The Art of Being a Gentleman

CHAPTER THIRTY

"Honestly from what you've told me about her, she seems cool, and if you like her I think you should go for it."

David's eyes flickered towards Mack for half a second. "Yeah, we'll figure it out. But um, anyway--"

"Alyssa?" Mack questioned around a mouthful of food. "Doesn't she know that you--"

"Oh, hey Mack!" Grace's voice poured happily through the speaker.

"Hi Grace, it's been a while, hey? I'm surprised David didn't tell you about all his stuff with his dream girl. I thought he'd--"

Before David could jump in, Grace was already launching into an explanation, "He did, he did, don't worry. I heard all about Alyssa. But we got on this discussion about making plans for him to come visit again, you know, to make up for the last time, and he was telling me about how when he was here he called this girl that he's only now realizing that he's super into, right? So I was just saying that he should--"

"Grace."

She stopped. "Oh, does Mack not know?"

David blinked, unable to look up. "Well, he probably does now."

Grace giggled a little bit, "Oops. I thought you guys told each other everything. My bad."

Mack's face was twisted up as he started to piece the puzzle together. "Wait, are you saying..."

"Maybe I should go."

"No, Grace, it's fine," David tried to assure her. He didn't want to have to stop talking to her. But mostly he didn't want to have this conversation with Mack right now. He was not mentally or physically prepared.

"Nah, I should go anyway. We'll keep in touch. I'll let you know when a good time to visit will be, alright?"

He sighed. "Alright."

"Love you, Champ."

"Love you, too."

"Buh-bye!"

Click.

There was a quiet moment after the soft beep of the phone disconnecting, and David felt himself start to sweat.

"What's going on, dude?"

He had barely come to terms with his feelings, let alone reached the point of sharing them with anyone. And yeah, maybe he'd had a sort of inkling that he liked the blonde, but a part of him was worried because, well, what if Mack was still into her? He didn't want to stomp on his friends toes like that.

To be fair, Mack had called dibs all that time ago.

Swallowing hard, David lifted his head to look over at his closest friend, and knew that he could never let a girl come between them. No matter how cool that girl was.

But, he needed to be honest. And if Mack was mad, or even took a swing at him, he had to at least let him know how he felt.

"Um," David started, his mouth suddenly very dry. "I..." he didn't know how to say it. Groaning, he ran his fingers through his hair. Never in all his life had he thought he'd be in a position like this. The two of them had always had almost opposite taste in girls, not to mention David had been so caught up on Alyssa that he hadn't really even thought about anyone else. "I guess, I just... I think I might kind of have a little thing for Hannah?"

Mack blinked, "Hannah? Which Hannah?"

"Like, our Hannah."

"Like, our friend Hannah?"

"How many Hannah's do we know that I would refer to as our Hannah?"