Edric as he hopped out of his Darling Knight.  That's his Wrangler's name.

"A lot scary."

"If that doesn't scare you, Wilder, your irrational feelings for her are dangerous."

"Speak for yourself." I gave him a once-over.

"You got me." He admitted his defeat.

That was the day I knew that there would be apart of me that would remember that day as the day that I realized my feelings for Margo would never leave. It would taunt me until I tell her what I feel and would haunt me if I can't have her. Consider me haunted.

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