Glades and Playgrounds
Chapter VII;
After a lot of ‘no, you can choose’, we settled for ‘Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban’. We took our seats in the saloon, talking as the commercials were playing on the screen.
“The books are so much better” I said, taking off my fingerless gloves and putting them in my lap. We’d agreed to not buy any popcorn, because neither of us actually ate them anyway, so we only bought two coca-cola’s.
“Agree”
“Ah, you’ve read them?”
“Of course!” he grinned, “And I take that as you have too?”
“Hell yeah, all my friends were too lazy, they just watched the movies with me so I got back on them by telling them what was gonna happen”
“Ooh, evil” he laughed and we went silent as the movie started. After about ten minutes, I took off my shoes and pulled up my legs under me as I’d done since I was a kid. Back then I just did it too see over the people’s head that were in front of me, but when I grew to see over them without this position, I still didn’t stop.
As I did so, I accidentally touched Gerard’s hand that was resting on the armchair and he turned his head to look at me, smiling before taking my hand fully in his. Smiling as well, and with a warm, fluttering feeling in my chest, I turned my attention to the movie.
*
“There’s just one thing I don’t get with ‘The prisoner of Azkaban’” I said when we walked out of the saloon, still holding hands, but the real surprising this here was that my hand hasn’t become sweaty. Now that’s a shocker. No, really.
“What?”
“If Sirius Black’s a wanted criminal, how could he buy Harry a broomstick? I mean, it’s not like he can just walk into a shop and buy one”
“He-“ he started, but went silent. “I actually don’t know. Maybe he ordered one”
“Or maybe Lupin helped him”
“Nah, Lupin thought he was a Deatheater…”
“Maybe he used a fake name then?”
“Let’s call J.K. Rowling and ask her” he laughed, letting go of my hand as we exited the cinema to put on his sunglasses. The sun was about to go down, so I didn’t really saw any point in wearing them. “So, do you wanna call it for the night or do you just wanna hang out in the park or something?”
“Actually” I said slowly, looking at my wristwatch. “I don’t have to be home before 11.30 and it’s only 10.45”
“Is that a yes to the park?” he asked, smiling as I nodded.
I found it really easy to talk to him; we shared the same interests. He liked music, art, comic books – all the things that I loved. Soon, we reached the park as we argued about which superhero was the best. It took me quite a few minutes until I realized that our fingers were once again linked together and when he caught me looking at it, he raised his eyebrow and twisted up his features, doing a really bad impression of Elvis Presley with his face.
“Pretty” I laughed and he giggled before taking a firmer grip around my hand, leading me off the asphalted path in the park and into the bushes. “Wh-what are you doing?” I couldn’t help but worry. I hardly knew the guy; he might me a murdered for all I know.
“I wanna show you something” he explained as he continued leading me through the bushes and I realized that we were walking on a small path which made me stop worrying. “This” he said, finally stopping before a glade with a view of a rather large pond, or maybe it’s called a lake. I looked at him, then back at the glade. It was completely isolated from the sounds from the park and a warm breeze made the leaves of the trees rustle.
“Bet you come here all the time to be alone, huh?” I asked, walking over to the water. You couldn’t exactly swim in it, it was full of green and black seaweeds that didn’t look too attractive, but farer out in the pond where the quickly fading sun was mirroring, it looked like something out of a children’s book.
“Yeah” he responded and I heard him take a few steps before he went still. I turned around, noticing that he was sitting down and looking out over the water. I joined him, sitting down next to him and decided to ask him the question that was gnawing on my inside.
“Why did you ask me out?”
“Hmm?” he asked, obviously lost in his own thoughts.
“I said, why did you ask me out? I mean, you’re sixteen… It can’t exactly look too cool to go out with a fourteen year old” I asked, cocking my head, “And how did you know I weren’t into girls?”
“Actually…” he said slowly, “I didn’t, it was a wild guess… and… It’s better you hear it from me than from Mikey… I ask a lot of guys out. Most of them aren’t gay, so they just politely turn me down and some beat me up” he grinned. “It’s hard to find someone and I don’t wanna miss the perfect guy just because I’m too scared of being ditched”
“Oh…” I said slowly, but before I could continue, he started talking.
“Don’t feel insulted though” he smiled nervously, “I had a great time with you… Better than any other first date I’ve had, actually”
“I’m not insulted, I asked, didn’t I?” I smiled, “I had a great time too”
… “Your mom can’t be the over-protective type” he said as he got up from the ground twenty minutes later. “I was supposed to be home at 11 and I’m older than you”
“No, she’s not. I have a feeling New Jersey’s about to change that” I laughed and he stretched out his hand to help me up. I took it and as I straightened up, his face came dangerously close to mine. I took a step back, giggling as his normally pale cheekbones now were slightly pink. I looked at my watch and saw it was 11.20.
“You know, you were supposed to be home 20 minutes ago”
“I know”
“So… we better get home, then?”
“I guess” he agreed, but stood still.
“And you’re not moving because…?”
“Because I wanna ask you if you wanna come over to my house tomorrow, but I’m scared my heart will break if you say no” he said dramatically and I was just gonna tell him I could come, when I suddenly remembered something my mom said a few hours earlier.
We’re going over for dinner tomorrow anyway, so I can talk to Donna about her naughty son then.
“I can’t turn you down even if I wanted to” I laughed, “Linda and I are apparently invited over for dinner at your house tomorrow”
“Ah, cool… You better pray it’s my mom who’s cooking, my dad’s terrible at it” he said as we walked back to the asphalted street in the park. The sun had gone down some minutes ago and the only thing that was enlightening our way was the streetlights since the moon’s light couldn’t break through the vault of leaves and branches above us.
“I think I’ll survive. Linda can’t even make pancakes… But she’s good at ordering pizza though”
Gerard laughed, “Your mom sounds so cool… And you don’t need to endure having a pain in the ass brother either”
“Yeah, poor you” I smirked, “But yeah, Linda’s cool… She’s more of a best friend than a mom, really. Hopefully you’ll get to meet her properly some day”
“And hopefully, you’ll avoid seeing my family all too much… They’ll get on your nerves, trust me”
“Mikey seems kinda okay though”
“Urgh, Mikey’s the worst” Gerard sighed. I recognized the houses around us and realized that we had reached our street. I felt suddenly disappointed, like I didn’t want to go home, I wanted to stay out with Gerard and talk. We stopped outside the fence of his house, seeing as his house was a few houses away from mine and we reached his first.
“So… we’re here” he said, smiling, “I really had a great time”
“So did I” I smiled back, “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”
“Yeah,” he said, leaning forward and gave me a quick hug, “Bye Frank”
“Frankie,” I corrected him, “Bye!”
He disappeared into the shadows in his garden and when I heard his front door close, I snapped out of my thoughts and went home.
… Linda was seated in the couch with a bowl of popcorn in her lap and was watching some lame comedy.
“Hey honey” she said, twisting her neck to look at me as I entered the room, the flickering lights from the tv casting distorted shadows over her face. Normally, on a Friday night, she’d be upstairs in her bedroom and reading some novel, but I had a pretty good feeling she had wanted to question me about my evening.
“Hey” I answered, watching her put the tv on mute and patting on the couch next to her.
“Come, sit down” she said, beckoning, “I wanna hear every god damn detail!”
Smiling and rolling my eyes, I took my seat next to her and as I sat, she looked at me with a blank expression. I furrowed my eyebrows and cocked my head to the side and she sighed impatiently.
“Spill!”
“Oh, right…” I said slowly, acting dumb, “So… What do you want me to tell you?”
“Everything!” she exclaimed, throwing her arms up in the air, failing to keep her patient surface. “What did you do? What did he say? Was he nice? Do you like him? Did you kiss? Where did you go? Did-“
“Linda!” I laughed and she fell silent. “I’m tired and all I really wanna do is to go to bed, so can you please pick out the most important questions and then we’ll take the rest tomorrow?”
“Fine,” she said grumpily, “What did you do?”
“We went to a movie and then to this really cool glade right next to a lake” I said, keeping it short just to annoy her. “More questions?”
“What did you talk about?”
“Geeky stuff” I said, grinning at the mere thought of when we talked about Spiderman or some other things that I knew mom would never understand.
“So…” she said slowly, “You like him?”
“He’s cool…” I said slowly, looking at a very interesting thread that was sticking out of my jeans. I felt her eyes on me and I slowly raised my head, only to notice that she was smirking teasingly. “What?”
“Frankie’s in luuhve!” she sang, laughing as I blushed. I protested weakly, but still knowing all to well that when her ‘thirteen-year-old-girl phase’ started, there was nothing I could do but run.
“G’night” I said quickly, jumping up from the couch, still with her laughing next to me. She caught my arm, but she didn’t pull me back down, she just held on to it.
“Just one more question,” she said, still giggling slightly, “Did he kiss you?”
“I just met the guy! It was our first date, not everyone’s acting like a whore on there dates, you know”
“True, true…” she giggled, letting go of my arm, “Well, I’m glad you had a good time, otherwise I’d be going alone tomorrow… Good night, sprout”
*
[A/N I know I said I would stop with these messages but yeh. XD I'm going to L.A. tonight and will be there for 12 days, so no updates 'til I get home... ;__; But when I do, you'll get a double update. XD Bye! <3 xo - And thanks for commenting and reading! :''D]
“The books are so much better” I said, taking off my fingerless gloves and putting them in my lap. We’d agreed to not buy any popcorn, because neither of us actually ate them anyway, so we only bought two coca-cola’s.
“Agree”
“Ah, you’ve read them?”
“Of course!” he grinned, “And I take that as you have too?”
“Hell yeah, all my friends were too lazy, they just watched the movies with me so I got back on them by telling them what was gonna happen”
“Ooh, evil” he laughed and we went silent as the movie started. After about ten minutes, I took off my shoes and pulled up my legs under me as I’d done since I was a kid. Back then I just did it too see over the people’s head that were in front of me, but when I grew to see over them without this position, I still didn’t stop.
As I did so, I accidentally touched Gerard’s hand that was resting on the armchair and he turned his head to look at me, smiling before taking my hand fully in his. Smiling as well, and with a warm, fluttering feeling in my chest, I turned my attention to the movie.
*
“There’s just one thing I don’t get with ‘The prisoner of Azkaban’” I said when we walked out of the saloon, still holding hands, but the real surprising this here was that my hand hasn’t become sweaty. Now that’s a shocker. No, really.
“What?”
“If Sirius Black’s a wanted criminal, how could he buy Harry a broomstick? I mean, it’s not like he can just walk into a shop and buy one”
“He-“ he started, but went silent. “I actually don’t know. Maybe he ordered one”
“Or maybe Lupin helped him”
“Nah, Lupin thought he was a Deatheater…”
“Maybe he used a fake name then?”
“Let’s call J.K. Rowling and ask her” he laughed, letting go of my hand as we exited the cinema to put on his sunglasses. The sun was about to go down, so I didn’t really saw any point in wearing them. “So, do you wanna call it for the night or do you just wanna hang out in the park or something?”
“Actually” I said slowly, looking at my wristwatch. “I don’t have to be home before 11.30 and it’s only 10.45”
“Is that a yes to the park?” he asked, smiling as I nodded.
I found it really easy to talk to him; we shared the same interests. He liked music, art, comic books – all the things that I loved. Soon, we reached the park as we argued about which superhero was the best. It took me quite a few minutes until I realized that our fingers were once again linked together and when he caught me looking at it, he raised his eyebrow and twisted up his features, doing a really bad impression of Elvis Presley with his face.
“Pretty” I laughed and he giggled before taking a firmer grip around my hand, leading me off the asphalted path in the park and into the bushes. “Wh-what are you doing?” I couldn’t help but worry. I hardly knew the guy; he might me a murdered for all I know.
“I wanna show you something” he explained as he continued leading me through the bushes and I realized that we were walking on a small path which made me stop worrying. “This” he said, finally stopping before a glade with a view of a rather large pond, or maybe it’s called a lake. I looked at him, then back at the glade. It was completely isolated from the sounds from the park and a warm breeze made the leaves of the trees rustle.
“Bet you come here all the time to be alone, huh?” I asked, walking over to the water. You couldn’t exactly swim in it, it was full of green and black seaweeds that didn’t look too attractive, but farer out in the pond where the quickly fading sun was mirroring, it looked like something out of a children’s book.
“Yeah” he responded and I heard him take a few steps before he went still. I turned around, noticing that he was sitting down and looking out over the water. I joined him, sitting down next to him and decided to ask him the question that was gnawing on my inside.
“Why did you ask me out?”
“Hmm?” he asked, obviously lost in his own thoughts.
“I said, why did you ask me out? I mean, you’re sixteen… It can’t exactly look too cool to go out with a fourteen year old” I asked, cocking my head, “And how did you know I weren’t into girls?”
“Actually…” he said slowly, “I didn’t, it was a wild guess… and… It’s better you hear it from me than from Mikey… I ask a lot of guys out. Most of them aren’t gay, so they just politely turn me down and some beat me up” he grinned. “It’s hard to find someone and I don’t wanna miss the perfect guy just because I’m too scared of being ditched”
“Oh…” I said slowly, but before I could continue, he started talking.
“Don’t feel insulted though” he smiled nervously, “I had a great time with you… Better than any other first date I’ve had, actually”
“I’m not insulted, I asked, didn’t I?” I smiled, “I had a great time too”
… “Your mom can’t be the over-protective type” he said as he got up from the ground twenty minutes later. “I was supposed to be home at 11 and I’m older than you”
“No, she’s not. I have a feeling New Jersey’s about to change that” I laughed and he stretched out his hand to help me up. I took it and as I straightened up, his face came dangerously close to mine. I took a step back, giggling as his normally pale cheekbones now were slightly pink. I looked at my watch and saw it was 11.20.
“You know, you were supposed to be home 20 minutes ago”
“I know”
“So… we better get home, then?”
“I guess” he agreed, but stood still.
“And you’re not moving because…?”
“Because I wanna ask you if you wanna come over to my house tomorrow, but I’m scared my heart will break if you say no” he said dramatically and I was just gonna tell him I could come, when I suddenly remembered something my mom said a few hours earlier.
We’re going over for dinner tomorrow anyway, so I can talk to Donna about her naughty son then.
“I can’t turn you down even if I wanted to” I laughed, “Linda and I are apparently invited over for dinner at your house tomorrow”
“Ah, cool… You better pray it’s my mom who’s cooking, my dad’s terrible at it” he said as we walked back to the asphalted street in the park. The sun had gone down some minutes ago and the only thing that was enlightening our way was the streetlights since the moon’s light couldn’t break through the vault of leaves and branches above us.
“I think I’ll survive. Linda can’t even make pancakes… But she’s good at ordering pizza though”
Gerard laughed, “Your mom sounds so cool… And you don’t need to endure having a pain in the ass brother either”
“Yeah, poor you” I smirked, “But yeah, Linda’s cool… She’s more of a best friend than a mom, really. Hopefully you’ll get to meet her properly some day”
“And hopefully, you’ll avoid seeing my family all too much… They’ll get on your nerves, trust me”
“Mikey seems kinda okay though”
“Urgh, Mikey’s the worst” Gerard sighed. I recognized the houses around us and realized that we had reached our street. I felt suddenly disappointed, like I didn’t want to go home, I wanted to stay out with Gerard and talk. We stopped outside the fence of his house, seeing as his house was a few houses away from mine and we reached his first.
“So… we’re here” he said, smiling, “I really had a great time”
“So did I” I smiled back, “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”
“Yeah,” he said, leaning forward and gave me a quick hug, “Bye Frank”
“Frankie,” I corrected him, “Bye!”
He disappeared into the shadows in his garden and when I heard his front door close, I snapped out of my thoughts and went home.
… Linda was seated in the couch with a bowl of popcorn in her lap and was watching some lame comedy.
“Hey honey” she said, twisting her neck to look at me as I entered the room, the flickering lights from the tv casting distorted shadows over her face. Normally, on a Friday night, she’d be upstairs in her bedroom and reading some novel, but I had a pretty good feeling she had wanted to question me about my evening.
“Hey” I answered, watching her put the tv on mute and patting on the couch next to her.
“Come, sit down” she said, beckoning, “I wanna hear every god damn detail!”
Smiling and rolling my eyes, I took my seat next to her and as I sat, she looked at me with a blank expression. I furrowed my eyebrows and cocked my head to the side and she sighed impatiently.
“Spill!”
“Oh, right…” I said slowly, acting dumb, “So… What do you want me to tell you?”
“Everything!” she exclaimed, throwing her arms up in the air, failing to keep her patient surface. “What did you do? What did he say? Was he nice? Do you like him? Did you kiss? Where did you go? Did-“
“Linda!” I laughed and she fell silent. “I’m tired and all I really wanna do is to go to bed, so can you please pick out the most important questions and then we’ll take the rest tomorrow?”
“Fine,” she said grumpily, “What did you do?”
“We went to a movie and then to this really cool glade right next to a lake” I said, keeping it short just to annoy her. “More questions?”
“What did you talk about?”
“Geeky stuff” I said, grinning at the mere thought of when we talked about Spiderman or some other things that I knew mom would never understand.
“So…” she said slowly, “You like him?”
“He’s cool…” I said slowly, looking at a very interesting thread that was sticking out of my jeans. I felt her eyes on me and I slowly raised my head, only to notice that she was smirking teasingly. “What?”
“Frankie’s in luuhve!” she sang, laughing as I blushed. I protested weakly, but still knowing all to well that when her ‘thirteen-year-old-girl phase’ started, there was nothing I could do but run.
“G’night” I said quickly, jumping up from the couch, still with her laughing next to me. She caught my arm, but she didn’t pull me back down, she just held on to it.
“Just one more question,” she said, still giggling slightly, “Did he kiss you?”
“I just met the guy! It was our first date, not everyone’s acting like a whore on there dates, you know”
“True, true…” she giggled, letting go of my arm, “Well, I’m glad you had a good time, otherwise I’d be going alone tomorrow… Good night, sprout”
*
[A/N I know I said I would stop with these messages but yeh. XD I'm going to L.A. tonight and will be there for 12 days, so no updates 'til I get home... ;__; But when I do, you'll get a double update. XD Bye! <3 xo - And thanks for commenting and reading! :''D]