A/N- I hope you guys like this chapter!! I would have updated sooner but ugh I've been uber busy. Anyway, this is all unedited so feel free to point out mistakes. I strongly encourage it, actually.
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"And just where do you think you're going?" a hard, familiarly girly voice inquired from somewhere behind me.
I froze in my tracks, tugging on Tinkerbell's leash so that he could stop his advance towards the front door. Then I turned around and latched my eyes onto Mel's form. Her blonde hair was tied up in a messy ponytail that made it stick up all over the place, and her pink sweatpants were partially covered by a plain white t-shirt with crinkles on the sides where her knuckles met with the fabric on her hips.
Mel tended to dress like a total bum whenever she decided not to go to school. Well-unless Robby was coming over. But the last I heard those two were having more problems than the drama queens of Killian High, Raymond Fowler and Scarlett Reynolds.
"Don't give me that motherly look." I scowled. "I'm just taking Tinkerbell out for a walk."
"You hate taking him out for walks," she said, suspicion creeping into her voice. "Why so eager all of a sudden?"
"Why do you care?" I countered, wanting to keep my planned run-in with Gwen under wraps. I hardly got any information on what was going on in her love life, especially now that I stopped listening in on her conversations on the phone (she stopped doing that a while ago after discovering I was being nosy when I accidentally sneezed into the phone call). There were a few instances where I would pass by her bedroom and catch a few muffled words spoken as she talked on her cell phone, but that was about it. And if she wasn't going to share anything with me (not that I particularly wanted to know about she and Robby making out in his car, but still), then I wasn't going to share anything with her.
Mel straightened up and crossed her skinny arms over her chest. "Because that's my dog. And I need to make sure you're not planning on doing anything dangerous with him."
"Aw, man. So I can't take him to a dog fighting match?" I asked, my voice oozing sarcasm. "And he is not your dog. It was our Christmas present, remember? You just got to name him because you got heads in the coin-flipping match. Which, now that I mention it, wasn't even fair because you were like five years old and didn't know how to flip a coin in the first place."
"Fine, but-" Mel started, pulling out a random sheet of paper and pencil from her sweats as if she had been planning this from the get go-"before you embark on this dangerous journey, there are a few important things you need to know about my little baby."
I gritted my teeth. "Oh, for the love of-he's not your baby! And it's just a walk; Tinkerbell will be fine."
"I need someplace flat to write on," Mel declared, apparently ignoring me. She scanned her eyes around the empty foyer for what I assumed was a table or some sort of furniture.
"How about your chest?" I suggested sourly.
Mel's mouth popped open, her blue eyes widening. She looked like she was either about to cry hysterically or cuss me out, and I tried unsuccessfully to stifle the triumphant smile that spread across my lips. But then her mouth closed, and her eyes shrunk, and when she spoke it was in a surprisingly subdued voice. "Wow. Not going to lie here-that was actually a good one."
I couldn't help but smirk. "I know, right? It just came to me. Like a message from God, or something."
"Huh."
"Yeah."
For a moment Mel and I stood there beneath a spell of silence.
"Anywayyy," I dragged out. "Yeah. Um. I'm gonna go take my dog for a walk now. See ya."
I turned to the door just as Mel called, "Derek, wait!" My hands grasped the doorknob because Derek was not going to wait any longer-he had a crush to "coincidentally" ambush at the dog park and he was wasting precious time.
But just as I was about to turn the knob, I peered out the oval glass window on the wooden door and witnessed a large black truck with monstrous wheels pull up into the driveway, its polished rims blinding me as the Sun struck them from overhead.
I recognized the vehicle instantly. I had always joked to Mel that boys who had small wieners liked big cars to make up for what they didn't have, which meant that her boyfriend's man parts were pretty much nonexistent.
"Oh, Robby's here!" I announced with feigned horror, turning around to look at Mel. My eyes caught a flash of something yellow on the floor.
"What?" Mel squeaked, and, unlike me, the horror in her voice was actually real. "You're joking-"
"Double oh!" I gasped dramatically, eyeing the shiny splotch of yellow layered over the white tile of the floor with mild interest. "Tinkerbell peed on the floor."
Mel eyed Tinkerbell's deposited waste with exasperation. "Ugh, you've got to be kidding me-"
The doorbell rang. Mel cursed. "I look like a total hobo! How could he just show up like that? Derek, whatever you do, don't open the door-!"
"Too late," I told her, sidestepping the pool of piss and opening the front door to Robby's broad form. I met his eyes, which were blanketed beneath the shady shadow of his stupid baseball cap. He smelled purely of those cheap male colognes you bought for half off at Kmart. "You might want to watch your step as you come inside," I advised lowly. "Mel forgot where the bathroom was again."
Then I was gone before I could see that whole episode go down. As much as I wanted to take the opportunity to watch Mel get humiliated in front of her boyfriend, I had a place to be. The dog park was only a few minutes away.
***
"If I could, I would totally high-five you right now," I told Tinkerbell, who was trotting alongside me; the tag dangling from his collar jingled along with his tiny steps. "That peeing on the floor bit was brilliant. I'm giving you extra treats when we get back."
Disregarding the fact that Tinkerbell deemed it absolutely necessary to stop at every single lamppost and patch of grass in order to lift his leg and pee (there came a point where he would lift his leg and nothing would come out), we managed to make pretty good time in our trip to the local dog park.
The place was pretty busy, crawling with dogs of all different colors and sizes-as well as their owners, who could be spotted sitting on benches or walking around the provided sidewalk, relaxing after a long day at work or school. I hadn't ever been here personally, but I knew it well enough to know that it was officially known as "The Bark Park," and that it was divided into two distinct sections: a separate area for big dogs, and a separate area for small dogs. A fence kept the two sections apart.
I approached the entrance, heading straight for the small dogs area, specified by a sign that read: For dogs under thirty-five pounds.
I glanced over the chain-link fence at the dogs in the opposite section, spotting every monstrous breed that spanned from Labradors, to Great Danes, to German Shepherds. If Tinkerbell, with his weight at a measly 3 pounds and length at meager twelve inches, went in there, he'd be treated like a chew toy.
And Peaches, Gwen's Terrier, wasn't much bigger either- which meant that she had to be in the small dog area.
I pushed the gate open, my stomach twisting in knots. I hadn't told Raymond or Luke about this in school today, because for once I wanted to see if I could handle something like this without having to follow their advice. It was sort of like riding a bike without training wheels or jumping into a pool without floaties. Hopefully I wouldn't lose my balance and fall to the ground, or get pulled under by the water and, you know, drown.
I closed the gate behind me and scanned my gaze over the busy area, searching for someone who bared Gwen's starkly contrasting physical characteristics. She was pretty exotic-looking, once you thought of it. There weren't many pale white girls with jet black hair and ocean blue eyes around here.
The dogs didn't really pay me any attention-although a few had approached Tinkerbell and commenced that whole "getting to know each other" ritual that consisted of sniffing each other's butts until their noses fell off.
But I wasn't going to have that. I had a possible future girlfriend to find.
I tugged on Tinkerbell's leash, his stubborn resistance reflected in the amount of force I needed to exert in order to get him to move. For a little thing, he was ridiculously strong. I peered down at him, assessing that there were two dogs that were currently all up in his grill, fighting for a place at the prized butthole.
"I know your ass is popular, but we have to keep moving," I told Tinkerbell as I dragged him away from his new friends. "I haven't found Gwen yet."
Yet only about a minute of walking along the concrete pathway, as I eyed the surrounding sea of green, I finally found her. She was in the center of the park, beckoning for her dog Peaches to hop over the hurdle standing between them with a bright smile on her face.
I immediately halted my advance, vaguely musing that the sight of Gwen tended to incite that exact same response from me every single time I laid eyes on her, almost as if she were Medusa and I had suddenly froze into stone.
Yet my brief, incompetent moment of wide-eyed, open-mouthed, stupidity came to an abrupt end as a violent jerk emanated from my hand, threatening to yank me down towards the ground. Tinkerbell was relentlessly tugging on that leash at the expense of his breathing ability since the collar was wound around his little throat. He was on the grass, his short tail wagging rapidly while his eyes rested on Gwen just a few feet away.
Using Tinkerbell's insistence as my motivation, I allowed him to tug me forwards, his little form leading the way as he half-ran, half-hopped across the field of prickly green grass, towards the girl he recognized from when she occasionally came over to hang out.
Act natural, a voice in my head advised. Then, after a pause it added, whatever the hell that means.
Tinkerbell reached Gwen first, the expandable leash chronicling the few yards of distance that stretched between me and them. Recognition instantly flitted past Gwen's face at the sight of Tinkerbell, her eyebrows furrowing adorably as she reached down to pat his head. Then she lifted her blue eyes, the color of the sky above, and they found my own.
"Derek?"
"Hey, Gwen" I said with what I hoped was somewhat of a crossover between casualness and pleasant surprise. "Fancy meeting you here."
"I could say the same about you," she replied, surprise etched in her words. She stood back up, wiping grass off her skinny jeans. "What are you doing here, of all places?"
I had that explanation down packed, having rehearsed it countless times throughout the day.
"I-"
"Not that I'm not happy to see you, or anything," Gwen cut me off, a nervous twitch playing at the corner of her pale lips. "It's just that, um- I never really pegged you as much of a dog person, and I'm sure you've got plenty of other things to do on a Tuesday after school, like do homework, or watch T.V., or eat some cereal, or clean your bathtub-"
"Gwen," I spoke up, swallowing down the urge to chuckle. "I didn't know you suffered from word vomit, too."
"What? Me? Word vomit? No, no," she shook her head. "No, this isn't word vomit! I-I, um..." She trailed off, lifting her slim fingers to her hair and twirling her oil-black locks around them. Her pale, freckled cheeks suddenly bloomed with a light pink flush. She darted her vivid gaze away from me, resting it on her dog. "Peaches, come on girl! Jump over the hurdle, you can do it!"
Ah, the good ol' subject change technique: one that I myself was all too familiar with. I didn't think it was possible, but Gwen was even cuter when she was nervous. Was that how I looked when I spazzed out in front of her? I doubted it. If anything I looked like a bumbling fool who probably had worse social skills than a monkey. Gwen looked like an innocent flower, with puckered lips and wide eyes and quirked brows.
"I can show her how it's done," I announced, handing Tinkerbell's leash over to Gwen.
Gwen didn't take it. "You should let him roam free," she suggested. "That's how dog parks work. Dogs don't have to be on leashes since they can't run away; everything here is fenced."
"Oh," I said, bending down to unhook Tinkerbell's leash from his collar. "I totally knew that."
"Uh huh," she said suspiciously, rolling her eyes.
"Now," I began, stepping over to the small hurdle. It currently had two bars, raising it to about a foot in height. I looked down at Peaches, who was looking back up at me with beady black eyes and a shiny black nose framed with fluffy brown hair. A bow sat perched upon her head, clipped onto a lock of hair that stood upwards as if static were keeping it erect. It bobbed as she continued to bark at me, apparently not over the fact that she hated me for some unidentifiable reason. "Watch how it's done, little doggy."
I backed up a few paces before charging towards the hurdle, springing upwards into the air as I neared it.
I was in mid-air when I felt a snag on my foot and my momentary feeling of airborne weightlessness was shattered along with my face as I planted face-first onto the grassy ground.
Very smooth, that stupid voice praised sarcastically.
"Ow," I mumbled into the prickly grass, my voice muffled, my body splintered with pain. Gwen's full laugh rang around in my ears, and even though I could hardly feel the front part of my body, I grinned to myself. Making Gwen laugh was even better than making others laugh. It made me feel more... satisfied.
I felt her kneel beside me, her presence making itself known in the form of quiet chuckles and the shadow she casted over my head. I laid there with my cheek pressed onto the grass, giving my body a chance to recover from the painful fall before I tried to move it.
"Are you okay?" she asked, a smile in her voice.
"Sure," I replied. "You know, that hurdle is a lot harder than it looks. I don't blame Peaches for not being able to jump it."
"Derek, it's a foot tall."
"See, that's what they want you to think," I said, nodding to myself. "It's all an illusion. The moment you try jumping it it'll rise up so that your foot can get caught and you fall onto the ground, embarrassing yourself in front of the girl you like."
"Ah," Gwen said. "I see. But-"
Gwen's words were drowned by the irritating sound of Peaches barking in my ear, her hot breath making me freeze with fear. Then four little weights plopped onto my back, and I felt a tugging at the sleeve of my shirt; through further inspection I realized that the little beast was trying to rip it.
"Peaches!" Gwen cried, completely outraged.
"Peaches," I groaned, rolling onto my back so that I could shake her off. "Peaches, get off me."
Gwen snatched her away from me and I sat up slowly, fighting against the soreness in my chin and chest and knees from the fall. While she started scolding Peaches for being a bad girl (although you can't really call it scolding when you're speaking to your dog with a honeyed voice that belonged in a naughty video), I gazed upon the surrounding area, my eyes marveling at the large, shady trees scattered around the field, and the many people playing with their dogs- as well as the many dogs playing with each other. Frisbees and balls were being thrown; dogs were playing on the seesaw, running around in fast circles, tongues flapping against the wind-a few passed by me so fast I could only register a blur and a breeze; children squealed with excitement at the sight of them frolicking around like the animals that they were. It was then that I understood why Gwen liked coming here so much. It was beautiful, peaceful, and fun all at the same time. And the best part was that it didn't smell like dog poop.
Then my eyes were hooked onto something that I couldn't help but comment on. "Hey, look! It's Raymond and Scarlett," I announced, pointing forwards.
Gwen followed my gaze. Her eyebrows knitted together. "Where?"
"Right there," I insisted, gesturing towards a dolled up poodle and a long, thin wiener dog that were currently whiffing each other's butts. "Raymond's the brown one and Scarett's the white one with the pink bows. They're perfect representations of their relationship, right down to the butt smelling."
"I dare you to take a picture of that and show it to Raymond," Gwen said with a laugh, petting a half-lidded Peaches on the head. That dog didn't know how lucky it was.
"Fine," I said with a shrug. "He already knows that this is how I feel about them, so it's not like it's anything new."
I reached into my pocket to pull out of phone, but was distracted by the sensation of something warm and watery on my foot.
I closed my eyes, afraid of what I knew I would see once I opened them.
And when I did, sure enough I saw a random Schnauzer with its leg up high, pissing a fountain of pee onto my foot as if I were a freaking tree.
"Hey!" I cried, shaking my foot to get the dog away. "What the hell do you think I am? A fire hydrant?!"
"I'll get some paper towels," Gwen declared, although it was obvious by the constipated look on her red face that she was trying with everything in her not to crack up. She stood up and jogged across the field while I thought of how disgusting it was that the lower part of my jeans, my socks, and my sneakers were soggy with dog piss from some random canine with an old man beard.
"Let's go over there," Gwen said as she returned, a stack of paper towels in her hand. She nudged her chin towards a nearby bench and we walked towards it, sitting down on the opposite end from where a little girl sat with her mother, eating a few goldfish crackers from a small container.
Gwen handed me the paper towels and I wiped away at the dog pee, crinkling my nose at the pungent smell and the total nastiness of my situation.
"Go on, do it," I grumbled to her.
She blinked, her eyes wide with innocence. "Do what?"
"Laugh. I know you want to."
"No I don't."
"Yes you do."
"Nuh-uh."
"Uh-huh."
She pursed her lips. "Okay, so maybe I want to. Just a little, though."
"I'm starting to think that dogs in general have it out for me," I admitted, dumping a soggy, yellow paper towel into the nearby trash can. I poured water from my water bottle over my leg to rinse it off. "Not even Tinkerbell likes me very much. Unless I have a treat in my hand he'll hardly even spare me a glance."
Gwen laughed, hugging Peaches closer to her chest. "That can't be true."
"It is."
"Well, I don't feel that way," she said.
I smiled at her. "That's because you're not a dog. But thanks."
"Excuse me!" a woman's voice huffed, calling my attention to my right, where the woman and the girl were still sitting on the bench. The lady looked quite upset; her nostrils were flaring rather unattractively. Meanwhile her daughter was crying hysterically, but I knew how little girls worked, seeing as that I had a little sister that was her age once. She was totally fake-crying; not a single tear was rolling down her cheek or swimming in her eyes.
"Yes?" I asked.
The woman pointed down to the floor, and that was when I realized that Tinkerbell was standing before the two of them, his mouth working as if he were chewing something.
"Is that your dog?"
"Depends," I said. "What happened?"
"He just ate all of my daughter's goldfish crackers! It's the only thing that keeps her quiet," she said. "Control him, please."
I wanted to tell that woman that if stuffing her daughter with goldfish crackers was the only way to get her to behave, then she had a lot to learn about parenting-not to mention that her daughter was an idiot if she thought placing her food near a dog's mouth was a good idea. I bit my tongue, though, mainly because I didn't want to cause a scene in front of Gwen. Even though causing scenes was sort of my thing-and I always tended to be the main star, undergoing some humiliating experience.
I grabbed Tinkerbell just as he swallowed down the last bits of goldfish crackers, letting out a burp afterwards. Then I turned to the red-faced girl, who couldn't be older than six.
"Sorry about your crackers," I told her. I looked down at the Chihuahua in my hands in indication. "The dog has more issues than you can imagine. I mean, his name is Tinkerbell."
She just stared at me, giving me the six-year old version of the "stank face". Which, I must say, was quite terrifying.
"Alrighty then," I cleared my throat. "I'll leave you to your grief."
I turned around, meeting Gwen's humorous gaze from across the sidewalk. Just as I lifted a foot to walk towards her, I felt a small hand grab my ass, and jumped.
I whipped around, my face naked with surprise. But the girl continued to stare at me with that same look of fury; I could practically see the steam coming out her ears. I opened my mouth to say something like did you just grab my ass, you little pervert? but I stopped my attack, choosing to take the high road and turn back around. I trudged over to Gwen, shaking my head.
"What was that about?" she asked.
"The girl from The Ring over there just finished grabbing my butt," I muttered. We began to walk through the sidewalk, Peaches still in her hands while Tinkerbell trotted alongside us.
"Seriously?"
"Yeah!"
"You know, if you're trying to make me jealous then I suggest you go for a higher age group."
"I'm not," I insisted. Then I paused, adding as an afterthought, "but are you? Jealous, I mean. Maybe a little?"
"Of a little girl who just cried over her goldfish crackers getting eaten?" Gwen asked, chuckling incredulously. "No."
The sound of something squishy, coupled with the soft impact of the ground beneath the sole of my right shoe, filled me with unease. I paused.
"Oh, God," I said.
Gwen stopped beside me. "What now?"
"You have got to be kidding me! What kind of dog poops on the sidewalk?!" I yelled to the sky. "There's like an entire field of grass in this place and a dog chooses to poop on a small thread of sidewalk of all places. It's just so ridicu... Gwen," I started as I registered the way she had her teeth sunk into her bottom lip while her face became a deep shade of scarlet and her eyes sparkled with tears. I sighed. "Gwen, just let it out, will you? It's really okay. You have every right to want to lau-"
The end of my statement was drowned by the sound of Gwen laughing hysterically, her body shaking along with her giggles. I fought the urge to smile at the sight of her laughing so fully-I mean, my current situation wasn't really one to grin about. But I found it impossible to do so, seeing as that Gwen had one of those laughs that were ridiculously contagious.
"I think that this is a sign from the dog universe," I said, scraping the sole of my shoe against the soft grass to get some of the dog poo off. It was pretty slimy, like diarrhea, smelling like someone had eaten a crap-load of baked beans before deciding to dump it all out. "Clearly I'm not welcome here."
Gwen's face was red and wet from laughing. "That's not true!" she said, her voice breathless from laughing. "You're just a bit unlucky today."
"Well the fact that I ran into you leaves me to question that statement," I said, surprised at myself for responding so quickly with such a smooth compliment. I was getting better at this "spitting game" thing.
But the assault wouldn't end there. Gwen and I continued on our pleasant stroll, Peaches throwing me dodgy glances from her place in Gwen's arms, near her boobs, and Tinkerbell trailing somewhere behind me. We talked about school for a few minutes, and I tried to keep the subject fixed on something safe like that because I knew refraining from discussing our date-gone-wrong would bring back bad thoughts and feelings.
Then, of course, something had to happen.
I felt a nudge on my butt-just a little push, as if someone had poked it. I commented on the sensation, rhetorically inquiring, "What is it with people touching my butt today?" But when I craned my head to peer over my shoulder, I caught sight of something I wasn't planning on seeing.
Instead of seeing a person, I saw a long line of dogs, all of them trailing behind me in a herd as if I were the mother duck and they were the little ducklings. Many were way too close to my butt for comfort, their noses all up in my private business.
"What the?" I asked in bewilderment.
"You're suddenly really popular around here," Gwen said, eyeing the group of small and medium-sized dogs curiously. And she wasn't the only one. Bystanders-most of them owners, were also observing the spectacle with a mix of awe and amusement, some of them snapping photos of the group of animals that continued to walk behind my pace.
Things quickly went from entertaining to deadly when I felt a sharp sting on my right butt cheek. A dog had tried to bite me.
"Ow!" I cried, jumping in response to the painful sensation. I hissed and winced. "What the hell was that for-?
Another nip, another scratch of the nails as a tiny dog tried climbing the back of my legs to reach my ass. I couldn't understand what had suddenly made it so attractive to these dogs.
"This ass is not for sale!" I told them, but it wasn't like they could understand me. I picked up my pace, throwing frantic glances over my shoulder as the dogs followed suit, maintaining their noses close to my butt. Even Gwen tried shooing them away, but it was like trying to swat away a fly; they kept coming back.
Then I caught sight of Tinkerbell's little body in the midst of the mass of dogs that, at this point, seemed to encompass the entire section of the dog park. I knew instantly what was going on here.
After all, my pet Chihuahua only ever sought me out when I had food in my possession.
I reached into my back pocket, pulling out a yellow cracker the size of a coin, shaped like a-you guessed it-goldfish.
"Evil little girl," I muttered.
"So that's why she touched your butt," Gwen realized. "She's a genius, I have to say."
"Is this what you all want?" I inquired to the crowd of dogs. All of them had their heads tilted upwards, wide black eyes honed in on the small cracker of cheese in my hands. I moved it around, back and forth, taking amusement in the way their heads twisted along with my movements, as if they were caught in some trance.
"Look, Gwen," I said proudly. "I am their King."
"Their Lion King?" she joked.
"No. Canine King," I corrected with triumph, puffing out my chest. "Bow down to me my fellow subjects! If you want the golden cracker you shall obey my comman-!"
I didn't get to finish my epic sentence because one dog decided to leap into the air in an attempt to reach the goldfish cracker. Considering the height of the pooch, it didn't get very high-but I was knocked to the ground by its force as it landed, and I fell backwards onto the grass, flat on my back. Witnessing the downfall of their King, the rest of the dogs seized the opportunity and created a stampede, stepping over me in an attempt to get to my outstretched hand.
I heard Gwen cry out my name while I felt the violent pressure of heavy and lightweight paws punching into every inch of the front of my body-from my nuts to my throat to my mouth. Recognizing the fact that if I didn't get the hell out of there I was going to meet the same fate Mufasa had in "The Lion King," I strained my arm and threw the cracker as far as my body could allow beneath the circumstances.
The dogs followed the tiny cracker in a wave of rapid movement, and soon I was completely free, the lingering smell of dog breath and poop clinging to my clothes hinting at their previous presence.
"Are you alright?" I heard Gwen ask, her voice laced with worry. I smirked to myself.
"No!" I cried, clutching my chest. "I can't-I can't breathe! I think I swallowed a hair ball-"
"Oh my God," Gwen cut me off frantically, her face appearing above my own from where I was laying sprawled on the grass, pretending to wince in pain. Her wide blue eyes were vivid in comparison to the dark shade blanketing her facial features. "Derek!" she cried.
I chuckled, this time wincing in response to the real pain that lanced through me, my body now sore from both the front side and the backside. "Just kidding. I'm fine. Ish."
Gwen did not look amused. She helped me sit up, eyeing me up and down with concern. Peaches was no longer in her hands; I assumed Gwen probably let her go sometime during my attack.
"Are you sure?" she insisted. "You were trampled by, like, twenty dogs."
"Twenty dogs under thirty-five pounds," I reminded her. "If this had happened on the other section of the Park, things would have ended a lot differently. We all know what happened to Mufasa in 'The Lion King.'"
"One of the most heartbreaking moments of my childhood," Gwen replied with a vigorous nod. "I still cry."
I turned my gaze in the direction where I threw the goldfish cracker, watching as the dogs crowded around that specific area with their noses in the grass, sniffing it out as if it were a nugget of gold. It was probably long gone by now. Didn't they know that?
"It was just a goldfish cracker," I said in astonishment. "What the hell is so special about a snack that smiles back?"
Gwen shrugged. "Dogs can be pretty weird sometimes. For example, Peaches scratches her dog bowl when she wants food-and then still scratches it even after I give her some. I just don't get it."
"Tinkerbell sometimes sleeps with one eye open," I said, my gaze suddenly caught by the sight of a blue Frisbee flying through the warm air, looking weightless as it breezed by gently. "Although that might just be a condition."
Gwen laughed softly, her breath tickling my face. It was only then that I realized how close we really were, with her bent leg rubbing against mine and the details of her face coming at me as if I had them placed under a magnifying lens. There was that familiar dust of brown freckles sprinkled across her cheeks and nose, the smoothness of her pale face reminding me of polished porcelain, and the lines cutting across her pale pink lips emphasizing their dryness.
But the most beautiful part had to be her eyes, the color of sapphire, glimmering beneath the afternoon Sun as if her irises were made of the stone itself. They were alluring in every sense of the word, like the exotic colors of some majestic animal of the jungle, their vibrancy emphasized by the paleness of her surrounding facial features and the thickness of her long, black eyelashes. I was in the process of gazing at the tiny strips of spindly shadows casted onto her cheeks by these very lashes when I noticed her gaze skate over my face, slipping downwards until it reached my lips.
And then my own eyes planted themselves on her lips, so full and pink and soft-looking, and the smell of her sweet perfume made me want to get even closer, to lean myself forwards so that I could see more of the tiny, hidden, tragically overlooked details that made her beautiful; to get a better whiff of that coconut shampoo clinging to her glossy black hair; to feel the warmth of her body as her skin met mine...
I was so close I could taste her breath, and I made a bold move to close the sliver of distance between us, my stomach being ravaged by a flock of butterflies, my hands growing clammy with sweat, my heart thumping wildly in my chest-
"Look out!" a faraway voice called.
And that was when I got hit in the head by a stupid Frisbee.
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A/N- So close!! Lol. Next chapter we get kissing lessons from... a pillow?!?
Please vote and comment! Thanks guys :)