Chapter 10: Race

I jog down the stairs and run smack into my dad, who has his eyebrows raised.

"Going somewhere?"

"Dad," I sigh. "You ask me that every year."

And? his face screams.

I fight against the urge to roll my eyes and sigh instead. "I'm going to that theme park with Gabs and Gracie. Like I do every year."

After I changed, I came back out from the bathroom to find Aaron gone; I'm assuming he went back to his own house because if he stayed in my room—or he's still in there—that's a little creepy.

"Ah." He nods his head. "And you're not going to be hanging around boys, right?"

"I mean, I guess not."

He shrugs and steps aside. "Carry on."

I snort. "You're so ridiculous."

He lets out a booming laugh as he climbs up the stairs. "Remember you have school tomorrow!" His footsteps sound above me before they stop, and I'm guessing that he's in his and Mom's room.

I walk out my front door and close it behind me, closing it, before jogging down the porch steps.

"Cassie!"

I sigh and turn my head to my right to see Aaron running down his front steps.

I walk down my walkway, stopping at the end of it, and turn towards Aaron, who has made his way over to stand in front of me.

"Yes?" I say with my eyebrows raised.

"Where are you going?"

"Somewhere."

"Yeah, I figured," he says. "Does it have a name?"

"Yeah."

He stares at me and I stare back.

"Are you going to tell me?"

"Well you never asked," I say defensively.

He rolls his eyes.

"I'm going to a theme park with Gracie and Gabs."

"What?"

"A theme park," I say slowly. "You do know what those are, right?"

Another eye roll.

I think I get why he likes to annoy me; it's actually kind of hilarious.

"Yes, Cassie, I know what a theme park is. I meant which one."

I shrug. "I don't know. A theme park is a theme park."

"Can I come with you?"

"No," I respond automatically, and then I do a double take. "What? No."

He pouts. "Come on, Cassie. Cole and Adrian and I were looking for something to do, just let us come with you."

I tear my eyes off his pouted lips and focus on his green orbs. "Nope."

His pout deepens or gets bigger or whatever. God, I can't think when he does that.

"Please? Pretty please?"

I close my eyes to avoid looking at his lips and I feel him take a step closer to me. I can feel the warmth oozing off of his body and his breath hitting my face.

"Please, Cassie?" he whispers.

My resolve crumbles. Damn him. "Fine," I mutter under my breath.

"What?"

"I said okay!" I yell, opening my eyes to glare at him and his stupid face with his stupid lips

His eyes light up. "Really?"

"Ask again and I'll change my mind, jackass."

Using a pretty face to influence my decisions. What kind of person is he? I hate him.

"No you don't, Cassie."

"I don't what?" I say, confused.

"Hate me."

My eyes widen. "What?"

Did I say that out loud?

He smirks at me. "Yes, you said that out loud."

Fuck.

"When are you guys leaving?"

"Now."

"Now?"

"As soon as I get to Gracie's house, we're leaving."

"That's not going to be enough time for Cole and Adrian to get here."

"Sounds like a you problem," I say as I shrug.

I shrug a lot around this boy; I think I have a problem.

He's silent, thinking. About what, I don't know.

All of a sudden, his eyes light up and a smirk grows on his face.

And then he picks me up.

He wraps his hands around my waist, ignoring my shrieks, and throws me over his shoulder.

"What am I," I say as I hit his back repeatedly. "A sack of potatoes?"

I can feel the vibration of his laugh. He has a nice laugh.

"Why, thank you, Cassie, I always knew you liked my laugh."

I groan in embarrassment. My mouth needs to stay closed.

He laughs again and turns around to start walking.

I look around, confused, and see that he's walking away from my house.

"What are you doing? Are you kidnapping me?"

"Yep," he says with no hesitation. "We're going to wait in my house until Cole and Adrian get here, and then we'll leave."

"This was a terrible idea," I groan, my body bouncing against his shoulder as he walks. "I don't want your friends corrupting mine."

"They're not going to corrupt your innocent friends, Cassie, don't worry," he says through a laugh.

"I'm worrying," I say grumpily, slumping against his shoulder and back like Princess Fiona in Shrek.

He bounds up his front steps and I hear the door open.

He starts to run up his stairs, and my head bounces against his back.

"Ow," I groan. "Slow the fuck down."

He chuckles. "Oops."

"Yeah, oops, asshole."

He laughs again, but starts to walk slowly up his stairs, and I feel the extreme caution he's taking to make me bounce as little as possible.

We enter what I think is his bedroom, and he closes the door behind us.

Suddenly, I'm thrown off his shoulder and tossed on to a bed, and I shriek in surprise.

He snorts, and I struggle to catch my breath.

"You're such a douchebag."

"Ooh, a new one. Nice, Cassie."

I roll my eyes, even though he's not looking at me; he's looking down at his phone and typing, probably telling Cole and Adrian to come over.

I sit up and look around his room.

Sitting here, actually in his room, I realize that one thought about what his room would look like and what he would have in it.

It's different than I thought it would be.

I admit I went with the stereotypical guy room, blue, messy, lots of...dude things. I wasn't completely wrong, but I was still wrong.

There are still some clothes and papers thrown randomly on the floor, but the walls are the same shade of white as mine.

His wood floors are a little darker than mine, but I still like the room.

He has a desk next to the window, like in my room, with a laptop on it, and an Xbox hooked up to his TV.

"I like your room," I say.

"Yeah," he smirks. "Didn't think you'd be seeing it this early in our friendship, but..." He shrugs.

I roll my eyes and he laughs.

He flops down on his bed, his back landing on it, causing the both of us to bounce.

I lay down on my back too and stare up at his ceiling.

His ceiling is almost the same color as his walls, and there are raised bumps on it.

Like, it's not broken or anything, but it looks like it has a texture, and if you stare hard enough or squint you can make out shapes, like when you look at the clouds.

I'm looking at what seems to be Ariel from The Little Mermaid.

"See that?" I say, pointing towards her

"See what?" Aaron asks, following my finger.

"That's Ariel. That's her fish friend, Flounder," I move my hand to point at a shape near Ariel. "That's Sebastian," I say, moving my hand to point somewhere else. " That's Prince Eric, that's Ursula, that's King Trident." I point to each of them in turn. "And that," I say grandly. "Is the stupid seagull that Ariel likes to talk to."

Aaron busts out laughing and I smile, happy to hear it. "Really, Cassie? You know every name except that one?"

"What?" I say, laughing.

I feel him shake his head, still laughing. "You're crazy."

"I used to ship them so hard."

"Who?"

"Sebastian and the seagull."

"I swear you say the craziest shit."

"I'm serious," I say, pretending to be offended by his words when, really, I'm happy that he pays attention to what I say. "Did you see that part when Ariel went to talk to the seagull and Sebastian found them? Their interaction and bantering was hilarious."

"And you shipped them when you were, what, twelve?"

My cheeks heat up and I stay silent.

"Cassie?"

Nope. Not telling him.

"Oh, sorry, were you fifteen when you last watched it and came up with this theory?"

"I mean, I came up with the theory when I was fifteen."

I wasn't born when the movie came out on DVD, but my parents bought it and I've watched it for as long as I can remember.

I practically grew up on Disney movies.

I just can never remember that damn seagull's name.

"When you came up with the theory when you were fifteen, but you didn't last watch it when you were fifteen?" I know he had his eyebrows furrowed even though I'm not looking at him.

That puts an idea in my head, and I turn to catch a glimpse of his thinking face.

Honestly, it's the cutest thing I've ever seen.

His eyebrows, obviously, are furrowed, and he's biting the inside of his cheek, gnawing gently.

His eyes remain trained on the ceiling, a thoughtful look in them.

He turns to me and smiles softly once he sees my eyes on him. "You watched it two years ago?" he asks.

My eyes fall to his lips, his warm-looking, soft-looking, entirely kissable-looking lips, and I shake my head softly after a second of delay.

His head inches closer to mine, so close that I can feel his warm breath blowing on my face.

Butterflies erupt in my stomach and a heat rushes through me, making me feel like the temperature went up by ten thousand degrees in the span of a second.

I haven't gotten butterflies in so long. The last time, I promised myself I wouldn't ever get close to another person that made me feel that way, but now, here with Aaron, it just feels so good, so... so... right.

And that scares the fucking shit out of me.

I let out a shaky breath as his face moves even closer to mine.

"A year ago?"

"No," I say breathlessly, my mind consumed with the need to feel his lips on mine. God, just for five seconds so I can get this out of my system and go back to hating his face.

"When?"

At this my eyes snap to his and the look of adoration and warmth in his eyes making me blurt out the answer to his question against my will. "The day before school started." I close my eyes as the embarrassment speeds in and slams into me like a sixteen-wheeler on an ice covered road.

He moves closer to me before he pauses and starts laughing again, making the embarrassment worsen.

"Five days ago? You watched a Disney movie five days ago, and you're a senior?"

"They're good movies," I say defensively, opening my eyes to glare at him. "Sue me for enjoying them."

His eyes soften and the adoring look is back. "You're weird, Cassie."

I blush. "Shut up," I mutter, getting up from his bed and watching as he does the same.

He hears me and gives a soft chuckle. "But I still like you." He says this softly, but I still hear him, my eyes widening.

He... likes me.

As a friend, right?

Right, brain?

Brain?

Great. The one time I actually need my brain for it's opinion and it has nothing.

I hate myself.

We stare at each other and his eyes travel down my bare legs, my shorts leaving most of my legs exposed, and back up. He takes a step closer to me, a look in his eyes that sends a shiver down my spine.

And then his door bursts open, slamming against his wall.

"Yo, yo, yo, what's up, we got Cole FoShizzle in the hizz-house. We bout to get lit up in he—"

He stops abruptly as he sees me, his eyes widening and his face going pale.

"What is she doing here?"

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, it's nice to see you too, Finny."

He lets out a groan at the name and glares at Aaron. "I don't know why you wanna hang out with her all the time, she's annoying as fuck."

"Hey," I gasp. "That's not true. Right, Aaron?"

I turn to him expectantly. I don't actually expect him to back me up. I'm well aware that I'm annoying; there are times when I want to slap myself.

But he doesn't hesitate with his answer. "Right."

"Dude, what happened to the bro code. You were supposed to take my side." His voice drops to a mutter. "One fucking girl and three years of dudeship thrown out the window."

I have to let out a snort, because that might just be the funniest thing I've ever heard come out of his mouth.

Adrian walks through the open door. "Bro, are we going or not?"

He sees me and doesn't look the slightest bit surprised. "Hey, Cass."

"Hey, Frilly."

"I hear we're going to a theme park."

"Yep."

"Cool."

Cole looks at between us expectantly.

"What?" I ask.

"I'm waiting for you to be mean to him."

I snort and Adrian rolls his eyes.

"He embraces the nickname and isn't a complete dumbass, excuse me if I like him better than you." I say.

"Aw," Adrian laughs. "Thanks, Cass. I like you better than him too."

I make an aww face and put my hand on my chest.

"You can't be serious. I'm supposed to be the favorite," Cole insists.

"It's okay, don't be sad, Finny."

He scowls at me but remains silent. Hey, at least he shut up.

"Well," Aaron says, clapping his hands together. "We should get going, right, Cassie?"

"Sure," I shrug.

We all walk out of his room and the boys stampede down the stairs, me calmly walking behind them.

"Idiots," I mutter, rolling my eyes.

"You know, I'm surprised your eyes haven't gotten stuck like that."

I jump, still halfway up the stairs, and my foot misses a step.

Not again.

I close my eyes and wait to hit the floor.

But I don't.

Honestly, at this point, I'm kind of surprised that I even expected to hit the floor.

I open my eyes to stare into Aaron's green ones.

"I'm also surprised you haven't died yet."

I roll my eyes and untangle myself from his arms.

He reaches up a hand and flicks my nose.

Hard.

"What the fuck?" I scowl, rubbing my throbbing nose.

Jackass.

He shrugs. "I'm taking precautions."

"For what?" I ask, letting my hand drop.

"To make sure your eyes don't get stuck in the back of your head."

I roll my eyes, and yet another flick hits my nose.

"Stop fucking doing that," I growl.

"Stop rolling your eyes and I will."

"If you do it again, I'll carve your eyes out and every time I want to roll my eyes, I'll roll yours instead."

"Cassie," he smirks. "Come on. Be serious. We both know you won't do that."

The weird thing is, I know I won't.

I roll my eyes. "Whatever."

Another flick.

I glare at him and walk towards his front door.

"Finally," Cole exclaims as he jumps up from one of the couches in the living room and comes up behind me.

We all step outside and wait as Aaron locks the door.

As soon as he's done, I turn around and walk down his walkway, passing his car that's sitting in the driveway.

"Where are we going?" Cole and Adrian ask together.

"My friend's house," I answer. "She lives in this neighborhood. We're going to use her mom's van and drive to the park."

The four of us are silent as we walk, but of course that doesn't last long.

"Anybody wanna race me there?" Coke asks, and I discreetly roll my eyes, proud when Aaron doesn't notice.

But also wishing he had.

What is wrong with me?

I promised him. And even though he broke that promise to me—hurting me in the process—I still want to keep my promise to him.

Even if it means staying away from Aaron.

"Yeah, sure."

"Why not?"

The three of them stop walking and stare at me with the same look on each of their faces.

"What?" Their faces don't change. "I'm not going to do it and nothing you say is going to change my mind. I don't run." They stare at me. "What? I don't."

I mean, I don't run anymore. But they don't need to know that.

"Just line up, Cass."

"Nope," I say, shaking my head. "I'm not doing it and that's fina––"

"I'll buy you food. Anything you want," Aaron chimes in, and I stare at him, conflicted.

I do love food.

"Fine."

I walk back and line up.

"But there's a catch, Cassie."

I raise my eyebrows. "Which is?"

"You need to win."

I narrow my eyes at him.

He smirks back at me.

Fine. I can play dirty too.

My inner self rubs her hands together maliciously, letting out an evil chuckle under her breath.

They don't know where Gracie's house is.

I let out a chuckle and Aaron turns his head to look at me suspiciously.

I stare back and make my face look as innocent as possible, letting a smirk back on my face as soon as he looks away.

When I said I didn't run—like I've already previously clarified—I meant I didn't run anymore.

I used to be on the cross-country and track and field team in all of middle school and then in my freshman year.

I got kicked off the team after Christmas break my freshman year.

Oops.

Freshman year was not a good year.

"Get ready..."

I crouch low, stretching my muscles.

They're all most likely faster than me—my pride takes a few hard hits at that—so the only real advantages I have are my ability to run long distances and the fact that I know where we're supposed to be going.

"Get set..."

I enter the runner's position and tense my muscles, ready to push off.

The only way I'm going to win this—and get that food—is if I run as fast as I can, while still maintaining and regulating my breathing and energy.

"Go!"

I push off, hard, and start off at a fast jog.

The three boys pass me, but they're all out sprinting, trying to beat each other.

Idiots.

I can't believe they didn't ask me where the house was; I knew the three of them were dumbasses, but I wasn't expecting them to be this stupid.

I gradually speed up to a sprint, and now I'm keeping pace with them, but still technically a little behind them.

The first spot where we need to turn pops up and, while the three boys keep running straight, I turn left.

"Shit!" The three of them let out the curse simultaneously.

I let out a breathy laugh, my rhythm faltering for a second, before I speed up to a pace slightly faster than my previous one.

The boys have recovered, because I can hear their footsteps thundering behind me.

They pass me once again, but we're approaching the last turn before the straight shoot to Gracie's house.

Adrian and Cole blow past the intersection, but Aaron turns with me, keeping pace.

Damn.

"You good, Cassie?" he says, sounding the tiniest bit out of breath.

I nod, preparing myself for what I'm about to do.

My body is going to hate me.

Gracie's house comes into view, and I push my legs faster, forcing my muscles to cooperate.

As my pace increases, I try and maintain my breathing at a relatively slow rate, but still at one fast enough to make sure I don't collapse from not being able to breathe.

I pass Aaron, who seems surprised by my sudden burst of speed, and listen to his footsteps as he scrambles to adjust.

We reach Gracie's house, and I'm still running fast enough to make it look like I'm going to pass it.

Aaron catches up to me, running alongside me, and at the last possible second, I abruptly turn up Gracie's driveway and knock on her door.

Aaron lets out a string of curses and I hear his footsteps falter and then stop completely.

Gracie opens the door just as I bend over and place my hands on my knees, breathing heavy.

Fucking hell, I'm so out of shape. Guess who's never doing that again.

"Cass?" she says, looking surprised.

"Hey, Gracie," I say, looking up and swallowing before resuming my panting. "You got any water?"

Her gaze lifts behind me, and I assume it's Aaron and Adrian and Cole, as three sets of heavy breathing, not including mine, are coming from behind me.

"Y-yeah," she stutters. "Um, I'll get four glasses right now."

She moves aside and I walk past her, collapsing on her couch.

The three boys walk in almost as soon as I sit down, and they do the same.

Aaron sits next to me, his chest falling and rising rapidly.

"I'm guessing you did track?" he asks.

I nod my head, not able to find the air needing to form words.

He nods his head just as a voice pops up.

"Um...Cass?"

My head looks around until I spot Gabs, sitting on Gracie's loveseat, looking both confused and scared at the same time.

"Yeah?"

"Um...why are...they here?"

I shrug. "Apparently, they're coming with us."

It's kind of my fault because I said they could, but she doesn't need to know that.

Gabs' face flushes and I immediately turn to Cole and Adrian who are smiling and staring at her.

I glare at them, and the smiles fall of their faces.

"Cassie," Aaron says warningly.

I roll my eyes and instantly regret it as another flick hits my nose.

"Asshole," I mutter, rubbing my nose and glaring at Aaron.

"You know you like me, Cassie."

Yeah, I'm starting to, and I really wish I didn't.

---------

I wish I could run, but, alas, that's too much work for me. How tall are you? (I'm five foot and three AND A HALF inches. Don't forget the half of an inch.)

--Rose