Pre-adoption

"Hey", said Lizzy as she sat next to the boy with red hair. They were both outside, sitting on the steps leading to the back courtyard of their school.

The boy turned to her and, when he realized who was talking to him, shifted uncomfortably.

"Oh, hey," he replied.

"Listen", continued Lizzy. "I'm sorry my parents accosted you like that the other day."

"Oh…" Charlie stumbled for words, not knowing how to talk to the girl he had liked for a while. "Uh… It's okay"

"It's not, they shouldn't have done that, and I'm sorry."

Charlie didn't know how to respond. "It's fine… I mean, it's all good now." A few moments passed in uncomfortable silence.

"I guess I just wanted to explain" said Lizzy. "I mean, they thought you were somebody else… I guess their parental instincts kicked in."

Charlie nodded. "They thought I was the janitor, right?"

Lizzy nodded slowly.

"Did he do something to you?" Charlie asked tentatively.

"No… not really anyway." She sighed. "They just overreacted. And I'm sorry, I just don't want to have any bad blood between us, k?"

"Oh," responded Charlie. "Well, don't worry about it. No bad blood." He smiled, and Lizzy returned his smile. The two teenagers stayed silent for the next couple minutes, neither of them knowing what to say next.

"So," said Lizzy. "Are you artistic?"

"Uh… I guess."

"You guess?" Lizzy laughed. "What does that mean? You either know or you don't"

"I mean, I like to paint and stuff, but I spend a lot of my time playing piano."

"That's artistic!" said Lizzy.

"I guess… but… I don't know. I don't think you can call it artistic if you only play songs that other people wrote, you know?"

"I like to play the ukulele" said Lizzy. "And we have a piano at home. You should defo come by sometime, and we could do a mesh session."

Charlie looked up at her and smiled. "Really?"

"Yeah, really" said Lizzy.

In the distance, she could see people giving her weird looks for hanging out with a 'loser' like Charlie, but she didn't care.

"And I promise my parents won't harass you again, ever." She laughed, and Charlie joined her, although his laugh was a bit more uncomfortable.

"I… I thought they weren't your parents," he blurted, then caught himself realising he might have said too much. "I mean…uh… that's what I've heard…"

Lizzy stayed silent for a few seconds, shrugged her shoulders and said, "I guess they are now."