Mindless

                                    

                                          
"Listen Foster." He started, taking a deep breath as she met his gaze. 
                          
"There's something I have to tell you."
                          
After he said those words he almost stopped to smack himself, he was telling Sophie? Telling miss oblivious about the one thing he could hide right in front of her for years and never have too worry about it being disclosed? 
                          
What was he thinking? But maybe that's just it. He wasn't. And so the words tumbled out of his mouth faster than he could've ever thought up. 
                          
"You see Foster, what I wanted to say... what I wanted to tell you is that..." he started, stopping a sigh as he shook his head. What was he doing? What in the freaking gulons nest was he doing? 
                          
"Keefe? Are you going to keep staring at me blankly or are you going to finish your sentence cause the constant mumbling is sorta freaking me out." Sophie said, pulling him out of his little worry world and back into the depths of her soul-capturing brown eyes. 
                          
"Sorry Foster, I'm just a little sidetracked by your obliviousness to my secrets." What? No! What was he doing? Telling Foster he... 
                          
"Obliviousness?" Sophie asked, and Keefe's worry's turned to amusement. 
                          
"Yes Foster, your obliviousness is off the charts, I swear I heard fangirls screaming it one time in... pretty much everywhere." He said with a smirk, not even sure where the joke had come from. But that's why he had the talent. 
                          
"I don't have fangirls," Sophie said wrinkling her nose at the word and furrowing her eyebrows in such a way that the cute little forehead crinkle showed up. 
                          
"You might not Foster, but we do!" He said with a wink and laughed at the dumbfounded confusion expression on Sophie's face. 
                          
"But anyways... we're getting off topic."  He said quietly, the humor fading away as he realized if he was going to say it he had to do it now. 
                          
"Listen Foster." He started again. 
                          
"You said that already." Sophie whispered, a twinkle in her eyes. They were sitting side by side underneath a tree and at that moment she shifted slightly, her shoulders brushed His shortly and he had a sharp intake of breath as her emotions swept through him, wonder, confusion, but something else... something that made all his fears whisk away as he held onto one last hope that Foster might feel the same. 
                          
"Um Keefe you're doing that blank stare again." Sophie said, looking the slightest bit concerned. He opened his mouth too speak, reminding himself that he'd gotten himself into this mess by falling for Sophie Foster, but honestly, who wouldn't? 
                          
"Look if you don't want to tell me-" 
                          
"No Foster." He interrupted. "I do. It's just... complicated." Complicated? Ha! That was one way to put it. Mind bogglingly difficult was even better. 
                          
"Okay... well I'm here to listen." Sophie said, offering a cute small smile that made him want too stop and frame the moment in his mind. A strand of her blonde hair fell over her eyes and he reached out too move it for her, as he tucked it in Sophie's eyes seemed to trace his every movement. He leaned a little closer too whisper in her ear, "You're cute Foster." 
                          
Sophie blushed at this and he smirked, noting there closeness as her breath tickled his cheeks, his arm brushed hers and he smiled at the emotions radiating off of her. He almost paused too tease her about it but decided enough was enough. Time to tell Foster, in... a round about way. 
                          
"remember the time when we talked about you and Fitz?" 
                          
"Yes? About how things were different somehow?" Sophie asked, seeming confused as too where he was going with this. 
                          
"Yeah, that. Well you might've noticed how... not forthcoming I was at first." Well. That was just the start of it. He distinctly remembered ramming his head into the wall repeatedly mumbling about oblivious girls who somehow caught his attention. In fact it would've taken a few thousand more bonks on the head for him to say a word about it, but Foster always had a way of prodding things out of him, and this was no exception. 
                          
"Well. Foster." He let out a long sigh.
                          
This was it. 
                          
It was now or never. 
                          
"I didn't tell you the whole story. And I..." 
                          
"Yes?" Sophie encouraged him with a beautiful smile, a patient one. 
                          
"Sophie." He gently took her hand in his and looked her straight in the eye as he spoke. 
                          
"I think I fell in love with you." 
                          
~~~
                          
Silence followed after his declaration and he closed his eyes, fear stirring inside him as he let go of Fosters hand. Not wanting too feel the emotions of rejection that would surely come next. Though it was futile, since he was sure too feel it because of his mother's experiments. So why did her emotions feel blank? 
                          
He opened his eyes just before he saw Sophie collapse in laughter. 
                          
"Sure Keefe. That's a good one, you almost got me, but seriously enough stalling. What did you actually want to tell me?" She asked, so innocently, so obliviously that he didn't even stop to think when he said. 
                          
"Look into my mind." What? Was he crazy? Telling the one person who appeared most in his thoughts too take a look around? But this time he was serious, he was telling Foster and fighting past her wall of obliviousness. 
                          
"Um. Okay? What do you want me too look at?" Sophie asked. 
                          
"Just... look inside my mind, I'll think about what I want you too see." He said, and waited for Sophie too dive into his mind before he brought the memory he needed.
                          
~~~
                          
"You have to tell her someday Keefe." It was Ro this time, the ogre was staring at him looking frustrated, he sitting at his desk drawing in Candleshade. The day after Foster brought him human cookies and told him about her unmatchable status. He'd never seen her more worried, and that was saying something. 
                          
"I can't do that too her, she's with Fitz now so it's even more complicated." 
                          
In real life he felt Sophie's mood sour, and yet her confusion was still there, clear as day. 
                          
"Fitz isn't good for her and you know it hunkyhair, a guy shouldn't care so much about a random sparkly list telling him who he can smooch with." Ro said, and made kissing noises, which would've seemed off character but than she held up a knife to her lips and mimed slicing them off in a very odd manner. 
                          
"Um. One, that's not what they're there for, and two I don't think they're sparkly." He said, shading the undertones of his sketch. 
                          
"Oh please, all you elves decorate with is sparkles. But seriously you have too agree with me when I say Blondie was right too worry so much about his reaction." 
                          
"I guess," he mumbled, still ignoring Ro.
                          
"Come one Hunkyhair, just say it. You're scared to tell her how you feel. You're afraid of rejection, you're heartbreakingly in love with someone who couldn't be more oblivious, you-"
                          
"You're right Okay?!" This time he couldn't stand it. He was shouting now and he saw no reason to stop it. 
                          
"You're right that I think Fitz should be better too her, you're right that I'm scared out of my mind too tell her that I smile every time I think of her, you're right that I fell for someone who wouldn't even know it if I wrote the words on my forehead." He stopped to take a breath. 
                          
"You're right, you're so right. There I said it. Is that what you wanted to hear? Is that why you've been nagging me about it for months? 
                          
"I'm in love with her." He said simply. 
                          
"I'm ridiculously in love with Sophie Elizabeth Foster." 
                          
~~~