Author's Note:

okay so sorry for the lack of punctuation, and let me tell you something about my decision to combine Quirky Tale of April Hale and Quirky Romantic Queries About Love together:

one: the wattpad formatting made it hard for me to have series

two: the ending of this book really did feel unfinished

three: it frustrated me when there are two books that are obviously better as one gets separated, and when I write, I write with publication *not* as an end-game, and rather with you, my *online* readers as my source of inspirations and motivations. combining both books will make it easier for you to navigate and such blah blah.

four: while this book has really made you get to know april, i don't think i've been fair to Ryder. the second part of the story will delve more into Ryder and what made him *bad* and how their relationship actually going to blossom when faced with a hard time. 27 chapters is not enough. i'll probably have another 30 chapters as the second season of The Quirky Tale of April Hale.

please bear with me. :) and thank you so much for reading and being patient with me.

one year later after the previous chapter

2.1: Straight Out of the Jungle

After legions of sessions with my etiquette teacher Dr. Lecter (whom I happily announce as a young female with no implication of cannibalism... yet)*1 , I started to get what it was like to be normal. Polite. And, in her words, predictable.

Quite frankly, I just describe the whole ordeal as 'sweating the small stuff 24/7'.

It took me a while to know that when someone offers you their fist, they expect you to first-bump it, not shake it. It took me a while to know that when someone with the opposite gender try to slip a lot of physical contact during our conversations, then he's most likely interested in you in a boy-girl way, and that I should decide whether I was feeling the same.

It took me a while to know (and of course learn), that people do make a use of their facial muscles to express their displeasure and/or happiness, and that there were cues. A lot of them.

Happiness: An open-hearted smile. Creases of crow-feet appear around their eyes.

Sadness: drawn eyebrows. Lips pulled down. Lots of creases around the middle of eyebrows.

Distress: self-hugging, crossed arms. Basically just trying to keep your body close to your body (Dr. Lecter's words, not mine).

And finally, a raging case of horniness: short, audible breath, dilated pupils, and somehow a gap between the lips that never close. Shown quite often by my boyfriend, whom I meet once a week, Ryder Black.

"Do you really need to say that out loud?" Ryder groaned. "Come on, I haven't seen you in four days and all I wanna do is kiss you without hearing a first-hand narrative of my expressions."

"Yeah but next week I'll be going to Greenville and we can kiss and make out all you want."

Ryder chucked his head to the direction of my camcorder. "And you're going to record it all?"

"Most probably, yes."

"That is actually pretty fucking hot," he mused. "Do you even know that?"

I stared at my lap in an attempt to hide from his intense stare.

Oh but I knew.

-

-

-

Quirky Tale of April Hale season 2
1. straight out to the jungle

-

-

-

"April, come down here!" my mother bellowed on top of her lungs, and with the amount of shaking that her voice held, I was pretty sure that she was crying.

When I reached downstairs, my mother's big, wet blue eyes met mine and she burst into tears. Real, streaming, never-ending, potential-flood-making tears.

It was the third time it happened. In an hour.

"Mom, are you crying again?" I asked her.

My father, who was supposed to be the man in the house, joined my mom as he started to soak himself in mantears.

"Dad," I bit onto my lips as I tried my best to emulate 'syphathetic' on my face. It wasn't easy when all I was thinking about was why they were crying.

I mean, I was the one who should be crying.

Because today was the day.

It was supposed to be the biggest day of my life. Beautifulest. Most wonderful. The day when I would suddenly grow up and take a ginger step into the scary and yet propitious adult life.

In three hours, I'm going to Greenville to stay in a rented townhouse along with three strangers.

I wasn't even sure how I came to agree with this, since strangers certainly wasn't my forte, and living far away from my family was something that could potentially cause brain-aneurysm to me. But then there was an Art-university that offered a film-making course in Greenville and my Precious Person also lived there. It would only be logical that I'd eventually move.

"I'd never thought that you'd leave this house!" my mother screeched in between hiccups and sobbing. "Oh April, my little April! Do you really need to go?"

"We can still pull you out from the uni!" Dad offered. "I mean, we've already paid around half of it, but we're willing to sacrifice 70k-"

"No! Don't sacrifice the 70k," my mom hissed, because maybe she thought that I would find it offensive that she'd rather have me out from the house than losing that much amount of money.

For the record, no I didn't find it offensive.

"We can have new living arrangements," Mom said. "We can go with you in greenville and stay in the townhouse!"

"Um, mom. From the photos that your friend sent me, the room's 4 times 4 meters big, so it would be anatomically impossible for the three of us to stay there without suffocating."

"Or we can kick out the other housemates," Dad said.

"That's a good idea!"

"We need to plan this fast, Honey. Ryder will be here in a couple of hours to pick her up and we gotta be ready when he's here."

"Oh my God, yes!"

"Mom," I looked at my mom. "Dad," I looked at my dad. "Quentin actually texted me earlier. He says, and I quote, 'Dnt let ma and pa cum w/ u 2 the uni. Bad omen!'"

Both of them blinked twice.

"Come again?" my father said. "And don't use the text lingo, translate it to english."

"Don't let mom and dad come with you to the uni. Bad omen."

This wasn't something that both of my parents could easily shallow. Instead of helping me pack up or give me pep-talk about college and growing up, they started crying and opened a new bottle of wine to 'alleviate their tormented souls'. Quentin had left the house last week, and their reaction hadn't been this bad. In fact, they had seemed to be happy to see him go off. I ended up packing alone, which turned to be quite a breeze since I don't own a lot of thing. After wrapping my new camcorder in four big layers of foam, I poured myself a bowl of cereal as I watched them go through the five stages of grief.

Other kids would call me morbid, but I actually felt happy seeing how affected my parents were to my existence in their house. I wasn't just another mouth to feed, they actually liked having me around.

Plus, their five stages of grief lasted only approximately two minutes.

"Okay, we're done now," Mom said as she wiped the last bit of tear. "Done. I promise no more crying."

I smiled at her. "Sure."

"She smiles at me!" my mom started to whimper. "I'm never gonna see her smile at me again."

"Me, toooo..." my dad joined her in session two of Obligatory Crying before Their Kid Goes to College.

Needless to say, when Ryder arrived, he was stunned to see the puffs around my parents's eyes. I expected him to ignore it, but he actually went onto them and put his hands on their either shoulders.

"Don't worry Mr and Mrs. Hale," his voice was warm and reassuring. "I'll take care of her."

My mom looked at Ryder from below her lashes. "Really?"

"I swear, Mrs. Hale. I know her eating schedule by heart so she won't skip meals because she can't find the food that matches her standard. I know how to calm her down, and if there's anyone who dares to hurt her..." he trailed off.

You see, there's this thing with Ryder. If any other guy do that, trailing off, I mean, people would expect him to continue his speech in an unsuspecting manner. But Ryder had this charisma that just screamed 'danger' that he could turn on and off.

And boy, was he turning it on right now.

Since our living separation a year ago, Ryder had certainly grown. He was a little above average in height, but it seemed that he was taller now. Broader. And scruffier. Like the type of guys in movies that made good fighters.

He also developed a five a clock shadow which I was unsure looked good or not. It certainly made my train of thought stopped far more violently than before, and that could be troublesome, because I wasn't comfortable not being able to think about anything else except for him.

Like right now.

I basically lost track on what was going on, and Ryder's comforting words to my parents faded into mere echoes at the back of my mind. I only stared at his forearm, looking at the way his muscles created definition that would look really good in the right lighting and angle. If I made movies someday, I would definitely ask him to be my actor. First-billed.

"April?" my mother brought me back from my forearm-fantasy.

"Yes?"

"It's time for you to go," she said in a lower voice, which I assumed she only took to make her sound calmer.

"It's time for you to go," my father mimicked her in the same lowered voice.

"O-Okay."

Ryder helped me bring the luggages and as he made a trip to put my bags on his car, both of my parents hugged me.

"Stay happy, April," my mother whispered. I inhaled her smell. It was home and everything I knew.

"Just be yourself, even if you're still searching for it," my father added.

"I'm always myself," I said. "Even at the times when I don't like myself."

Both of them smiled so wide their lips might crack. "Be careful. You can go home anytime you want to."

"And..." Mom glanced towards Ryder, who was still getting the bags to fit into the trunk of his car. "If he ever... ever force you to do something you don't want to do-"

"Don't let boys dictate you," Dad cut in. "Never let boys dictate you. Young boys can be assholes."

"You are so going to put some money in the Curse Jar," my mother apprehended him, but nevertheless nodded. "But yes, April. Please be safe. Be happy. And learn a lot."

"I will," I nodded as I gestured at my camcorder, my first weapon to get through uni. "It's all worth 70 grand after all."

We said our final goodbyes and my mother gave me a bone-crushing hug before she finally let me get inside the car.

As we drove away, everything fell into silence. It was something that usually didn't happen between me and Ryder. We were comfortable, we always had something to say, we clicked in our conversations. And yet, for some reasons, I couldn't bring myself to talk, and he didn't say anything either.

Until this.

"Just let it go."

I had to look at him because at how very befitting and yet unfitting his statement was. What was to let go? My steely grip on the side of his car? My suspicion of me being a bi because I stared way too much at Scarlet Johansson on Avengers instead of the guys? My fart?

"You don't cry in front of them, but you can cry here," he finally added, his brown eyes glanced at me for a split second. "They won't know."

And again, I was reminded at how much I treasured him, because he knew me more than I knew myself. He knew I had been clenching my fists until they turned white. He knew I didn't dare to breathe in too much in fear that I'd lose the scent of my mother. He knew I was in the verge of crying the whole time.

As the first tear slithered down slowly to my chin, I wailed and there was no going back. Ryder pulled over and held me wordlessly as I emptied my tear ducts. The supposedly three hour trip stretched out to five hour trip. Plus meal.

Sometimes I really was grateful that I was with him and not alone.

I wouldn't have made it. College was scary. Living alone with a bunch of strangers was scary.

Finding yourself was the scariest.

-

-

Glossary:

1. Dr. Hannibal Lecter from The Silence of the Lamb. A serial killer and he EATS PEOPLE. Overall he's fantastic and charming.

-

-

-

see you on the next chapter soon! 

-mwah-