The Spill Over

[40] Cottonwood Fallin'.

"They're not dating, Di," Jayden grinned. "Not yet, at least."

Diana laughed. "Let's drop the topic, Jayden, since both of them are getting embarrassed," she joked.

"Thanks," Zac muttered. He sat quietly as he glanced at Ashley and wondered if he should ask her out. After all, it was pretty obvious she was into him too.

∞∞∞

Twenty minutes later, Ashley and Zac found themselves alone again. The two of them, along with Jayden and Diana had decided to head towards the common room and within five minutes of having reached there, Diana and Jayden decided that they wanted to go out and get some air, after which they left the common room, leaving Zac and Ashley alone, with each other.

"Try one of their numbers again, Ash," Zac suggested. He was almost worried to death, trying too figure out where might two of his best friends be.

"Yeah," Ashley sighed as she pulled her phone out of her pocket, went to the latest calls list and found Gabriella's number right at the top. Exhaling loudly, she clicked on the dial button.

"Where are you?" Ashley screamed into the phone a few moments later, as soon as Gabriella picked up the phone.

Zac's head snapped to look at her, with relief evident on his face.

"I uh . . . I'm with Sean," Gabriella replied nervously from the other end.

"Where?" Ashley asked, beginning to get impatient and if possible, even more annoyed.

"Wait, let me talk," Zac muttered as he grabbed the phone from Ashley's grasp. "Gab? Is Sean with you?"

"Yeah . . ."

"Well," Zac sighed impatiently. "Where?"

Ashley watched Zac's face, waiting for his reaction. She frowned as Zac's mouth dropped open and unattractively, stayed that way.

"Oh my god . . ." he trailed off as his eyes met those of Ashley.

It had been a little over half an hour after the phone call had been made. Ashley kept asking Zac to tell her what was it that had got him so shocked, but he wouldn't tell."

"You'll know for yourself," he repeated as Ashley asked him, yet again.

The brunette sighed as she slumped onto Zac's side. 'Always the same old reply,' she thought.

"Heath's coming this side and by the looks of it, he wants to probably talk to you," Zac commented a few minutes later.

Ashley nodded as she sat up. "Zac, how are things with Heath? I mean, he thinks you were my date to homecoming, for real and apparently, he had a thing for me . . ." she trailed off unsurely.

"He doesn't hate you, if that's what you wanna know. Hey, man," Zac said with a smile as he stood up. "I'll leave you two alone now," he added as he tiredly ran a hand through his already messed up hair. "See you guys."

Once Zac left, Heath turned to look at Ashley.

"I'm sorry I'd been behaving like such a prick," he blurted out. "I was pathetic the past few days."

Ashley cocked her head. "You weren't rude or anything, Heath, you weren't behaving like a prick. In fact, you just ignored me, that's it . . ."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that," he apologized. "I just realized that the feelings I had for you . . . it was just an infatuation, Ash, a very tiny crush."

Ashley heaved a mental sigh of relief. "So, does that mean that you're not going to ignore me anymore?" she asked teasingly.

"I won't," Heath promised. "Is Jade okay with you?"