Oliver Loves Carson | ✔️

chapter one

The boy shrugged. "Yeah, sure, okay. What about you guys, do you want anything?"

It was just Oliver's luck that everybody in their stupid fucking friend group--with the exception of Carson, who had just shrugged--had wanted ice cream. The annoying girl skipped over to the truck and walked over to the side of it, knocking on the glass. Her friends were close behind. "Hello?" she chirped.

Oliver deadpanned, taking a deep breath and wishing for death. He stood up, annoyance embedded in every fiber of his tense frame. His lungs constricted, a lump forming in his throat. He walked over to the window and slid it open. "How may I help you?" he asked, his voice steady and devoid of emotion.

If there was anything that Oliver was good at, it was being an asshole, no matter the feelings stirring in his chest.

The girl's friends had all crowded around the window. Luckily, Carson was looking at his phone. The girl smiled cheerily. Oliver hated her. "Yeah! Can I have a chocolate chip ice cream sandwich?"

Oliver sighed, eyes darting nervously to the faces of all of the strangers. His palms began to sweat. "I would say no, but it's my job, so whatever," he drawled in the same steady tone that masked his nervousness. The other girl snickered. "Anyone else?"

"Hey, do I know you?" Oliver froze. His eyes were wide and blue, and for once, an emotion appeared on his face--horror. The voice was Carson--who was coincidentally the last person Oliver had wanted to talk to. Oliver tilted his head forward, letting his messy, curly black hair hide a portion of his face. "Weren't you in one of my classes or something?" Carson asked. He gave Oliver a once over, and stared at him, his head cocked to the side adorably, his hair falling into his eyes.

Yes, yes he was. He was in Carson's AP Chemistry class last year. He sat exactly two rows behind him. Oliver could tell you exactly what Carson was wearing on the last day of school, but he couldn't tell you anything that he'd learned in that class. He had barely managed to pass with a decent grade, and he had gotten hell for it from his parents.

But honestly, they couldn't expect him to pay attention to chemistry when the only chemistry that was occurring were all the love hormones that were being released in his brain every time he looked at Carson.

Shit, was that chemistry?

It didn't matter. It would never matter; Carson didn't know who Oliver was. Carson was on the swim team--and a hell of a good swimmer. He was so good, in fact, that he got put on the varsity team as a sophomore. The word was that he was aiming to get assigned team captain this year as a junior, and Oliver had no doubt that he would. He was intelligent, funny and kind and-

Oliver was none of these things.

He wasn't funny--his humor consisted of sarcastic remarks that most people take offense to. He wasn't athletic--instead, he played guitar when he was bored, and liked watching dumb cartoons like Tom and Jerry. People had told him he was smart before, but he wasn't smart enough to be considered smart--maybe above average at best. And he was nowhere near kind.

Oliver had no idea how Carson had recognized him, but his palms tingled with nerves, blood pounding in his ears. "Uh, no, no I don't think I've ever seen you before in my life." he lied. "Anyone else want ice cream?" Oliver did his best to change the topic, hoping to distract Carson from talking to him again, lest he says something incredibly idiotic.

Oliver noticed how his detached tone had suddenly turned nervous, a slight tremor taking over. Fucking hell. One look at Carson freaking Katsaros and Oliver was a mess. If he had to stand here any longer, he would become even more of a blubbering, dumb disaster.