Its gay idk what else to say

Chapter 4, Claire POV

Authors note: Sorry this one came out late, I think I'm going to spend 2 days per chapter or more because when I did that for this one it ended up a lot better. I apologize in advance.

As soon as she hung up I ran to my bed and screamed into my pillow, blushing as red as a tomato. I have no idea what I was doing still gushing over her after what she had said but I couldn't help it, she was too cute. I lay in bed thinking about my dilemma for a while before deciding to head to sleep, after all, I had school tomorrow. The second I closed my eyes, I fell asleep almost immediately. I was woken up the next day by my dog licking my face, not the most reliable alarm clock, but I preferred it. I jumped out of bed and put on some clothes, getting ready for school. I rush out and greet my friends at the bus stop. As the bus pulled up we were already talking about random nonsense. The bus ride to school was full of more lively chatter and banter alike. When we finally got there we said goodbye as we each went to our own classes. I ran down the hallway to my locker and grabbed my art supplies. As I sprint down to the art room to get there before the bell rings, I run straight into someone, knocking us both down. As I looked up, still dazed from the impact, I see a familiar face, it's Lily. "Oh my god, I'm so so sorry!" I say, frantically trying to help her gather her stuff, my face quickly turning a scarlet red. "It's whatever." She mumbles as she grabs the rest of her stuff, leaving me alone with my pencils scattered all over the floor. As I gather the last of my pencils, the bell rings. I'm late.

As I get scolded by Mrs. Coleman for being late again I glance over at Lily to see her turned away from me. Why did she leave me alone to pick my stuff up? From what I could tell we had gotten over what happened last class. After getting the usual lecture from the teacher I rush to the seat next to Lily. "What happened back there? You left me all alone." I said jokingly. "I'm sorry." She quickly mumbles. "Let's just get started on the project." She says without missing a beat. We quickly arrange our materials and start brainstorming. We just sit there talking about ideas, and surprisingly we make a pretty good team. We talk about backgrounds, colors to use, and how large the canvas will be. We eventually decide on making a portfolio of landscape paintings with abstract colors. I constantly try to crack jokes, but she never even breaks a smile. Is she still mad from before? I thought we had made up since then. Nevertheless we continue working on our project without any form of an argument. As the minutes fly by we keep working on the project and I find myself staring at her more and more and noticing so many tiny things. How she twirls her hair nearly all the time, how she always rests her head on her arms when she has nothing to do, how she always stares around the room absentmindedly with eyes that would soften even the hardest of hearts. She turns over and I stare into her eyes mesmerized for a good few seconds until she snaps in my face. "Did you even hear what I was saying?" She asks. "What- I uh." I stammer out breaking out of my trance. "I swear to god you're hopeless." She groans. "I was asking if you wanted to go to the park to look at scenery for inspiration." She asks packing up her stuff as class is about to end. "Like, just us, by ourselves?" I ask taken by surprise. "Yes just us, why would we need anyone else there?" She says. It takes her a few seconds to realize why I was asking, and then it dawns on her. Her face flashes red and she storms off out of class leaving me to clean everything. I quickly put away all our materials and apologize to Mrs. Coleman for being late again. I head out of class in a daze, wondering how Lily was going to react.

The rest of the day was pretty boring with nothing really out of the ordinary happening except a fight at lunch. As the final bell rang, I grabbed my things and headed out to the bus. As I was getting on I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. It was a text from Lily. "Meet me at the park at 5:30 pm today, don't get any ideas." A beam shot across my face, I was deliriously happy at this turn of events. As soon as the bus arrived at my house, I darted into my room and put on a change of clothes. This time actually thinking about what I was wearing. I settled on some jeans, a black tee and a flannel jacket over it. I say bye to my mom as I rush out the door and drive to the park. It's a long ride so I make it only 5 minutes early, I play on my phone as I wait for Lily to arrive. A long time passes and she's still not here, I look at my phone and see it's 5:15. I never saw Lily as one to be late but I decided to wait a few more minutes. 

At 5:30 I'm about to call her when I see someone enter the park, it's Lily. I wave over to her and she walks my way. "What took you so long?" I ask. "I don't have a car so I had to walk all the way here." She explains nonchalantly. "I could have driven you here you know, you just had to ask." I tell her, wondering how she manged to walked that long. "Yeah well..." She says as her voice trails off. "Whatever, let's just focus on our project now." I say. She nods and points over to a tree on a tall hill. "There's a really nice view from that tree lets go check it out." She says. As we walk up the rocky hill I start to feel my foot slip on some loose pebbles. I lose my balance and start to fell when I feel a hand wrap around my waist, Lily pulls me up to her and immediately lets go of me. "Thanks for that save, I would have gotten hurt if you didn't do that." I say, panting, I hoped at this point she would say something instead of incoherent mumbling but to my dismay, I didn't understand a word of what came out of her mouth.

As soon as we reach the top, my jaw drops, it's gorgeous. You can see a huge lake for what looks like miles. "It's so pretty." I say, mesmerized. "Yeah, it really is." She whispers, it seems like even Lily was impressed by this. For a while we forget all about the project and we just sit there taking the view in. Eventually we get to work. I take notes of all the ideas I have and Lily takes some pictures with her phone. "Do you come here often?" I ask her. "Yeah, whenever I'm feeling down I'll just sit here for a while to take my mind off things." She answers to my surprise. "I can see why, it's really pretty." I tell her in return. We stay there for a few hours just working and talking. 

At first its just me talking about my dog and what I do for fun but eventually she says something that surprises me. "I come here a lot whenever I'm feeling lonely." I turn around and face her. "Don't you have any friends you could talk to?" I asked. "Not really, the only ones I have I'm not really close with." She says looking off into the distance. "Why not? You're a really great person." I say before realizing my mistake. "I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to-" I quickly spit out before she gets mad. "It's OK, I know what you meant." She says. "I guess I just never really tried to make any friends before." She explains. We both sit there in an uncomfortable silence until I look at my phone and realize it's late. "I should be heading home soon, my mom wants me back for dinner." I say. We pack up our stuff and head down the hill. Just as she's about to go home I stop her. "I could drive you home if you wanted, it's a long walk back." I expect her to get mad and refuse but in line with the rest of today she surprises me. "If you're OK with it then sure." She replies

We get into the car and Lily puts in her seat belt, she tells me her address and I drive off. The rest of the car ride is full of silence but that's OK, I had more fun talking to her today than I expected to. We pull up to her house and she gets out saying goodbye. Before she walks to her door she turns back and knocks on the door. I roll the window down and she pokes her head in. "That was fun, thanks for being chill about everything." She says. "No problem." I reply, not knowing what else to say. I make sure she gets into her house alright and I drive back to my house. As soon as I get there my mom asks me for help with dinner. After an hour of cooking and eating I head back to my room exhausted. I lay in bed for a while before checking my phone to see I have a text notification. I unlock it already knowing who it's from. Lily had texted me a photo, it's a picture of me looking into the sunset. I don't remember her taking it but that was probably since I was busy taking notes. "You looked nice in here, I thought you could use it for a profile picture or something." The message said. I smile, happy that she thought of me like that. "Thanks, I'll use it for sure!" I reply before turning my phone off. I lay in bed with a wide grin on my face thinking about Lily, unable to sleep. Maybe things between us would turn out fine after all.