aprilfoolsgirl
FHAWB
RECAP:
"H-he's my...boyfriend," I stuttered over the awkward words.
END RECAP
If I were somehow spring boarded off this planet and thrown universes away from here I don’t think it would be far to escape Alex’s scream.
“BOYFRIEND??”
“Well yeah,” I timidly answered.
“You never told me you had a boyfriend,” he bitterly spat.
“You never asked. Now if you’ll excuse me I’d like to continue my conversation.” I turned from him and started walking off. “So Eric what did you have in mind?”
“Well now I forgot because I just found out I’m your boyfriend.” Lucky for me we were far enough away and Alex had already started storming off so he couldn’t hear.
“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to drag you into this, it’s just this guy-“
“Boy troubles?” Eric guessed. He sighed. “What happened?”
“He stood me up at my first dance that was also going to be my first date.”
“What a jerkwad.”
“He truly is a wad of jerk yes and now he keeps following me around trying to make it up to me. Maybe I should give him a chance though, I have been giving him enough of the cold shoulder.”
Eric put on a fake Spanish accent and clicked his tongue. “Girl don’t be stupid. He deserves it that…that…you know I bet he’s gay.”
I laughed. “Gay people do unintentionally flirt with people sometimes, it could be.”
“Does he look like he takes care of his appearance?”
“Yes.”
“No question about it, he’s gay.”
The bell rang for fifth period and I had to hang up, but not before I promised Eric I’d call him after school.
When I arrived in math I took the seat in front like usual and Alex took the seat behind me like he usually did too. “Psst Devin…psst Deviiiiin,” he whispered.
“Mr. Aaronson please answer the problem on the board,” the teacher boomed and for once Alex couldn’t understand the problem and couldn’t come up with an answer.
I grinned, life was sweet, karma was a bitch, and Alex was an idiot.
After math I was tailed by him to science where I took a seat next to Brett in the middle of the class. He smiled and started talking to me so when Alex came in and saw us his face contorted in a snarl and he trudged to the back, glaring purposefully at either Brett or me…or both.
My protector pretended not to notice and chatted happily away to me until Mrs. Smith came in and did the science routine. I struggled a bit with the lab we were given so Brett leaned over to help me, invading my bubble space in the process.
I could feel Alex’s gaze boring into my back.
The bell erupted through the school and Brett promised he would meet me at my locker after school and I trudged through the halls to my last remaining class.
With Charlie there with me and us being in partners at our own stations Alex couldn’t come within ten feet of me. We ended up making cinnamon twist doughnuts which turned out to be really delicious. I stashed a few extra for Brett to thank him for being so nice to me seeing as he had music for an elective and wouldn’t be able to eat such mouth watering treats.
Finally the unbearably long day ended and I sped out of the class after wishing Charlie a fun time in detention.
I strode to my locker to find, true to his promise, Brett leaning against it and patiently waiting for me.
“How’d you get here so fast?” I called out to him when I was maybe 20 feet away and he still hadn’t noticed me.
“Close classroom,” he replied while popping my locker again.
“You know one day you’re going to leave a dent.”
“Then you’ll have something to treasure me with always,” he joked. I elbowed him before I snatched up my books and stuffed them in my bag.
“You wanna come over today?” he offered. This caught me off guard and I stumbled a bit back, staring at him with a shocked expression.
“W-what?”
“Do you want to come to my house? You know, instead of going home to an empty place. We can help each other with our homework.”
“Uh sure, why not?”
“Cool.”
The two of us proceeded to leave the school grounds together when halfway out on the yard Stacy hollered me over. “Be back in a sec,” I told Brett before finding the blonde and walking over. “What?” I hissed.
“Boy do you get around fast,” she wickedly smiled.
“What are you talking about?”
“What happened to Alex? Is he last week’s news already?” My shoulders slumped.
“Alex stood me up at the dance.” She gasped.
“No!”
“Yes, and I’ve barely talked to him since.”
“Has he made any effort to make things better?”
“Well I haven’t exactly let him; I’ve been giving him the cold shoulder.”
Stacy stared at me for awhile, her gaze fixated on mine. “Devin give him a chance, he seems sweet enough, and his intentions are on the right track. For all you know it was a family emergency and he didn’t have a chance to get a hold of you.”
Hm, hadn’t thought of that, but if it was a family emergency he wouldn’t have been at the dance in the first place. “Fine, I’ll give him a chance. Happy?”
“Ecstatic. Tell me how it goes. In the meantime, you’ve got another hottie eyeing you.” I turned and saw Brett, not even attempting to disguise the fact that he was watching.
“’K I’ll catch ya later.”
“See ya,” she daintily waved.
Brett and I walked in silence until we got to his house; I admired the fact that he could mind his own business.
He fished for his keys and unlocked the door, then gracefully held it open for me. “M’lady,” he fooled around, mocking a butler with a British accent.
“Thank you sir,” I pretended to courtesy and stepped through the doorway. When the door clicked I realized something.
“Oh!”
“What? What’s wrong?”
I lightly laughed as I started digging through my bag to finger a plastic baggy.
“Here, I almost forgot. We made doughnuts in Home Ec and I saved you some.” I placed the bag in his hands while he stared down at them.
“Thanks, they look yummy.” He licked his lips playfully, pulled one out, and tore it in half. “Share one with me.”
I took the other part and put it up. “Cheers.” He chuckled and tapped his with mine.
“Cheers.” We each took a bite. “Very palatable,” he commented.
“You just love to use big words I don’t understand don’t you?”
“It means tasty. The ambrosial flavor of this exquisiteness is superlative.”
“Oh….thanks.” That’s one thing about girls that I’m not sure guys notice but it’s pretty important. If you explain something to a girl and she says ‘oh’ then it most likely means she doesn’t actually get it but she’s humoring you, like I was doing right now. If she stretches out the ‘oh’ to ‘oooohhh’ then really without a doubt she knows and understands. If she uses a few ‘oh’s such as ‘oh…oh…ooooohhh’ then it took her a few seconds but she got it.
I didn’t get it, I didn’t even try to.
“What subject do you wanna work on first?” Brett inquired as he threw his backpack on the couch and headed into the kitchen only to come back a few minutes later holding two glasses filled with a dark liquid. “You like Dr. Pepper?”
“Love it, thanks.” I seized the drink and took a gulp. “You mind if we work on math, that’s where I stink the most.”
“Sure no problem.”
We each pulled out a page covered in numbers but when we examined each other’s papers we realized they weren’t the same. “I’m in honors,” he said.
“Excel.”
“No wonder. I can’t pick out anything I might know.”
“I’m only having trouble with a few so it’s ok.” I wondered how someone with such a large vocabulary like him couldn’t be in excel. You’d think he’d be better in math.
I spent a full hour with Brett and managed to complete almost all of my homework (I still didn’t understand a few math problems) when Charlie busted through the door.
“I’m home,” she announced.
“Good to know, let’s call the fanfare,” Brett sardonically muttered.
“Don’t toy with me boy,” she warned….then she found me. “Devin! What are you doing here? What did he do to you? Are you ok?”
“I’m fine Charlie; Brett’s been helping me with my homework.”
“Oh.” Remember what I said earlier about ‘oh’? “You thirsty?”
I held my drink up for her to see. “Alrighty then.” She plopped herself on the couch in between us and stared down at the messy table covered in papers. “You guys really have been doing homework.”
“That’s what I said isn’t it?”
Brett leaned around her and mumbled, “She tends to hear what she wants so when you said homework…well she didn’t think it was actual homework.”
I gaped at her. “Charlie get your mind out of the gutter this instant!”
She turned to me with a blank expression on her face, and then she beamed at me. She brought her hands up to my cheeks and began to pinch and pull them like I was a toddler and she the grandmother.
“You’re so innocent for a high schooler Devin, I’ve never met anyone like you before.” She let go and crawled around to the other side of me only to start picking through my hair and at my scalp. “What are you doing?” Brett and I asked together.
“Looking for the place you put the batteries, I mean you can’t be human.” I shook her off and flailed my arms around.
“JUST BECAUSE I DON’T HAVE DIRTY INTENTIONS WITH BRETT DOESN’T MAKE ME A ROBOT!”
“That’s good to know,” came a new voice. I froze and my eyes bugged, especially because of what Charlie said next.
“Hey Dad, you’re home early.” My gosh I just screamed that in front of their dad!!!
“Hey Charlie, hey Brett. I see you two made a new friend.” My face burned into a fiery red and I forced myself to rotate so that he could see me and managed to create a weak smile and nervous laugh.
“Hello,” my small voice greeted.
“Howdy.” Charlie and Brett groaned.
“Dad no one talks like that,” the daughter protested.
“Well I do so I guess I’m no one. No One Moon, pleased to meet you.”
“Give it a rest Dad,” the son moaned.
“When I have an opportunity like this to embarrass the both of you? No way.”
I rose from the couch and offered my hand. “Devin Anderson sir. I’m a classmate of Charlie and Brett.” He seemed pleased with my introduction and firmly shook my hand.
“Nice to meet you Devin, I’m Peter.”
“Nice to meet you too Mr. Moon.”
He released my hand and sort of swiped the air in a forget-about-it motion. “Please call me Peter; I’m not going to call you Ms. Anderson. Unless you want me to of course.”
“No sir that doesn’t appeal to me very much.”
“A girl with manners. Brett you sure picked a good one, don’t let her go.” I flushed again, my cheeks flaming.
“It’s not like that Dad, we aren’t going out or anything.” His father’s face fell.
“What a shame, she’s much better than that other girl you used to bring home.”
I raised my eyebrows at Brett. “I’d like to hear about this other girl.”
“No you don’t, really-“
“Course she does Brett, didn’t you just hear her?” Charlie taunted.
“You should have seen her, plastic as a Barbie doll.”
“Dad,” he muttered. Charlie stifled a giggle and ran up the steps, claiming she still had some homework left to do. I couldn’t imagine why she’d want to miss this.
“Come on, I’ll tell you all about her after we get situated in the living room, I didn’t stand on my feet all day just to come home and do it some more.”
Mr. Moon rested in one of the two recliner seats just opposite of the couch where I sat.
I noted that this was a different living room than the one I’d spent the night in with Cambria and Charlie the night of the dance. Wow two living rooms, fancy folks huh?
“Brett be a good boy and make me a sandwich would you, I’m a tad hungry. And if you wouldn’t mind making a water while you’re at it.” He grumbled off into the kitchen and Mr. Moon smiled after him. “Thank you.”
I snickered a bit and he grinned at me. “Now there’s some personality. For a minute there I almost thought you lied earlier and you really were a robot. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to get some respect, I’m just not used to them bringing home someone as respectful as you.”
“T-thank you s-sir,” I stuttered. He chuckled and eased more into his seat.
“Now about my son’s previous girlfriend.”
“Don’t do it Dad,” Brett ordered from the kitchen. Mr. Moon seemed to shake him off like he hadn’t said a word. I began to see the family resemblance between him and Charlie.
“She was a scrawny thing,” he started, holding his hands up to show me how small. “And she sported the skimpiest clothes.”
“Dad,” his son warned, more urgent now.
“She’ll hear it sooner or later, might as well have some fun with it.” He turned back to me. “Anyway like I was saying, she reminded me of a hooker, couldn’t believe my boy saw something in her.”
Brett came back with the sandwich and placed it in his father’s lap while setting the water on the coffee table in between the recliner and sofa.
“Shove that in your mouth and see how much you talk. C’mon Devin I think we should be getting you home.”
“No no,” I waved him off. “I’m interested to know if I know her.”
“You do now let’s go.”
“Well then I want to know who it is now. Go on Mr. Moon, continue please.”
He playfully glared at me. “Alright Ms. Anderson I’ll go on. This girl wore so much makeup I wasn’t sure if there was even a face under there anymore. Her hair was this hideous dyed blonde with pink highlights, disgusting.” I was pretty sure I knew who he was talking about, but I let him continue so I could be sure, my heart pounding and praying it wasn’t her. “And her voice! I never heard something so high. I mean, any higher and it’d go beyond the talents of human ears.” I was certain now and I couldn’t believe it.
“YOU DATED MARCY?” I exploded at Brett. He winced.
“Kinda.”
“How do you ‘kinda’ date someone?”
“Ok so I did date her, so what? It’s over now.”
I turned to face his father. “Sorry for my outburst.”
“Nah it was fun,” he laughed. I glanced at the clock and realized Brett was right earlier and I did need to be getting back.
“Thanks for the conversation but I do need to get going.”
“Devin don’t do this,” Brett pleaded.
“Do what? You were right I actually do need to go, I promised Eric I’d call him after school and I completely blew him off.”
“Who’s Eric?”
Oops, let that one slip. “I’ll tell you about that later, long story that involves your sister.”
Both their faces took on the same look that said understood and they’d been there time and again because of her. “Want to walk to school together tomorrow?” Brett offered.
“Sure. I won’t be up and out until around 8, 8:15, somewhere around there. That cool?”
“Yeah it’s fine.”
I walked over to his dad and put my hand out. “It was lovely to meet you Peter and thank you for the entertainment.” Brett murmured incomprehensible words behind me at that part. Mr. Moon stood up and instead of taking my hand embraced me with a hug.
“Great meeting you too Devin. I hope I get to see more of you around here, it really lightens things up.”
“Yeah for you,” was Brett’s counter.
“I hope I get the privilege to come around here more often.” He let me go and stared down at my face,
“You’re always welcome here, especially if you make my kids happy.” He looked away from me to stare at his son. “Brett be a gentleman and walk her home.”
“Oh no that’s not necessary,” I shook my head.
“It’s ok, I was planning on offering anyway.” We cleaned up our papers and I slung the bag over my shoulder.
“Bye,” I parted from his dad.
“See ya!” and then more to himself, “So polite.”
I smiled. Still, I wasn’t nor would I probably ever be, over the shock that Marcy and Brett…dated.
The way back was dead, the air too silent for words to cut through.
Brett suddenly felt the need to talk so I suddenly felt the need to listen.
“Look I only dated Marcy because she used to be nice. I mean, she wasn’t always so…ugh. I can’t even bear to think of the way she is now.”
Time to speak up!
“Uh Brett I’ve known Marcy since I moved here, she hasn’t changed at all.”
“Well I know that, but I was here before you and so was she, she used to be different.”
I stared at him for a moment, wondering if he took me for stupid. “Brett your dad said that she was the last girl you brought home. You haven’t brought a girl home in over a year?”
“No.”
“Liar. It was more recent than that and you know what? I don’t care. I really could care less who Marcy’s been out with. Just tell me one thing.”
“What?”
“You didn’t give up your virginity to her.”
“No of course not! I didn’t give up my virginity to her.”
The way he said it made my mind explode. “You gave it up to someone else?”
“AAH Devin no! Not what I meant.”
“So you’re half a virgin?”
“What? How can you be half a virgin?”
“The same way you can ‘kinda’ date someone.”
“Look this conversation is getting a little weird, can we stop?”
“Sure.”
A few moments of silence.
“Devin are you a virgin?”
Silence.
“Devin?” His tone became worried.
Silence.
“Devin answer me please!!”
Silence.
“DEVIN YOU’RE NOT A VIRGIN ARE YOU???”
Passerby’s faces just sorta gawked at me, covering their children’s eyes.
“YOU IDIOT!” I yelled and threw a punch at his jaw. Perfect target.
“Ah Devin that hurt.”
We weren’t too far away from the house so it was weird that it didn’t surprise me that Charlie came running out and hugged me after she saw what I did. “Thank you thank you thank you. You rule Devin.”
Then she ran back inside.
Ok then.
The rest of the way Brett held his jaw and I was fuming.
When we got to my yard I told him this was far enough and I could go in on my own the rest of the way.
“Devin you’re not mad at me are you?”
“Slightly yes. By the way, I am a virgin.”
I began walking to my front door and when I turned back watched Brett merrily skip away, clicking his heels in the air every now and then.
Maybe Eric was wrong and Brett is the gay one.
The first step I took into the house I dug out my phone and called up the gay predictor.
“Hey Eric.”
“Hey Devin, I thought you forgot about me.”
“Sorry I was over at a friend’s doing homework.”
“Homework…right.”
“My gosh everyone has their mind in the gutter! We really did homework so shut up!”
“Touchy touchy. So if you have this real boyfriend why do you need me?”
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Uh huh, suuure he’s not.”
“What the hell is wrong with everyone?”
“Plenty of things are wrong with people Devin, you just happen to be one of the few in the world who are right.”
“Good to know. So earlier you asked if I wanted to do something later right?”
“Right. I hadn’t exactly thought it through though. Um you know I’ll just call Charlie and see if she has any ideas. You don’t mind her tagging along do you?”
“No not at all, she’s great.”
“Great. Bye.” Before I could say bye back he hung up. Well that was a total waste of cell phone minutes.
I trudged up the stairs and fell on my bed in my room. So comfy. I searched through my cell phone under the incoming calls and found Alex’s number.
If I didn’t do it now then I wouldn’t ever consider it again.
After the first two rings I heard his voice. My heart began to flutter. No, bad feelings. Bad bad feelings, go away! I banished you already, you’re not aloud to come back.
“Um hey Alex.”
I heard a thud on the other end followed by a groan. “Are you ok?”
His voice was strained. “Yeah, I just fell off the couch is all.”
Smooth. “Uh well I was calling because…well…look I’m giving you a chance to explain yourself. Take it now before I come to some common sense and find my mind.”
“DevinI’msosorryInevermeanttohurtyouIdidn’tevenknowIwouldn’tbeabletogoI’msosorrypleaseforgiveme-“
“Slowly please, I can only pick out so many words from that.”
“Devin I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. You have no idea. I wish I could’ve been there with you I really do but you have to understand that I couldn’t. I never meant to hurt you, it’s the last thing I would’ve wanted. No, I wouldn’t have wanted it at all. It’s the first thing I didn’t want. I wish I could tell, I really wish I could, but I can’t.”
“Why not? Why can’t you tell me?”
“Well I, I mean uh…I can’t tell you that either! It’s so frustrating Dev and I feel terrible for what I did and for what I said.”
“What you said?”
“I know you heard what I said the night of the dance. I just got caught up in my emotions. Teenage hormones are the devil.”
I sighed. “Yeah they really are. It’s ok though, I mean we were only going as friends.”
His tone of voice noticeably dropped to one of sadness. “Yeah…friends.”
“In any rate I guess I forgive you. I mean if it’s that big a secret and all.”
“It’s huge Devin, beyond huge. I would trust you with it but it’s not my place for me to put trust in someone, that belongs to…sorry I can’t say anymore.”
“Understandable I suppose. Plus it’s too much work ignoring you, you make it so difficult.” He chuckled.
“I do try. So…can I walk you to school tomorrow?”
The opportunity to anger him just a bit more by seeing Brett was just too good to pass up. He deserved just a bit more punishment.
“Sure why not?”
“Great, see ya later.” Before he hung up Eric’s words rang through my head and I had to ask, it was the perfect chance.
“Wait Alex!”
“What?”
“Are you gay?”
“What? No!”
“Hm, potentially gay. All right. See ya.”
“No Dev-“ End call.
Ok everyone, I’m doing one of those annoying message threats. However unlike other people who want 4 messages or whatever I only want one. A message. Uno messageo. One little thing that says ‘please continue’. I mean I would like more than that but it’s all I require to continue the series. Otherwise I’m leaving it like this and you’ll never get another chapter and I’ll know what happened but you, you won’t. You won’t know what happened. One message please, all I ask.
