"No."

I shook my head, opening the book and showed it to Kate.

"This is the actual product. The one you wrote is what we assume it to be. But this is an exceptional case."

"Oh, next one too?" She looked at me eagerly and I gave her a nod.

"Just try doing some of-" I cut myself off with widened eyes when I saw the time.

Oh, shit. I'm really late.

My legs were flying to get me in time and because of that, I was panting heavily by the time I stepped into the class and almost crashed into someone.

"Hey, morning." Cassy smiled, helping me stand straight.

"Morning. Why are you going out?" I frowned and she smiled.

"Mrs Banks have stuff to do, It's a free hour."

I sighed. Should I be happy that I wasn't technically late or sad that I just wasted my energy on running to catch up a non-existent class?

"Great." I muttered, walking into the cafeteria and made myself comfortable with a coffee.

"Ah, see who's alone." Tyler's voice echoed.

It surprised me that I actually smiled, hearing his voice.

But he wasn't alone. His awful friends were along with him and I could sense an insult on its way.

"Go on, I'll see you later." He muttered, making them leave and I sighed in relief. "Hey, what's up?"

"Nothing much." I said, sipping my coffee and he smiled.

"Are you ditching? Really? Miss goody two shoes?" He smirked, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

"No, it's a free hour." I don't know why I just cleared that.

"That's what I thought. Are you ever gonna come to one of the parties?" He raised his eyebrows, smirk still lightly playing on his perfect mouth.

"And let you dump alcohol on me? No thanks, I'm already done with soda."

"Oh come on, it was fun watching soda drip from your beautiful hair." He smirked, leaning back, looking attractive as usual.

Beautiful hair? What happened to him?

"It's not that fun for us." I turned away, facing the window.

"Okay, agreed. But hey, I stopped doing it, didn't I?"

That's true.

"And sorry though," he added and I was left completely surprised.

"But seriously, why not? It'd be fun. If work is the problem, I'll take you with me. We can probably give your shift to someone else." He shrugged.

Wow, I'm liking this. I wish Jake could hear it.

"Xander's having a party tonight. Come, it'll be fun."

I narrowed my eyes, looking at him. What's he planning?

"Hey, Tyler! Come on, man. We gotta go." I heard someone shouting from the other side and he turned towards them.

"Yeah, just a minute!" He sighed, "See, we need to talk. I've been trying to, like, for days. But you're always with that hottie or that dumbass."

I knew who he was referring to as a dumbass and I don't agree with him.

"So, I wanna talk. Not right now, but some time?" He asked and the next moment, walked away to join his friends.

I hate that he never waits for my answer. But something's definitely changing. This wasn't the Tyler in school.

A smile took over my face.

Whoever is responsible for this change, God bless them. This guy looks way more good when he acts good.

I came out of my thinking loop when my phone vibrated,

Justin: I'm missing you.

I laughed, sitting alone, looking at my phone screen.

Justin! He texts me the same thing every week.

It's mutual.

I typed out and smiled. After a long second, my phone made a sound.

Justin : Aw. Guess who I met yesterday? DELILAH!!!

I smiled at the name.

Your first kiss Delilah?

Justin : yes!!!

I smiled at the screen as his text about accidentally bumping into her, flooded my inbox.

"What are you smiling at?"

I smiled at Zack as he sat beside me.
"Justin met Delilah."

"Man, He told you too?" He chuckled and then frowned. "Wait a minute. What are you doing here now? A free hour?"

"Yeah, what about you?"

"Oh, don't mind me. I'm ditching." He shrugged.

"You do that a lot."

"It's fun. You should try it."

"I remember ditching." I smiled, sighing. I've done that quite a few times in high school.

"Let's refresh your memory." He smacked his hands on the table and grinned.

I exactly know what he's thinking about.

"Nope, next class starts in half an hour." I shook my head and his smirk grew wider.

"It'd be awesome. I swear."

I looked at him and shook my head with a grin as his smirk grew wider and wider.

"Come on," he stood up, walking straight with my bag in his hands.

"Zack!"

"Oh, right. Forgot you." He came back, grabbed my hand and the next second, my arm was locked in his.
"Off we go."

"Aye, captain." I recalled Noel's words and Zack laughed on the way to his car.

"What shall we do? We have a whole day."

"What? You're not gonna drop me back soon?" I asked and he frowned.

"What's the fun in that? If you're ditching, go for a whole day. So, where to?"

"Anywhere you like?" I said because lately, I found out that places doesn't matter when you've got great company.

"Hmm," he smirked, starting the engine. "Don't change that."

.
.
.

"No." I shook my head frantically looking from the skating shoes to him.
"Not going to happen."

He laughed again, "Yes, it is going to happen."

"I don't know how to."

"That's a shame. I do know." He nodded, chuckling.

"Of course, you know. Is there anything you don't know?" I groaned. Fighting, skating, basketball... What else?

"I don't know how to cook. You know that." He shrugged.

"Yeah, but you're kinda good at it. You'll study soon."

"What can I say? I'm a talented person." He chuckled, "Dean plays roller hockey, that's how we know."

"That's great. But I'm not stepping into these shoes and fall down."

"You said anywhere I like." He shrugged innocently.

"Yeah, but who knew you'd be such a brat-"

"Ouch, that hurts." He pouted.

"-and bring me into a... a ..." I trailed off, not knowing what to call this place.

"Roller rink." He finished it for me, chuckling.

"Yeah, that one. I'm going." I turned back and heard him laugh again.

"You said you would."

"Nope. I said anywhere, not anything." I smiled proudly and started walking. But not long before I was dragged back by him.

"Leave me, Zack. I swear, I don't care about any krav maga, I'll kill you." I shouted, hearing him laugh as he tightened his grip around my waist and pulled me closer to the shoes.

Threatening is cool, I like it. The only problem was that I knew I could do nothing to him. After he broke that man's leg, I was a bit curious about the krav maga thing and even searched it online.

And boy, that thing was deadly.

"I'd like to see that." He put me in front of the shoes and smiled.

"If I fall and crack my head open, my brothers are gonna kill you." I threatened him one more time since I loved it and stepped into those shoes.

The moment I swayed a bit, it moved.
"God!"

"Wait for me." He said, slipping into his skating shoes as if I know how to move without him.

"Come on," he gave me a gentle push and the shoes rolled on.

"Oh... My.." I was going in complete opposite direction from where I wanted to go and Zack couldn't stop laughing.

A shriek left me as I stumbled and was about to fall back when he caught me.

"I'm loving this." He chuckled, looking at my embarrassed, scared, struggling face.

"I don't think-" my legs were wobbling before I could speak further and finally fell on the floor, bringing him down with me. "-so,"

He laughed so hard that he didn't even notice me, half lying on his leg. I gave him a smack on his shoulder and placed my palms on the floor to get up.

"The floor is so smooth." I said, looking at it and heard a snort.

"Yeah, why? You wanna lie down?" He asked and I rolled my eyes.

"Are you kidding me? I'm literally on the wheels and the floor is smooth! No wonder I fall again and again."

"Like you would've aced it if it was a rough surface." He cracked up again and I stifled a smile, trying to stand.

"You'll fall again." He snickered, holding my hand and I stood up, putting my whole weight on him.

"Now let's skate." I could feel the smile in his voice as he pushed my shoulder and my shoes started taking me forward.

To be honest, it was fun like he said. It was awesome moving around gracefully.

"Woah!" I began slightly wobbling again and he placed his hands on my waist, steadying me. And he kept it there for the next few minutes until I successfully skated a round.

"Yes! Finally." I sighed, turning to look at him and he smiled.

"I did it!"

"I did it." I reminded him and he raised his eyebrows.

"Are you sure? It's me who made you skate a round." He sighed, wiping off an imaginary bead of sweat off his face and I sighed.

"Fine. We did it?"

"Yeah, we did it." He gave me a high five and the wheels decided it was time to roll back, taking me along.

"Woah," he chuckled, grabbing my hands. "Easy there." He pulled me in, and I skated into his chest.

"This helmet looks good on you." He smiled, brushing a few strands of hair off my face before placing his hands back on my waist.

I looked up at his face with a smile and locked my gaze with those light brown eyes, inherited from his dad.

The fact that we were close and his hands were still around me, didn't bother me anymore and that was odd.

And then, he flipped his small smile into a smirk.

"You look like Bob the builder." He chuckled and I rolled my eyes.

"That's you." I threw my arm around his neck and used the other one to pull out the shoes. "How is it that you're not swaying a bit?"

"Like I said, I'm very talented." He smirked, helping me with the helmet.

"I feel free." I sighed, once I was out of  skating shoes.

"It was fun watching you skate." He smirked, "You know, like you watching me bake."

"Oh, so that's the thing, huh?" I threw my helmet at him and he smiled, taking out his. The usual perfect hair was now all messy and it was quite a pretty sight.

"That's our next mission." He pointed at a skateboard and my smile had an instantaneous death.

"This is insane. You are insane." I muttered as I held onto his arms tightly.

But alas, It did happen.

Since I had a very good balance on wheels, instead of taking another one, I hopped onto Zack's skateboard.

"But it's fun." He whistled arms out like flying.

That statement didn't need any argument. It was.

"Back at home, this is what we do almost every day."

"Skating?" I asked, smiling because I no longer had to keep myself steady. Zack was doing a good job of balancing us and skating on it.

"Nope. Make others do something that only we know. That's how I know this shit." He swayed to take a turn and I gripped his arm tighter. "Dean made us skate every day with him. It was so damn hard. Caleb and I were the last to learn."

"That's oddly satisfying, knowing that you were as pathetic as me." I smiled.

"We were slower than them and yeah, we did fall a hundred times. But I was not as pathetic as you."

I tried turning my face to him and glare but stopped when I almost lost my balance.

I need to learn this.

I let out a deep sigh as I stepped out of the skating board and he let out a chuckle.

"Water?"

"Yes please." I gulped down half of it. Not because I was tired, but to help my afraid heart slower it's beating.

"Great. I just realized it's time for lunch." He said and I choked a bit on my water.

Lunch? How much time did we spend here?

"Lunch?"

"Yup. Pass me that board, I need to give it to that boy." He nodded as I passed him the very piece of board that made me happy and freaked out as well.

I'm sure if I was back in class, hearing those lectures, time would have been crawling. And maybe that's why I was smiling throughout the drive to get lunch.

Instead of stopping at a fancy restaurant or a nice cafe, we just bought some food. It was Zack's idea to eat outside.

"This is a nice place." I smiled, biting my sandwich and he nodded.

"I hope there's no sarcasm in that comment."

"No," I chuckled, looking at him. "This is way better than any restaurant."

I'm a person who finds happiness in silly and tiny things. Maybe that's the reason why I enjoyed sitting under a beautiful oak tree.
 
The sight of perfect blue sky and swaying of branches in the cool strong wind was undeniably relaxing.

"What now?" Zack asked as we finished our lunch. "We have a few more hours till your shift starts."

I nodded, encouraging him to think.

"What about us heading to a movie theatre?" He wiggled his eyebrows and I smiled.

Hell, yeah.

I loved movies. Maybe that's why I had this smile for the entire ride.

We were about to buy some popcorn when I got a call from Sasha, probably because I wasn't at lunch. I was wondering what to say when Zack said he'd attend the call.

I know there's nothing to hide. But I still feel a bit awkward to tell her that I was ditching to hang out with her brother, who has a crush on someone else.

"Catch." He said, throwing the popcorn tub and I smiled as it landed perfectly in my arms.

It was a rom-com movie, which by the way, is my favourite genre. The movie was good, cute one and I really enjoyed it until the main actors realised they're in love.

 It's not the movie's problem though, it's mine. Because when the couple started kissing, kissing and more kissing, I may have felt a bit of that unnamed feeling in my stomach and sat still.

But that wasn't the worst. Almost half of the theatre was occupied by teenagers like us, but not quite like us. Most of them were couples and slowly it turned out into a make-out place.

I should have thought about it before choosing this genre. And for a moment, I felt bad for making Zack feel awkward because I felt him stiffening beside me.

"Look how they make it so simple." He broke the silence after a few minutes. "The guy likes a girl, he asks her out and she immediately says yes."

That made me smile. "Isn't it that simple?"

"No. I mean, maybe. What if the girl already like someone else?"

"Well, there's no problem in trying."

"Sometimes there is. If she never saw him that way, it'd create distance." I saw him shrug in the dark.

"That's a slight possibility. But what movies are you watching? You need to watch more." I chuckled.

"Maybe."

Then it struck me. Maybe he was referring to himself. Was he oblivious to the fact that Rosaline likes him too?

I felt guilty for not telling him. If I say what I know, It'd be easier for him. But despite being guilty, I said nothing. I just immersed myself in the movie.

I'm a bad friend.

I was out of my movie trance once the lights were back. And that's when I realised my head was peacefully resting on his shoulder.

"That was a good one." He smiled.

"Yeah. It was." I don't know if we're referring to the same thing.

"Hmm, it's almost time for you to take care of April." He hummed, getting into his car.

I smiled. He knew my routine better than me.

"It is."

A smile was plastered on my face for so long that it hurt.

He said bye and quickly drove back to pick Sasha. And I spent rest of the day playing with April, working with Jake and finally returned home.

But I still had that smile on my face.

*****************

🎶 All alone I watch you watch her,
Like she's the only thing you've ever seen.
     How is it you never notice
That you are slowly killing me! 🎶

💕💕💕

That's what kept playing in my mind today😇

Well, just realised that this chapter was all about boys😌

And hey everyone, thanks a lot for reading 😍

Stay happy! 💜