Katie’s POV
I am rummaging through my closet trying to find the perfect outfit for my date with James tonight. I wonder what we’re going to do on this date. Yesterday’s date was supposed to be out of the apartment but we ended up staying inside. I decide to wear my white shorts that go to mid thigh, my purple tank top that James got me for my birthday, and my black flip flops. I shower and straighten my hair that goes down my back. I put on some light make-up. I know James would like the more natural look on me instead of caking on the make-up. I finish getting ready and I hear a knock on my door.
“Who is it?” I shout as I get everything I need in my purse. It better not be Carlos saying he ate all the corndogs already.
“It’s me Katie-kat. Are you ready to go?” James shouts through the door and I hear someone pounding on the door.
“Calm down Jamie! I’ll be right out,” I say as I chuckle and open the door to see James waiting and a guilty looking Kendall.
“Sorry baby sis, it was me who was pounding on your door. I just didn’t want James to keep waiting for you,” Kendall tells me as he hugs me and I hit him in the stomach; he is such an older brother.
“Let’s get going Katie baby,” James whispers in my ear as he takes my hand and we make our way to the door.
“Bye guys! Have fun. But not too much fun!” Kendall shouts as we walk out the door and Logan closes the door behind us.
“Where are we going?” I ask him as we take the elevator to the lobby and walk to the Jeep.
“It’s a surprise Katie baby. You will have to wait and see,” James tells me as he opens the door for me and I get in; does he always have to make me anxious?
“Awe you know I don’t like surprises! Just tell me,” I tell him with my signature Katie Knight puppy pout hoping he will tell me.
“Nice try baby girl. That pout isn’t going to work on me right now,” James tells me as he pulls out of the Palmwoods and starts driving. He hasn’t called me baby girl since I had the flu when I was sixteen.
“It usually does,” I mutter under breath and look out the window trying to figure out where James is taking me.
“Hey now babe. Don’t be mad. Be happy. We will be there soon,” he tells me as he grabs my hand and holds it as he continues to drive.
“I better like this surprise. You know I don’t like surprises and if I don’t like this surprise, it’s your fault,” I tell him as he continues the seemingly long drive.
“You’re going to love this surprise. I promise Katie bear,” he tells me as he grabs my hand and kisses it.
“Okay Jamie. Where the heck are we and how much longer are we going to be in this car?” I ask him impatiently.
“Don’t worry Katie ‘cause we are here,” he says as he pulls into a parking lot and turns off the Jeep.
“And exactly where are we?” I ask as I look around to see just green grass; we drove all this way to go to what looks like a park?
“We are at a park for a picnic,” he tells me as he gets the picnic basket from the back of the Jeep.
“If we are just going to have a picnic then why didn’t we go to the Palmwoods Park?” I ask him as we get the food out of the basket under a tree. Did we really have to drive this far to a park?
“Because we always go there and I didn’t want to be interrupted by our friends or by fans,” he tells me as we sit on the blanket; he is such a romantic.
“I can’t complain about that because that is actually very romantic,” I tell him as we start eating.
“I can be very romantic Katie. I wasn’t romantic with the other girls because I only went out with them to get my mind off of you but I couldn’t. I couldn’t get you out of my head. I realized that the only girl I wanted to be romantic to is you. I didn’t want to charm the others. I love you Katie and I would do anything to bring a smile to your face. I only want you,” he tells me as he gets a ring box out of his pocket and I gasp.
“James what are you—“ I try to say but he puts his finger to my lips to shush me.
“It’s not what you think it is Katie. It’s not an engagement ring. It’s just a promise ring. Though one day I’d love to get married. Your brother would freak out if I proposed to you this soon. This ring is to symbolize my promise that we will be together no matter what,” he tells me as he slips the ring on my right ring finger as to not make people (i.e. Kendall) think we are engaged.
“It’s beautiful James. When did you have the time to go get it?” I ask him with confusion; I don’t remember him leaving the apartment lately without me.
“I’ve had this for a while now, maybe a year or so. I just wanted to wait until we got together and then once we did I wanted to wait for the perfect moment. I didn’t want to spring this on you too soon and then scare you off. The last thing I’d want is to lose you. Logan went with me one day after we were at the studio. We had told Kendall and Carlos that we were going to play hockey at the ice rink but we really went out to a jewelry store,” he tells me as we lie down on the blanket and look at the stars and moon.
“Wait are you saying Logan knew how you felt about me for a year?” I ask him.
“Well Logan knew my feelings for about three years now. I needed someone to confide in. Carlos would’ve ended up accidentally blabbing it to you and Kendall would’ve murdered me if I told him,” he tells me and I can’t help but laugh a little bit.
“That’s funny because Logan knew my feelings for just as long. I needed to confide in someone too. Of course Carlos wouldn’t have been able to keep it a secret unless corndogs were involved and Kendall would’ve wanted to send me to an all-girls school if he knew. I just find it funny that Logan knew we had feelings for each other for this long and now I understand why he kept telling me to tell you how I felt,” I tell him and he starts laughing too.
“He kept telling me the same thing too. I remember telling him that I was afraid you would reject me and he would always say that he highly doubted that would happen. Now I get why he said that. He knew we wanted to be together so he kept trying to push us together. There’s a reason why Logan is the smart one,” he says and we laugh at the fact that Logan knew for so long.
“What are the odds we’d both tell Logan how we felt around the same time? Poor Logie was keeping this a secret for years,” I say and James kisses my forehead.
“Now I understand why you would go to Logan’s room a lot to talk to him. I used to get jealous but then I would remember that Logan knew how I felt and I knew Logan wouldn’t try to get me to tell you how I felt if he had feelings for you. Logan is the kind of friend that would’ve told me if he liked you. But I still couldn’t help wonder what you were talking to him about. I thought it was about homework but when you would go into his room to talk during the summer I knew it wasn’t about homework,” he tells me and I laugh.
“Yeah sometimes I would go in his room to ask for homework help. Other times it was to ask what I should do when I see you at the pool with some girl. He always told me that those girls wouldn’t last and that he could tell by the way you looked at those girls that it didn’t mean anything. I just thought he said that to make me feel better. I thought I was a good detective growing up. How did I not catch on to your feelings?” I ask him as I deeply think about how I didn’t catch on and my thoughts are interrupted when James kisses my cheek.
“You were a good detective Katie. Remember when you found out that Jo was lying about having a boyfriend back home? You also were the one to catch Logan and Camille dating and doing other things. You caught on to Gustavo hiring a fake girlfriend for Carlos so we could sing the breakup song. You were even close a couple times to finding out about my feelings for you,” he tells me and I’m shocked; how was I close to finding out?
“I was? How?” I ask him as I’m genuinely confused on how I was close to finding out but I didn’t.
James’ POV
“Okay it was more than a couple times. There were the times I would see you in a bikini before you went to the pool and I would be too hypnotized that I had to run into Logan’s room so he could make sure I was still breathing. There were the times that when I was talking to Logan I’d get so passionate about my feelings that my voice would get louder and Logan would have to tell me to lower my voice or else you would hear me. Then there was the time you found my open journal by my guitar to a song I had written about you. If you were to have turned to the page before or after the song you would’ve seen my feelings being poured out,” I tell her and I notice she’s in deep thought probably thinking about the examples I just gave her.
“Wow I really was close with the journal. I remember that day. You and the guys were at the studio and it was after my mom moved back to Minnesota. I was bored so I decided to go into your bedrooms to see if anything needed to be picked up and I went into your room last. I was shocked to see how clean it was and I noticed your guitar and journal. I knew you had a journal unlike the others because we have always been so close. I didn’t think it would hurt to see the song that was open and I remember loving those lyrics and hoping it would get on your next album. After reading through the lyrics once I couldn’t help myself so I lifted up your guitar and started to play the chords you had written down. Then you walked in and I was expecting you to yell at me for invading your space but then you looked at me before you left the room. I left right after you to apologize but you had rushed into Logan’s room before I could say anything,” she tells me her story of that day as I smile remembering that day.
“I remember that day perfectly. The only reason I rushed out of the room was because I was afraid that you had seen the page before and/or after the song. I thought you knew how I felt so I ran to Logan. When I came out you were apologizing nonstop and I kept telling you it was okay. I even asked you if you looked anywhere else in the journal and you said you didn’t because you felt bad already for looking at the open song. I smiled a little bit because it meant you didn’t know and I thought that it bought me time. But I knew I was running out of time and that I had to tell you soon. Logan told me that I had to either hide my journal or tell you how I felt. I decided to not take the time and effort to hide my journal and to figure out how to tell you. Yesterday was it. I couldn’t keep it inside me anymore and it was driving me crazy. I knew that if I didn’t tell you yesterday that Logan would’ve eventually gotten fed up and would tell you before I could,” I tell her and I notice that most of the food was gone and it is pretty dark out so we better get home soon before Kendall freaks out.
“I’m glad that you told me Jamie. I was freaking out too that if I didn’t tell you soon I’d lose you completely,” she tells me as we put the leftover food in the basket and pick up our stuff.
“You wouldn’t have lost me and you will never lose me. We have always been so close and part of the reason why was because we knew in our hearts that we were meant to be together. I think God had put me and Kendall in the same preschool classroom when we were three because I was meant to become best friends with him and to be in the hospital with Kendall waiting to meet the cutest baby girl I had ever seen. I made a promise that day with Kendall that we would be best friends forever and that I’d do anything to protect you,” I say as we walk to my Jeep and head back to the Palmwoods.
“Dang I knew you were friends with Kendall when I was born but I didn’t know that you were at the hospital waiting to meet me. I guess when you say you knew me since I was born, you really meant since I was born. I just thought that you met me like a week after I was born. But you saw me what- five minutes after I was born?” she asks me as I drive back to the Palmwoods and I bite the inside of my lip.
“Actually your mom had us in the room while she was pushing. We apparently stayed by her head and she figured since we were so young that we wouldn’t remember being in the room. But we proved her wrong. We did remember being in the room. I would never forget that day. We weren’t grossed out or anything because we were only three,” I tell her and I notice her blushing.
“Do you realize that this means you have seen me naked before?” She asks me and I couldn’t hold back my laughter.
“Katie, you were a baby. I didn’t think anything gross when I saw you. I just remember thinking that you were a cute baby and when I told my mom that, she told me that if a baby is cute the second he or she comes out then he or she will most likely be cute throughout life. And she wasn’t wrong. You have been cute since day one Katie-kat. I will probably regret telling you this but that wasn’t the only time I saw you naked growing up,” I tell her as her blush gets redder and she looks at me with her mouth open.
“How many times have you seen me naked? And when did you? This is news to me,” she says as I contemplate whether I should tell her or not… I think I should tell her; don’t want to start the relationship with lies.
“Well there was the day you were born. I was over at your house a lot since my mom worked so much so I was there most of the time when it was bath time so I helped Kendall and your mom give you baths for years. Then we got to the period where my mom took extremely long trips so I practically lived at your house and your mom wanted to save water. This meant that the three of us took baths together up until you were like five. So that also means that you have also seen me naked many times but you can’t remember. I don’t think you remember this either but when you were like a year and half and were walking and talking, you used to just walk around in a diaper and sometimes not even that. You would sometimes rip off your clean diaper and scream no whenever your mom or Kendall tried to get it back on you. You would run around naked and screaming and your mom was getting tired of chasing you so one day I told her that I would try to get you in a diaper. I was only four at the time but by the time you were a year and half we were close. All I had to do was ask if I could put a diaper on you and you would always say, ‘Yes Jamie’. I was the only one who could do it. As much as it disappointed your mom and Kendall do you know what your first word was?” I ask her as I drive and mentally tell myself to wrap up this little story before we get home.
“What was my first word?” She asks me with a smile on her face; I guess she doesn’t mind now that I have seen her naked when she was younger.
“Much to the disappointment to your mom and Kendall, your first word was Jamie. I’ll never forget the day. You were about a year old and the three of us were outside playing in the snow. You had barely started to walk so you were a bit clumsy. You were trying to walk over to Kendall and me and there was a lot of snow that you tripped over something buried in the snow and fell down. You started crying and Kendall and your mom ran to you but you started shaking your head and your mom asked you what you wanted and you opened your mouth and said, ‘Jamie’. Your mom looked at me and I walked over to you and hugged you and you smiled at me. Later that night Kendall got mad and jealous that you said my name before you could say his name. Your mom told me at the time that I must have become a big part of your life for you to say my name first. Kendall got over his jealousy when a week later you said Kenny. I don’t think your mom got over the fact that mama was the third word you said,” I tell her and we laugh.
“Wow I can’t believe my first word was Jamie. That explains why I love calling you that. And of course Kendork was jealous. He would’ve been jealous if my first word was mama like most babies. Apparently one year old Katie loved you so much that she had to say your name first,” she tells me and I laugh as we pull into the Palmwoods.
“You really did love me and I have loved you since forever Katie bear. No matter what happens I will always love you,” I tell her as we walk into the Palmwoods up to 2J.
“How was your date?” Kendall asks us as we walk into the apartment to find everyone awake.
“It was great. What time is it?” Katie asks him and I can tell that she is afraid that Kendall will make a big deal if it is really late; I’m afraid too.
“It’s almost one a.m. What the hell were you doing till this late?” He asks us with a tone in his voice that is telling me that right now he’s acting like he’s just her older brother not my best friend.
“Easy there Kendall. We were just at a park having a picnic and watching the stars. We started talking and we lost track of time,” I tell him and I notice he starts to calm down while he takes a few deep breaths.
“Sorry dude. I know you wouldn’t do anything to her. It’s just not easy for me to see my baby sister going out with someone. Even if she’s eighteen and the guy is my best friend,” he tells me as he pats my back and I put my arm around his shoulders giving him a side hug.
“Can we all go to bed please? It’s late and I’m tired,” Carlos says with a tired voice and a sleepy look on his face and I go to help support his body before he falls over.
“Sure thing buddy. Let’s go,” Logan tells him as he takes my place and helps Carlos to his bedroom, as he looks really tired.
“Night you two. Don’t stay up much longer,” Kendall tells us as he walks into his bedroom and shuts the door.
“I had fun today Jamie. Thank you for the picnic and for the stories,” Katie says as she wraps her arms around my neck and I wrap my arms around her waist pulling her closer to my body.
“Anytime Katie bear. Any time you want to hear a story about when we were younger just find me. I’d be happy to tell you,” I whisper as our faces get closer and our lips meet for a sweet yet passionate kiss. We kiss for what seems like forever until someone coughs and we pull apart.
“Hey lovebirds you might want to stop just in case Kendall comes back out,” Logan tells us and we both blush.
“Sorry Logie. By the way we both know that you knew all along for the past few years that we have feelings for each other,” Katie tells him and he throws his hands up in surrender.
“What was I supposed to do? Tell you both that the other is in love with you? Yeah that wasn’t going to happen. All I could do was advise you both to tell the other how you felt. I couldn’t lock you both in a room and force you to talk, even though at times I wanted to. The only hard part of keeping both your secrets to myself was to make sure Kendall was oblivious. It wasn’t really all that hard since he has Jo and he spends a lot of time with her. Now let’s go to sleep. Night,” he tells us as he walks to his room and opens the door.
“Night Logie,” Katie and I tell him as he walks into his room and shuts the door.
“Night Jamie,” Katie tells me as she kisses my cheek and walks to her room and shuts the door.
“Night Katie baby,” I whisper at her door before I go to my room and shut the door.
Today has been a good day. Any day that I get to spend with Katie is a good day. I honestly would not mind it one bit if I could spend everyday of my life with Katie. She is my world. I walk through my room and I can’t help but chuckle at a couple things. She said that when she walked into my room the day she saw my journal, she was shocked that it was clean. She didn’t ask why it was so clean. I always keep my room clean because I don’t want her to think I’m a sloppy guy. I take the time to make sure my appearance looks good so why shouldn’t I make sure my room is clean?
The other thing I am chuckling about is the fact that she said that she hoped the song she saw would end up on our album. She must have not remembered the words because it did end up on our album. The song was Cover Girl. I had Kendall sing the big parts because I like his voice and his voice would make it sound better. I should probably let her know that her favorite song was written by me. Yes her favorite song is Cover Girl.