•••
A week has passed.
I haven't spilled the beans yet.
I honestly can't stop thinking about last week. Shawn's so grown now. He grew extremely tall. His braces are GONE. Puberty hit him harder than a wrecking ball. Literally. And he's still as sweet as a pie. He's always have. Sparks tingled inside of me, right when I opened that front door. It was so shocking to see him again, after years of him not seeing Shawn.
So, Shawn is moving back to the wonderful city of San Francisco, which means he finally gets to be with Lauren every single day of his life. Or every weekday. Not so sure about weekends, unless they can go mingle on Saturday and Sunday nights.
***
It is currently brunch, and I am starving. I haven't eaten breakfast, because I was too lazy to make my own meal at home. My mother now makes me create my own lunches since I'm now a more "responsible" person, which is so untrue.
Anyways, my best friend Nick was kind enough to lend me his apple. So glad I'm not starving to death anymore.
"So, I heard Shawn is coming back. I don't know when he's coming back to the school, but I know that he's moving back to the city. How do you feel about him moving back in?" Nick questions, as he eats his extra apple he packed for lunch.
"Uh, well, I'm glad he's coming back. I actually saw him last week," I slightly grinned. Nick raised an eyebrow, with a confused look. "You guys saw each other last week, as in you guys being a... 'Thing'?"
I face palm myself. ...This boy. "No, Nick, no. Really?" I shook my head in disbelief. Is this kid joking, or...
"Sorry! I didn't know. I know what you mean now, really. That's cool you got to see him again after years of him being in a different city a couple hours away." Well, the uncool part was hearing about his "oh so fantastic" relationship with problematic Laur. I'm sorry, I'm not extremely rude, I promise you.
"Yeah, it was. Oh, also, him and Laur are a thing now by the way," I raised my eyebrows and gave out a slight grin. I cringe every time I mention them both in a sentence.
Nick raises an eyebrow. "Really? Wow, they probably won't last long." He chuckled. I one hundred percent agree with his statement.
"Okay, I bought you a muffin, you're welcome," Leah says, as she walks towards the both of us. "Thank you!" I grab the muffin. "It smells so freaking good. Damn." I absolutely love muffins. Specifically chocolate chip. Buy me tons of them, and I'll love you forever.
***
So, today, after school, I have to help Shawn and his family out to move in some more furniture into their new home. They started moving in two days ago, and they're already almost done. Help is very well needed.
Pretty sick knowing that Shawn's neighbor is Nick, my best friend.
"Hey, mind if I help moving stuff in at Shawn's new house after school?" Leah asks.
"I don't mind at all! I'm pretty sure they won't mind. His family is lovely," I smiled to myself. Shawn's family is the best. Whenever his family would come over for dinner whenever my mom cooks, they would always be so sweet and generous. Especially his mom.
"Dude... Look... Shawn's already back," Nick looks over towards the cafeteria, hugging each and every one of his friends. Brian, Matt, and Lyall. So happy seeing him reunite with his best friends.
I'm not close to any of them, except for
Brian. He's probably one of Ian's most goofiest friends, but I guess I can tolerate him.
Leah places her hand on her cheek, as she gasps. "Oh my gosh!"
"Please don't tell me you think he's cute," Nick rolls his eyes and shakes his head.
"Oh, he's a cutie," Leah affirms confidently.
"Speaking of cutie..." Nick looks ahead of us. "Here comes the cutie himself."
I turn around, and there I see, Shawn walking towards us. Yikes.
"Mal! Hey!" Shawn happily says as he hugs me tightly. "It honestly feels so good to be back."
"I'm glad!..." I grinned joyfully. It's enjoyable to see him this happy. It's a good thing though.
Then, with my very own eyes, a girl slightly shorter than him wraps her arms around his waist. Laur. "Hey, babe, I got your muffin," She slightly laughs and then let's go of his waist. "Babe", I see. "Oh, hey guys," Lauren gives us all happy grins. I fake a smile, and go with the flow. "Thanks, you can give it to me later," Shawn smiles and rubs her back. Right now, I'm currently rolling my eyes, in the inside of me.
I feel Nick secretly hitting my side, to get my attention. He rolls his eyes and shakes his head. I feel you Nick, I seriously do.
"SO, uh, I'll see you later after school? Leah will help you and your family out as well, if you don't mind," I interrupted Shawn and Lauren's romantic moment. I shouldn't have done that, whoops.
"Yeah! I'll see you later. And I don't mind, she can definitely help," Shawn smiles as he puts his arm around Laur's shoulder, and then leaves us.
A few seconds after they left, Leah spoke right away. "UGH, I was so close to pulling that girl's hair.." She shakes her head and squints her eyes, while looking at Lauren. "Hey, Leah, don't be too violent. She may have done a whole lot of extremely horrible things to us b-"
Leah interrupts. "She MADE fun of me when I got surgery for my back, and she created a rumor saying I had an affair with one of the teachers! Do you seriously think I'd get over that?"
"N-no... Of course not. I'm just saying don't be too violent when it comes to Laur. I know she deserves to be punished, due to the rude comments she has made that referred to us, but still."
Lauren was a very horrible person back then. But she changed a bit, but she's still problematic, and fake. Just not as much as a few years back. The only reason why Shawn never found out about her was because he was in a whole different city when she became a such evil, cruel person.
"Hey guys, don't worry, you guys won't ever go through the shit she brought you two in ever again. You two are incredible people and I'm glad you guys are my friends," Nick admits, happily.
I love Nick, as a friend. He's so sweet and kind like Shawn. He's the only guy best friend I have.
***
After school, Leah and I went to Shawn's new home to help him and his family to move in furniture and help sort things out a bit.
"Hey, I'm glad you guys are here!" Shawn grins and gives us both side hugs.
"So, what do you guys need help with?" I asked, as I sat on the stairway that was in front of the garage door.
"Well," Shawn begins to speak. "My dad's getting the moving truck, which'll be arriving pretty soon. There's stuff in there that's gonna need a lot of hand use to carry in the house." I nod my head in agreement.
Everything was going perfectly fine, until Leah had to ask one stupid question. "So, Shawn, how's Lauren?"
Is this woman out of her mind?
"Lauren? She's great, honestly. We're going out tonight," Shawn grinned and folded his arms. I look at Leah and give her the death stare.
"What the hell?" I mouth.
"Sorry," she mouths back.
"Anyways, so Mal, any boys in your life, in particular?" Shawn questioned, randomly. Yeah, his name is Justin Drew Bieber.
"No, not necessarily. But, there's this guy that I may or may not be catching feelings for. It sucks to catch feelings. You know what I mean?" I look up at him, and he nods. "I 100% agree with you. Catching feelings sucks, honestly." Yeah, for you, it does.
"And... Who exactly is this boy?" Leah straight up asks. What is up with this girl...
"Uh... I-I'd rather keep this to myself," I slowly spoke. I'm not telling her how I feel about Shawn, just yet.
"Well, whoever that guy is, I'm pretty sure he'll love you. You're really sweet and kind, and he'd be lucky," Shawn states. 'Really sweet and kind' eh? I think not. I laughed, as I shook my head. "No, you're totally wrong, but thank you."
"Oh, shut up," Leah rolls her eyes. "Says the person who has never been rude to one single person." Shawn laughs as his wonderful wide smile shows. I love it.
"By the way, Ian will be on his way soon. He promised Rayah he'd take her out on a Starbucks date. Those two love birds," I rolled my eyes and shook my head. So surprised someone actually likes my brother.
"Hey, um, guys... I'll be right back. I have to go take a bathroom break," Leah spoke. "Do you want me to show you where the bathroom is?"
"Uhh, no thanks, I'm fine. I'll find it myself," Leah says, as she gets up and heads inside the half empty house. "WOW this is hella nice!" I can hear her yell out loud. Shawn and I both laugh, as I shake my head. "Leah's a bit of a weirdo, sorry."
"That's totally fine, you know I'm pretty weird too," He chuckled and smiled. "Yeah, I know, very weird," I laughed. Shawn's extremely shy when you first meet him. But, once you get to know him more and more throughout being friends with him, you guys will get comfortable with each other. And you get to see his inner weirdness.
"You know, my butt hearts from sitting on these stairs, I'm just gonna get up for a sec and grab my phone," I laughed and stood up. As I walked towards my phone, I tripped on something, and fell.
On Shawn.
I fell on Shawn, as he held both my arms. He stares right into my soul and tried to hold in his smile for a couple of seconds, and after that, I quickly spoke. "I am so so so, sorry... Oh my god," I chuckled and quickly got up. "Need a hand?" I put my hand out and pulled Shawn up from the ground. "Thank you, and it's totally fine, no worries," Shawn spoke, as he wiped his sweaty hands on his pants.
"What just happened?..." I hear Leah ask, in the background. I immediately turned around. Leah must've saw everything.
"Uh, I accidentally fell on him," I laughed, in an awkward tone. It was funny, but when you think about it deeply, it just makes things awkward between the both of you. If you know what I mean.
"Oh, are you guys okay?" She questions, and chuckles.
"Yeah! Totally..." I said enthusiastically. "Yeah, I'm fine, my butt hurts, but I'm fine," Shawn chuckles. "I'm sorry again," I apologized for like the thousandth time. "It's okay! No worries," Shawn replied.
"Hey! I see the truck. We should start helping now," Leah walks outside the garage and starts to help out.
Today has just been completely awkward. I can't believe I fell on Shawn. So embarrassing.
***
The rest of the day has been extremely awkward for me. I feel as if I can't even say a word to Shawn anymore, after what happened. I can't even stop thinking about it. Now I'll have a possibility of getting nightmares about this.
"Are you okay? You've been quiet the whole time we were helping out Shawn and his parents," I hear Ian speak, as he walks into my room. I quickly nod my head. "Y-yeah, I'm fine. I just have a headache," I lied.
"Oh, okay. Well mom made dinner, so come on downstairs so we can all eat," Ian gives out a grin and leaves.
I groan onto my pillow, in a stressful way. Why did I have to fall on Shawn, why...
I jog downstairs, and head towards the kitchen. "Hey mom," I smiled and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Hey sweetie, how was helping Shawn and his parents out?" She questioned. Oh, it was wonderful. Speaking of wonderful, I fell on Shawn! Their very own lovely son.
"Oh! It was fun and quite tiring. But we all enjoyed helping," I nodded my head and smiled while I twirl my spaghetti with around with my fork.
"You know, Shawn is so big now... The last time I saw him he was your height! Or even taller. But he's really tall and handsome too! He even has a girlfriend," My mom says, in a very shocking way.
"Mhm..." I mumbled.
"Well, that's my best friend!" Ian spoke happily and confidently. Both Ian and Shawn are friendship goals, honestly. They've been best friends for years. And even when Shawn moved, they still kept in touch. They're such close friends and I just love it. It makes me happy.
***
"Nick, can you pass me my backpack please, I have to get something in my bag," I asked, as I munched on my muffin. Nick grabbed my bag, and handed it to me. "Hey... Why does Shawn always give you glares every so often now...?" He confusingly questions, as he looks towards Shawn's direction. He's currently chatting with Brian and his group of other friends.
"Does he, really?" I squinted my eyes.
"Well, yeah, he's constantly looking this way whenever you're not looking."
"Well something happened yesterday... Maybe he's not over the fact I made him fall on his ass," I admitted.
"You what?!" Nick shockingly asks.
"I fell on him... I tripped on some rock or whatever and fell on Shawn - Hey, let's not talk about this, okay? I don't wanna get a whole lot of chills by just thinking about it."
"That's insane. Did he do anything else rather than fall on his ass, in particular? Like you know... Lean in a little closer towards your face?" He questioned, as he smirked.
"Oh shut up! Jesus Christ Nick..." I rolled my eyes in disgust, shook my head, and looked down at my lovely warm muffin. Before I can speak again, Nick clears his throat really loud and taps my shoulder. "Wha-oh," I looked up to see Shawn right in front of me.
"Hey, Shawn!..." I spoke with enthusiasm.
"Hey Mal," he grinned. "Do you mind if we talk for a bit?" He questions.
I gulped. Oh, please don't talk about yesterday, please.
"No! No, not at all," I stuttered a bit, and stood up from the bench.
This'll be tremendously awkward.
•••