thank you to the moon and back for checking this story out. whether you came from if this is love or not, i'm incredibly happy that you're taking the time to read the first chapter at least. i hope this story gets the same support as my other stories have gotten. you all amaze me with the insane amount of support i've gotten throughout the years and i couldn't be more happier.
i love each and every one of you. enjoy the new book💜
Worth the Wait: 1 | Lunch Dates
| Laura Marano |
| Wednesday, March 4th, 2021 |
Living on my own has taught me a few things. 1, you can't rely on your parents for money or food. 2, you have to plan out your grocery list by where your items are located in the store to make it fast and easy. 3, you have to clean your house all the freaking time. 4, you have to pay bills on time or else you get a fee of being late. And 5, everything is suddenly really expensive. Sure, I'm 25 years old and I have enough money for literally almost everything and anything I want. Heck, I could pretty much buy myself a mansion that's worth 3 or 4 million dollars and still have plenty of money to buy a brand new Tesla with the most updated gadgets, and so much more. Does that mean I'll buy all these fancy things? Hell. No. I have a decent sized one story cozy home with two bedrooms and a music room. I have a huge deck with cute outdoor furniture, a nice front porch with one of those bench swings that can fit three people on it. I have a hot tub that I rarely use because I'm so tired and almost never have guests over.
Ralphs:
ranch ✔️
pizza sauce ✔️
noodles✔️
mozzarella cheese✔️
pepperoni ✔️
cream cheese ✔️
eggs✔️
pizza dough✔️
flour✔️
chocolate chips✔️
a case of water
passionfruit, pamplemousse, berry, and mango la coix
throat coat tea
green tea
vitamin c
muti-vitamins
tampons super + and regular
panty liners
shampoo
conditioner
And that's exactly what I'm looking for. I wouldn't really need the flour and chocolate chips, but Vanessa is suppose to make chocolate chip cookies for her boyfriends niece is staying with them for a few nights and she's 7 and loves chocolate chip cookies. Sighing, I walk down the drink aisle while pushing my cart and stop at the cases of la coix. One by one, I pick up the 8 pack of passionfruit, the 8 pack of beery, the 8 pack of pamplemousse, and the 8 pack of mango before continuing my walk down to the cases of water. Another thing I have learned: I'm way too weak to be picking up cases of water. You think I'd get a clue. I always grunt and pant, I always wobble as I stand up, I always breathe heavy by the time I drop it in the bottom of my cart. This time was no different.
"Wow, you think you'd be able to lift that by now." A familiar voice says. "You, my friend, need to go lift." With a smile and a slight push up of my glasses, I turn around and look up to meet Ross' face. He was wearing a long sleeved thicker gray shirt, blue ripped jeans, his nasty black converse, his red SnapBack on backwards, and sunglasses hanging from his shirt. Where as myself, I'm dressed in blue ripped jeans and a red USC sweatshirt I got from a few years back and some white knockoff vans with my glasses and almost medium length hair natural.
"First of all, I'm little. It's expected that I can't lift these things especially when I'm not athletic whatsoever." I tell him. "And second of all, my friend, you have no room to judge." He laughs the slightest and walks closer, greeting me with a hug. I go on my tip-toes and wrap my arms around his neck, letting him give me a soft squeeze.
"How have you been?" He asks.
"Pretty good, actually." I tell him, pushing my glasses up my nose more. "How have you been?" I ask.
"Busy. Rocky and I have been in our little studio nonstop for the past few weeks trying to get new music out for everyone." He tells me.
"How are Rocky and Ryland?" I ask, knowing the three of them still all live together.
"Uh, well... Rocky almost moved out but he broke up with his girlfriend because she kinda started liking someone else and Rocky was not having that so he just... dumped her the second he found out." He tells me. "So we had to unpack all his stuff that was already packed away." I give him a sad smile.
"Good thing he found out now rather than a month of living with her." I say. "Are you here by yourself?" I ask him.
"No, Rocky and Ryland are around here somewhere. I was just going to grab a variety pack of la croix, but then I saw you struggling so I decided to make fun of you." I playfully roll my eyes at him. "Since when have you been such a big fan of la croix?" He asks, pointing to my cart.
"Since you had that house party over a year ago and had these. I've been hooked ever since." I tell him.
"That's because they're amazing." He tells me. He looks down at his phone for a second before frowning the slightest. "One second." He says, bringing his phone up to his ear. "Yo, where are you?" He asks. "I was, but I ran into Laura. Yes, Laura Laura. A crowd? Of how many? Oh, not bad then." He scratches his jaw for a second before sighing. "Can't I just meet up with you when you're done?" He asks. I raise my eyebrows, not expecting him to say that. "Well obviously. I haven't seen her in a long time and dude, she's standing right next to me-alright bye, text me when you're in the checkout line if I don't text you first." He hangs up and shoves his phone in his back pocket.
"So now you're inviting yourself to shop with me?" I ask, a teasing smile on my face.
"Oh shut up. And hey, this way I can do all the heavy lifting." He tells me.
"Great, I'm gonna really need it when I get tampons and pads." For a slight millisecond, Ross' cheeks turn a light pink shade and I couldn't help but laugh at him. "Twenty-five years old and you still get embarrassed about periods." I say, beginning to push my cart.
"Actually, I don't. I don't know why I did just now, but I never do. I've grown up with a sister and have had girlfriends before." He defends himself, walking right beside me. I just roll my eyes and make my way towards the tea aisle. "Anything exciting happening with song writing?" He asks.
"Always." I reply. "In a few weeks I'm meeting with other song writers." I tell him. "In fact, I just recently finished up a song that I think may be single worthy." I say, smiling over at him.
"Hm, I think I might just have to hear it to decide whether it's single worthy or not." He says.
"Nice try, buddy." I say, gently shoving his shoulder. He shoves me right back, causing my glasses to fall back down my nose the slightest. For the umpteenth time, I push them back up. "Any new girlfriends the world doesn't know about but I should?" I ask, a hint of a smirk. Since he and Courtney ended things, Ross hasn't really had a girlfriend. At least one that he hasn't shared from the numerous times we've hung out over the past several years.
"No. Definitely not." He tells me, a small laugh escaping his lips. "Still kinda, not into the whole commitment thing right now. Too much going on." I nod my head at his words, turning down the tea section and searching for green tea and throat coat tea.
"Ah, I feel you I'm that, dude." I say, picking up a little box of green tea.
"So I'm guessing the guy you were seeing like a year ago never worked out?" He asks. I chuckle the slightest and nod my head, now walking a little further to grab two boxes of throat coat tea.
"We broke things off seven or eight months ago." I tell him.
"Aw, that's too bad. You seemed to really like him." He replies. "But hey, that just means another dude is waiting to be picked up by the Laura Marano." I roll my eyes at him and place the tea in the cart, continuing my way to the vitamin section.
"Eh, I have a feeling I'm gonna be too busy and focused on my career to have a love life anytime soon." I reply, shrugging my shoulders.
"Wait, seriously?" He asks.
"Kinda, yeah." I say. "Plus, finding a guy is hard, you know? You never know if they're being genuine or if they only want you to become famous." I tell him.
"Hmm... alright, I see your point." He says, putting a hand on my cart. I give him a small smile as I grab my thing of vitamins. I walk a little farther and point up at the vitamin c that I definitely could not reach, giving Ross my version of his puppy dog eyes.
"Please?" I ask. Ross playfully rolls his eyes and grabs the container without even reaching that far up, and places it in my cart for me. "Thank you." I say to him. As we rounded the corner towards the makeup and toiletries, I spotted Rocky and Ryland walking out of the pots aisle with a few over excited teenage girls trailing a little ways behind them.
"We need to buy my mom a new crockpot because we borrowed it last week and Ryland dropped it and broke it." Ross tells me, most likely seeing my confused face. And believe it or not, a brand new crockpot was in their cart.
"Are you going to go back with them?" I ask him, nodding my heads towards the direction they're going. He shrugs his shoulders.
"Are you almost done?" He asks.
"All I need is shampoo, conditioner and some tampons and stuff." I tell him.
"Um... what are you doing tomorrow?" He asks.
"I have yoga in the morning, and that's about it." I say, reaching for my shampoo bottle.
"When does it end?" He asks.
"Ten thirty." I reply, now grabbing my conditioner.
"Wanna get some lunch tomorrow? I feel like we haven't hung out in awhile." He says. I raise my eyebrows up at him, not really expecting him to say that. Usually, it's always me trying to arrange plans or even Raini.
"Just the two of us?" I ask, now furrowing my eyebrows.
"Yeah, just the two of us. We can ask Raini and Calum a different time if they wanna join." He says. "Come on, Laura. You and I having gone out for awhile. You know it'll be fun. Have we never not had fun?" I roll my eyes, because we literally just hung out for a few hours like a month ago when we went to Vegas for some award thing. But I guess we were surrounded by his friends and my friends, so we didn't really properly hang out.
"Text me later with the restaurant name?" I ask, not really needing more convincing to hang out with him.
"Sure. I'll see you tomorrow." He takes a step to me and looks around for a second before kissing my cheek. I laugh the slightest and give him a quick hug before he waves me off to go find his two brothers.
10:43pm
From Ross Lynch:
Hey. I was thinking we could eat at the Grub on Seward St
From Ross Lynch:
They have salads
To Ross Lynch:
Sweet, that sounds great. What time should we meet
there?
From Ross Lynch:
I could pick you up if you'd like. I'm pretty sure you're on
the way.
To Ross Lynch:
Ah, but if you followed me on social media you'd
remember that I recently just moved out of my
apartment and into a house
From Ross Lynch:
Ah, but just because I don't follow you doesn't mean I
didn't know that. In fact, I actually did know you
moved because my sister and mom told me
To Ross Lynch:
Alright, I'll give you that much. But I just googled it
and I'm not on the way. If you pick me up it adds
about another 20 minutes to your drive. So I'll just
meet you there
From Ross Lynch:
You're difficult
To Ross Lynch:
I know, I really try when it comes to you :)
From Ross Lynch:
Trust me, I know ???
To Ross Lynch:
You have seam to forgot that I do not have an iPhone
either. I'm just going to assume that you sent me the
middle finger emoji
From Ross Lynch:
Hmm... you're correct. Why aren't you using your
iPad?
To Ross Lynch:
See, this is where you not following me on social media
actually ties in. If you did follow me, you'd know that it's
officially broken and I need a new one, which I haven't
gotten around to yet
From Ross Lynch:
I think this is just you begging me to follow you
again
To Ross Lynch:
I mean, getting a follow from the "Ross Lynch"
would be a dream come true, my friend
From Ross Lynch:
Hmmm... let me think about it and I'll get back
to you later
To Ross Lynch:
While you're at it, you should think about following
Raini too. I bet she'd flip out
From Ross Lynch:
Excuse me miss, you can not rush me into this. It's
a big deal that could affect the rest of my life
To Ross Lynch:
Yeah yeah. Go to bed, Ross. It's past your bedtime
From Ross Lynch:
Dude, it's literally not even eleven. I think it's just
past your bed time
To Ross Lynch:
You're right. Good night, my friend
From Ross Lynch:
Night. Try to be at the place by like 11:30
To Ross Lynch:
Got it
| The Next Day (March 6th, 2021) |
I practically run into the Grub at nearly 12:00 o'clock. Ross text me fifteen minutes ago saying he just pulled up and said he was sorry he was late, and I legit almost had a panic attack. I overslept this morning, making me miss my yoga class and had to go to the the 10:30 class instead of the 9:00 o'clock class I originally planned on going to. Breathing a little heavy, I quickly move some pieces of my already messy low bun (most likely turned ponytail) out of my face before I look around the restaurant. Ross looks up from the menu in the back corner and smiles at me. I smile back and walk as fast as I could over to him. He sported a red hockey SnapBack hat, a light pink crewneck with a white T-shirt poking out underneath and some ripped blue jeans.
"I'm so freaking sorry I'm late." I say, giving him a guilty smile as I sit down. I set my purse down by my feet and look back up at his face.
"It's fine." He tells me. "How was yoga?" He asks me. I was a little surprised he asked me that. Don't get me wrong, Ross is a sweet guy and always a gentlemen, but I didn't really expect him to ask me how my yoga class was.
"Oh, it was nice. I accidentally overslept and missed the early class, so I had a different instructor and I just... wasn't my favorite, but it was still nice." I tell him, shrugging my shoulders. "And uh, that's actually why I'm late. It didn't end until noon, but I left early because it's actually down the road, but I couldn't find parking..." I mumble. He just chuckles and shakes his head.
"It's fine, Laura." Nodding at his words, I look over the menu.
"How's your family?" I ask.
"Good." He replies.
"Are you serious? Come on, Ross. Go into some detail. It's not like we're complete strangers here." I tease, a smile on my face.
"Alright alright, lets see... Riker is officially engaged with Vanni, as of around two and a half months ago? But I'm assuming you already knew that." I nod my head, a smile creeping up on my face. He rolls his eyes and keeps talking. "Rydel and Ellington are still planning the wedding and I think they chose a date but I already forgot it." Now I roll my eyes at him. "Um, Rocky actually just broke up with his girlfriend, which I told you yesterday, but he already has a date with a girl next weekend or something. And uh, Ryland is still single, he's sorta been into the whole I don't need a girlfriend to be happy phase because his last girlfriend kinda broke his heart, I guess." He shrugs his shoulders.
"Wasn't her name Alex?" I ask, trying to remember what she looked like. He nods his head at me. "Weren't they only together for like, six months?" Again, he nods his head. I furrow my eyebrows. "And she broke his heart after six months of dating?"
"She was cheating on him with some dude who, by the way, does not compare to my brother on appearance level and personality level."
"You're biased, he's your brother." I tell him, narrowing my eyes at him.
"Trust me, if you saw the guy, you'd agree." I roll my eyes at him.
"What about you?" I ask.
"What about me?" He asks, shrugging his shoulders.
"Ross, come on. There's gotta be something to share with me. Love life, writing life, actor life, anything!" I exclaim.
"We talked about my love life yesterday, Laura. Acting is not high on my list right now, making music is." He tells me. "
"You're unbelievable." I mutter, now rolling my eyes.
"What? I just told you what you asked for." He gives me a smile and I gently nudge him in the shoulder from across the table.
"But that isn't like, how we use to talk about that kind of stuff!" I say, a small laugh escaping me. His smile fades the slightest before he licks his lips and sets down his menu completely.
"How about we go back to your place after this and we'll talk like we use to." He tells me.
"No secrets?" I ask, slightly pouting back like I did when I was sixteen.
"No secrets." He replies, nodding his head. I smile back at him, already getting excited about going back to my place. "While we're here, let's not talk about anything too personal. I'll even let you listen to some of our new stuff." I smile wider at that. "As long as you let me listen to your new stuff."
"Hm... that's asking a lot, Ross." I say.
"I don't think so, Laura." I playfully roll my eyes at him.
"Alright alright, I'll tease some." Now he playfully rolls his eyes. I laugh the slightest and look over the menu again, still not knowing what to get.
"Uh... Laura?" I don't lift my head up from the menu and hum a reply. "You might want to like, look outside. Or, ya know, three tables to your left of us." I furrow my eyebrows and look up, first glancing to the table he was talking about. The table sat four teenage girls, all with their phones pointed at us and giant smiles on their face. I frown and look out the window, seeing a small gathering of teenagers all looking between their phones and at Ross and I, and even a couple older men with professional looking cameras.
"Hmm... that lasted a good ten minutes." I mumble, setting the menu down. "Um... do you wanna still eat here or would you rather go somewhere else?" I ask, looking up to meet his eyes. "I can always whip up noodles or something at my place if you'd rather just do that." I tell him.
"Or we could order food." He says, shrugging his shoulders. "Your place sounds good." He adds.
"Do you want to ride with me and leave your car here or just follow me home?" I ask him.
"I'd rather follow you home, to be honest." I nod my head and stick my hand out, gesturing towards his phone. He furrows his eyebrows and hands me it without much thought, only to snatch it back and use his fingerprint to get in. I roll my eyes and go onto his maps, quickly typing in my address. But once I'm done, I take a second to look at his background on his phone. It was of him, Rocky and Ryland all standing in front of what looks like a bathroom mirror with straight faces. Smiling the slightest, I lock up his phone and hand it back to him.
"Just in case we get separated. I usually take backroads and that's what I put in your phone." I tell him.
"Oh, okay sweet, thanks." I reach for my purse and pull out my wallet, leaving a five dollar bill on the table. "What are you doing?" Ross asks, pointing to the money on the table.
"Uh, leaving a tip since we took up a table? Don't you usually do that when you decide not to eat someplace after already sitting down?" I ask him, a little confused.
"No, I mean, yes I do that, but I was gonna leave money, not you." I smile the slightest at him.
"Ross, it's five dollars. I was gonna pay for my own food anyways." I say.
"And I was going to pay for both our meals after I convinced you not to pay for your own." He tells me.
"Ross, I'm not going to argue with you over this. Just leave the money and lets go." He quietly groans and stands up, gesturing me to walk away first. Not trusting him to leave the money on the table, I hesitate to step forward and stare at him.
"Go, Laura. Ladies first." I roll my eyes at him and walk forward, only to quickly turn around and catch Ross looking through his wallet.
"Ross, seriously?" I ask, taking a step towards him. He quickly picks up my five dollar bill and replaces it with a ten, then puts his wallet back in his pocket and quickly uses that hand to push on my back. "I really hate you." I mutter, walking towards the door. He drops his hand from my back, but stays behind me as we walk outside.
"I told you I was paying." He replies, not even paying attention to the crowd around us. "Which way did you park?" He asks. I point to the right. "Okay me too." Quickly, he pushes on my back again and I couldn't help but to roll my eyes.
"I can walk myself, you know." I say, ignoring the few paps following us with the clicks of there cameras. "And take your hand off my back. We don't need any rumors going around about us dating, Ross." I quietly tell him.
"Alright alright." He mumbles, letting his hand down. For two steps he kept his space, but within a second he lifted my crew neck up and slipped what I'm assuming was my five dollar bill behind the waistband of my leggings. Quickly, I slap his hand away and my leggings slap my skin, causing Ross to chuckle.
"I'm seriously going to hurt you, Ross. If pictures of you doing that start circling around the internet-"
"Relax, I'm completely blocking the view. No pictures will go around of your fancy thong-ow. Shit." I see his car up ahead and nearly thank the lord that I'm a whole street away. I love this guy, I really do, but he is so annoying at times that all I want to do is slap him silly. I'm sure he feels that way about me, too. That show we end up bickering. "You didn't need to elbow me."
"Yeah, I really did." I stop in front of his car. "I'll meet you at my place. If you get there before me please don't block the driveway."
"I was gonna walk you to your car." He tells me.
"It's fine, I'm a whole street over so don't worry about it." I say, shrugging my shoulders.
"Then we better start walking." I sigh loudly. Sadly I know he won't give up, so I start walking again. Once we stop at my car, I turn around and look at him. By the way he didn't talk to me on the walk over here, I knew he realized he was beginning to annoy me the slightest, and he looked kind of guilty.
"You sure you don't want me to drive you?" I ask him quietly.
"Nah, it's fine." He replies, shrugging his shoulders. "Plus... if there is a chance that I end up staying late and am too tired to drive home or I have had some drinks, I'd feel safer with my car at your place than on a street." He tells me.
"Good point." I mumble. "Alright, I'll see you there. My house is a medium brownish, not too dark or not too light, color and the garage is not attached to the house." I tell him.
"Got it." He says, nodding his head.
"Walk safe." I say, opening my car door. "I know it's only a street a way, but still walk safe." He rolls his eyes with a soft smile.
"I will, don't worry." I give him a smile of my own before waving him off. I wait until he crosses the street and turns the corner before I start up my car and head home. Up until the last few minutes, Ross was nowhere in sight behind me, but the second we pulled into housing developments, I could see his car coming into view. I open my garage with the opener, pull in, cut the engine and step out. As I step out onto the driveway, Ross pulls in and stops just a foot in front of me with a smirk. Rolling my eyes, I shut my garage and wait for Ross to get out of his car.
"You're an actual idiot." I tell him, leading him to my front door.
"And your porch is amazing." He replies. I smile at that. One of the main reasons I rented out this house was because of the giant porch and the deck out back, those were the dealbreakers right there. Not to mention, I put out a black bench rocking chair on one side with cute plants in matching pots, and then two matching black chairs and a table on the other side with the same matching pots.
"Thanks." I say. Quickly, I type in the code to unlock the door and within seconds, I was inviting Ross in.
• i hope I didn't disappoint any of you with this first chapter. like all new stories, it takes awhile to adjust to it and I hope you continue to stick with it and continue to support me and my writing journey. don't forget to vote, comment something sweet, and follow me! •
thank you once again... -rydelly_belly💜