“What do you mean?” I asked Claire, narrowing my eyes at her.
“I’m telling you to come with me. Everyone’s going to be there and I don’t want my only female companion to be Gemma. I hate her.”
“Then don’t go,” I shrugged. “Simple.”
“But I want to go! And you’re going to come with me.” Claire whined. “Everyone is going to be there! Darren, Brian, Sam, Josh, Tyler and J-” she stopped paused suddenly.
I raised an eyebrow at her. “And?”
She paused for a bit, “Jake,” She finally said in a small voice.
“I’m not coming.”
“Brooke, please. Come on! I don’t want to be there alone. This is the last party I’ll be dragging you to. I promise.”
“Promises are made to be broken. But fine I’ll come.”
“You will??”
“Yes… but um… who’s party is it, again?”
“Blake.”
“Who the hell is he?”
“You don’t know? He’s the football captain of our school.”
I gave her a blank stare. “I don’t know anyone from the football team except Darren.”
“Who cares who’s party it is. Just go with me.”
“Okay,” I said. She gave me a hug before skipping away to her class. I made my way to my Chemistry class, straight from the cafeteria.
I didn’t want to go the party that Blake – whoever he was, was throwing. But I also didn’t want Claire to be with the boys all alone, not that I didn’t trust them, it was just that I didn’t trust her with Gemma. She would probably drink too much and make out with a guy who was not even her boyfriend. Or will do something more.
I shook my head. Gemma was weird. She was completely fine with snogging with another guy in front of her boyfriend. Brian was not affected by it because he doesn’t like her but still, that’s kind of cheating on your partner.
I reached my class. Brian was already sat on his seat beside mine. I plopped down next to him. He turned his attention to me, “Hey, babe.”
Those two words surprised me and I raised a brow at him. “I’m not your babe.”
“You never know what’ll happen in the future,” He said, giving me a wink, “Babe.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“What, babe?” He asked innocently.
“That. Don’t call me that. Don’t call me babe.”
“You know you want me to call you that,” He said.
“No I don’t.”
“Yes you do. Now have you completed the homework we got yesterday.”
“Well, duh. Chemistry is my favourite subject and I never keep my work incomplete,” I said proudly.
“Good. Give it to me.”
I frowned at him, “No.”
“What?”
“I said no. I won’t give you my homework. I spent an hour and a half to complete it. I won’t give that to you to copy. Do it yourself.”
He pouted and I had a hard time keeping my eyes off of his lips, “You won’t help your boyfriend.”
“No I won’t. I said do i-” Wait, did he just say boyfriend? “Wait, what? You’re not my boyfriend.”
“Yet.”
“I don’t think you’ll ever be.”
“Let’s see! Now come on, give me your homework.”
“No.”
“I’ll take it, then.”
“Uh huh… and how do you plan to do that?” I asked as I gripped at my book tightly as if my life depended on it.
“Like this,” He said and lunged at my book. I was quick to react and so I leaned away from him, as much as my seat would allow and held my book away from him.
“Brian! I won’t give it to you!” I whisper yelled at him.
“I know. That’s why I’ll take it myself,” He said as he lunged for my book again.
“Brian! Stop!” I laughed, as he put his arms around my waist and drew me closer, his hand almost reaching mine which held my precious note book away from him.
His hand reached the book and grabbed it from my hands and before I knew it, he already had it with him. I glared at him as he opened my book to copy my work.
Asshole.
I was still glaring holes into his head when he spoke up. “Stop checking me out,” He said without meeting my eyes.
“I-I was not checking you out!” I said, turning a bit red to which he just smirked.
“Sure you weren’t.”
“I didn’t know you were so dumb that you couldn’t even complete your work by yourself. And instead are copying from my homework,” I said, changing the topic.
“Ouch. That hurt. I’m not dumb like your lover boy.”
“Darren is not dumb! Your Gemma is!”
“I don’t argue with that. But Darren is a bit stupid too.”
“If you’re not dumb then why are you copying?”
“I’m uh… trying to understand what you have written. But I’m doing the work by myself.”
“Huh… And that’s not called copying?”
“Nope.”
“I hate you,” I said, pouting in the end.
He looked over at me for a second, his eyes drifting to my lips before flickering to the pages in front of him. “No you don’t. You love me. And don’t pout like that, I’m trying very hard to keep my lips to myself and you are weakening my self control.”
I bit my lower lip as I felt my cheeks go warm again. He wanted to kiss me?
Darren! Ugh, you are his? girlfriend. Don’t you dare forget that,? I threatened myself.
“The blush is not helping either. You look cute when you blush,” He said as he flipped a page over.
“Then don’t look at me,” I said as I felt myself blushing deeper. I looked at my lap, refusing to meet his gaze.
“I can’t help myself. You’re too gorgeous to keep my eyes off of you.”
“You’re so cheesy,” I said and sighed.
“Yes, I’m. You okay?” He asked and I looked up to meet his gaze.
“I feel… guilty. I’m Darren’s girlfriend and I like you. I do like him too but your like feels different from Darren’s. It feels more intense. I-I am such a bad girlfriend. Darren and I started dating almost three weeks ago and I already like another guy. This is so wrong. If Darren gets to know about this, he’ll be so heartbroken. It will kill me to see him like that. He’s being my friend since fifth grade and what I’m doing, it’s horrible.”
Brian placed his hand over mine, his touch sending tingles all over my body. His touch was warm and comforting.
“Brooke, you can save both Darren and I from the pain, if he gets to know about this. He will know this some day or the other. You can’t keep it a secret forever. You yourself have to do that because if he gets to know about this from someone else, the pain he’ll feel will be greater.”
“I can’t tell him. It’s barely being three weeks since we started dating and I don’t like him in that way. Of course I love Darren, but not in the way it’s supposed to be. And that’s making me guilty because he deserves so much love. And I can’t seem to give him that.”
“If your relationship with him was destined to be, then it’ll be.”
“Now what should I do? Should I just go to Darren and say ‘Hey there, Darren. I’m breaking up with you because I don’t like you in the way you like me. Wish you the best in your life, adios amigo.’ I can’t say like that, Brian!”
I heard the familiar, shrill voice of my Chemistry teacher. I looked up to see the teacher explaining some structures of God knows what.
When did she come?
“No. But I don’t know. You just have to tell him.”
I didn’t answer him, and instead started doodling on the back of my book.
“Hey, Brooke,” Brian said after some time. I turned to look at him.
“Yeah?”
“You and Darren have been dating for three weeks, have you gone on your first date?”
“No. But Claire told me Darren is planning to ask me out soon.”
Brian sighed. “There goes my wish to be your first date.”
“You wanted to be my first date?” He just nodded. “How do you know that I hadn’t been on any dates before.”
“I know you. You’re a bit shy. So I guessed you didn’t go on any dates before. You seem inexperienced in this stuff. And Darren is your first boyfriend so of course.”
“And you are experienced in it?”
“Not really. I went on a few blind dates before, Sam tried to set me up with some chicks. He dragged me to many dates but I didn’t have an interest in the girls he tried to set me up with.”
“Hmm… and who was your first kiss?”
Brian chuckled at that. “I didn’t have my first kiss yet.”
I was surprised at this. “Really? Why not?”
“I was not focussed on the dating stuff. I was more concerned with my grades at that time. I was a nerd back then, not anymore now.”
“When I first met you, I thought you were that typical nerd of our high school, only unusually popular.”
“Sorry to disappoint you but I’m not a typical nerd. And I can’t help it if people here give more importance to brain than beauty. I’m actually quite talented. What, were you hoping I was a player or something?”
“No, actually I’m happy you are the way you are. And this school has like, highly competitive kids so I actually like the way it is.”
“But what about you? Have you kissed Darren yet?”
I shook my head. “No, I haven’t.”
“Why not?” He asked, raising his brows.
“He tried to kiss me a few times but I told him that I hadn’t kissed anyone before and I want my first kiss to be special.”
“Oh. That’s good. I can steal your first kiss then.”
“Brian! Shut up. You’re not going to do any such thing,” I said, looking away as my cheeks reddened again. Jeez, I was blushing too much today.
“We’ll see,” He said, shrugging.
The bell rang, signalling the end of Chemistry class. I stood up to gather my books. Brian still had my book and so I snatched it out of his hands.
“Hey!” He exclaimed.
“Do it yourself!”
“Please, Brooke. It’s almost complete!”
“Nuh uh, not happening. Goodbye,” I said as I stuffed my book in my bag.
“Ruuuuude.”
I looked back, sticking my tongue out at him. “Jerrrrrk.”
“I’m still going to steal your first kiss,” He hollered. Thank God the class was empty by now so nobody heard him.
“You wish,” I said, giving him a last glance before I walked out of the class.
I exited the classroom. My next class was History with Darren.
“Brooke,” I heard the familiar voice of Darren behind me.?
I turned around to look at him. He jogged over to me.
“Hey, beautiful,” He said as he stopped in front of me, his arms encircling my waist. He pulled me into a hug.
“Hey, Darren.”
“I missed you. So much,” He whispered into the crook of my neck.
I chuckled. “We saw each other an hour ago.”
He snuggled closer into my neck. “But I still missed my girlfriend. I like you so much.”
He liked me. But I didn’t love him the way it was supposed to be. Should I tell him now?
I peered over Darren’s shoulder to see Brian standing in the hallway. He was looking straight at us, his hands clenched into fists at his side. He glared at Darren, at his arms which were holding me tightly in a hug.
He looked at me for less than a second before turning around and walking away.
I didn’t know what I was doing. I liked Brian. He liked me back. I was Darren’s girlfriend. I was saying that I liked Darren. But i knew my heart said otherwise.
This was one hell of a sticky situation I was in.
And why did I felt that the end of this wouldn’t be good?