Love Has No Age

When we were at the field, we sat down in a small circle. “I already told you what to do.” Said Natalie with an annoyed voice. “Just make as if you don’t know everyone knows.”

“But that’s not going to work.” I told her. “I’m sure Ashley will torture me until I tell her that I’m going with him.” I paused to take a breath. “And when I tell her then she’s going to kill me.”

“You’re such a drama queen.” Josh rolled his eyes. “Just do what Natalie says.”

“But what if that doesn’t work?” I asked desperate.

“Well, in that case,” Josh rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “you should run away from Ashley and go look for Justin.” He finished song-singly.

I arched a brow. Is he serious? “What?”

“Yes!” Natalie shrieked. “That will work!” She went on. “She won’t be able to bother you during class, so when the class finishes if she says anything to you, you just run and look for Justin!”

“Are you both talking seriously?” I couldn’t believe what they were saying. “That’s the lamest plan I have ever heard.”

“Oh, come on.” Josh pocked me in the arm. “Don’t be such a child.” He kidded. “Just try it ok?”

I let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine, fine.” I shook my head in defeat. “I’ll try.” I rolled my eyes. “But if that doesn’t work, then you will have to help me to think of a better plan, okay?”

“Okay.” They happily sang in unison.

At that moment the bell rang telling that the lunchtime had ended. The three of us stood up and began walking towards the building. All the way towards it I kept praying that their plan would work.

*****
I arrived to the Math class and sat in my usual seat next to the window. I placed my things on top of the desk and plugged my earphones in my ears. I pressed shuffle and “The Town’s Been Talking” from The Maine began blasting in my ears. Ha ha ha. This is so funny. The song kept playing until someone tapped, it was more like hit, my shoulder. No, please don’t let it be her.

I turned and saw Ashley’s angry face glaring at me. I unplugged one of my earphones out and waited for her to begin.

“What do you want?” I asked, as she didn’t speak a single word.

She took a deep breath to begin her speech, but before she could start the teacher entered the classroom saving me from the annoying doll.

“Please take your seats.” He announced his arrival. “Today we’ll see geometry.” A communal groan sounded all over the classroom, mine included. Phew. At least I can just ignore Ashley for the rest of the class.

All of the class went by quickly, and when it finished I gathered my things and walked towards the door as fast as I could, but a voice stopped me in my tracks.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Ashley’s squeal said. “I just wanna ask you something.” She walked to where I was. “Who do you think you are?”

She actually had curiosity in her eyes. Oh my God. “Excuse me?” Was the only thing that my voice could say.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” She made that annoying sound with her tounge. “Rae, Rae, Rae.” Jesus. Please make her stop. “Do you think I’m an idiot?”

A contained laugh escaped my lips without me noticing. It was just too uncontrollable for me to handle.

Her eyes opened as big as plates and her mouth dropped a bit. “Excuse me?” She asked with a tone of indignation.

“U...Um.” I stammered. What do I do now?

“Is everything okay?” A smooth voice sounded by my side. I turned around and saw Justin staring at the both of us frowning.

“Oh, yes.” Ashley’s voice transformed from menacing to sickly sweet. “Why wouldn’t it be?” She put a strand of her dyed blond hair behind her ear in what she probably thought would be a flirting way. I just rolled my eyes.

“Um...Well, okay.” Justin said with a slight shrug. “Would you mind leaving us alone for a moment?” He asked Ashley in a polite way. “I wanna talk to Rae in private.”

Once again, her face became totally surprised: enormous eyes, mouth even more dropped, and an offended look in her eyes. But even though she was offended by the fact that Justin wanted to talk to me alone, she faked her voice into the same sickly sweet from before. “Of course, yeah, no problem.” With that she walked away with her clone barbies behind her.

“Well, thanks for that.” I smiled and gave a lttle laugh.

“It’s okay.” He smiled too. “I can’t stand that girl.” Wow. Even though he can’t stand her, he treats her with lots of respect.

“What was what you wanted to talk to me about?”

“Oh. Yeah, right.” He looked left and right. “I think that everybody in the school, or at least the girls, already know that we are going to the dance togehter.” He began. “And I think it’s my fault.” He looked guilty.

I just looked at him, surprised.

“I wanted to apologize, because of me things like that will happen to you.”

I laughed. He looked at me puzzled. “Don’t worry.” I said. “I’ve been in worst situations than that,” I explained. “I can handle it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yep.”

“Well, then just let me invite you to eat something after school as a way of paying my error.” He offered.

I can’t say no, can I? “Okay.” I gave in.

“Then I’ll see you at the entrance when classes are over.”

“See you there.”

He turned around and began walking away towards his next class. I smiled. Wait, why am I smiling? I bit my lower lip to stop it. Okay, just concentrate in your classes.

I also began walking to my next class, but while I walked I couldn’t stop wondering what that funny feeling in my stomach was.

*****
The next classes went by slowly. Ashley didn’t say a thing, but always glared at me. At Literature class, I sat with Natalie and Josh.

“I can’t believe you were right.” I mumbled when we had placed our things on our desks.

“What do you mean?” Josh looked at me with a frown.

“Your plan worked.” I looked at the floor.

“HA!” Natalie shrieked. “See? You should have listened to us.” She smiled triunfantly.

“Yeah, yeah.” I rolled my eyes. “I know.”

“So?” Josh said. “Tell us what happened.”

So I did. I told them how Ashley had intercepted me when I was walking out of the classroom and how Justin had come to save me. “And then he invited me to eat something when school ends.”

Natalie’s face was lit up as a freaking star. “AAAHHH!” She screamed and made some of the faces turn to look at us, fortunately the teacher hadn’t arrived yet. “Seriously?!”

“Yep.” I smiled. What? I was happy. “Except I don’t know what that’ll make Ashley do to me.” I arched a brow, thinking. “Well, it doesn’t worry me too much, since Justin will protect me.” I joked. We all laughed.

“You don’t need to worry.” Natalie assured me. “I’m sure my brother will protect you.”

“I wonder where he’ll take you.” Josh nudged me in the ribs, I jumped and laughed.

“Stop that!” I complained getting his hands off my sides. He just laughed. I glared at him. “I’m ticklish and you know it.”

“That’s why it’s so fun to do it.” He began tickling me again. At that moment Mr. Thompson entered the classroom and saved me from my attacker.

“Hello guys.” He said while putting some books on top of his desk. “Sorry I’m late.” He laughed a bit.

Mr. Thompson is like twenty five years old and the most amazing teacher I’ve ever known. He likes music like ‘Pixies’ and ‘Deftones’, not to mention that he is very cute. Every single girl in the school likes him, and I don’t blame them, I like him too. He looks like he’s nineteen or twenty, he’s tall, tanned and has an amazing pair of blue eyes. Even Josh likes him.

But instead of some idiot girls, like Ashley, I obviosuly don’t think that he’ll ever put any attention to me. He’s just good to watch.

“So, today we’re going to talk about Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”.” He began. I could see his eyes flicker slightly towards Natalie’s direction. Huh? “Natalie.” He finally said. “What do you think about Romeo’s position in the situation that both their families doesn’t allow them to be together?”

I turned to see Natalie. Her blush was way more intense than I had ver seen it before.

“U...Umm.” She stuttered. “Well, I think that Romeo will never give up the one who he truly loves,” Her voice had a hint of determination in it. “I think he will always follow what his heart and feelings tell him, even if there are a million barriers that will want to stop him,” She was getting inspirated, I could tell. “he has enough determination and strength to get over them and find his true love.” She took a deep breath before ending her speech. “That’s why I admire him the most.”

Every person in the class was staring at Natalie, speechless. When she noticed this, her blush became even darker and she looked away from Mr. Thompson. He cleared his throat and made everyone put their attention back on him.

“Thanks Natalie.” He said. “That was a very speech.” I could see a very light blusa in his cheeks. Okay. THAT was weird.

After that the class went by smoothly, in the middle of it I scribbled a message in a piece of paper and passed it to Natalie. I wrote:

What was that?!

A few seconds later she tapped my shoulder and passed me the paper. In te paper said:

What was what?

I rolled my eyes at her note and wrote back:

You know exactly what I’m talking about.

I passed it to her and waited for her answer. When she gave it back, I read:

Ok. You got me. I’ll tell you later ok? When you come back from your date with Justin.

I sighed and gave the paper back where I had wrote:

Fine. But that is NOT a date.

I could hear her giggle. She came forward a bit and whispered in my ear. “You know it is.” When she said this I could feel the blush rising to my face. Just calm down. It is NOT a date, ok? He just wants to apologize, that’s all.

I sighed and began putting attention to the class, although it was kind of difficult with all those thoughts passing by my mind, and when the class was finally over, Josh and I went directly towards Natalie.

“What was that?!” Josh asked lifting his eyebrows.

“I-I...” Natalie was all read and began stammering. She was extremely nervous.

“Don’t worry.” I put my hand in her shoulder. “You’ll tell us today when I get back from eating with Justin, right Josh?” I sent him a meaningful look, which probably he didn’t get.

“What?” He asked, puzzled. “Are we meeting somewhere?”

I mentaly smacked my hand in my forehead. “Yes Josh, you are cordially invited to come to my house when I come back from the lunch with Justin.” I said. “I’ll text you both when I get there so you can come, ok?”

“Ok.” They said in unison. Natalie seemed to be a lot more calmed than before.

“Lets hurry up, or we’ll be late for our class.” I smiled at them, and we began walking to each of our classes.

*****
When classes were over, the funny feeling in my stomach came back to me. Jeez, just calm down!

Before I could get to the entrance of the school, I saw from affar that Justin was already there, waiting for me. The feeling in my stomach only intensified when I saw him.

I began walking again towards the entrance when I noticed that there was someone else with him. They were two girls from a year below from mine. I frowned and got closer, without them noticing.

“I-I just wanted to ask you if you wanted to go out with me today.” I heard one of the girl’s soft voice ask. When she said that my stomach began doing flip-flops in itself. What is wrong with me?

“I’m sorry.” I heard Justin’s voice answer. “But I’ve already got plans for today.” I could notice that he didn’t want to hurt the girl. “Sorry.” He repeated.

“N-No... It’s okay.” The girl finished.

I heard footsetps coming towards me, then the girls appeared entering the school. One of them had her face as red as a tomatoe, and the other one had an arm around the first one’s back.

“Oh Kat.” The second one said. “He just can’t see how awesome you are.”

“You think?” Kat asked a bit insecure.

“Of course.” The other one comforted her. “I’m sure that if he hadn’t other plans already he would have said yes.”

Kat looked at her friend with hope in he reyes. “Maybe I should ask him again.”

“Totally.” Her friend assured her.

They kept talking, but they were too far now and I couldn’t hear what they said. It surprised me that they didn’t even see me. I had been getting death glares all day, at least from the girls.

I walked to where Justin was. “Hey.”

“Hey.” He said turning around to see me.

“What was that?” I frowned.

“Oh. You saw that?” He blushed slightly. “Just a girl that asked me out.” He looked away.

“Just a girl?” I gave him a mocking look.

“Yeah.” He blushed a bit harder. “They just don’t get that I’m not interested on any of them.”

I gave a slight laugh. “Then you’re not interested on anybody.” I said kind of sarcastically. Why did I said that? I shouldn’t have said that!

“Uh...” He doubted. “Kind of.” Kind of? What is that supposed to mean?

“Kind of?” I lifted an eyebrow. He just nodded. He looks so cute when he’s embarrased. I smiled at the thought.

He cleared his throaght. “Should we go?” I nodded and followed him across the parking lot.

“Did Natalie borrowed you her car?” I asked.

“Yep.” He answered more calmly. “She said she was going with Josh to his house.” He explained.

“Oh.” I murmured. We got to where Natalie’s car was parked and got in it. “So.” I buckled my seat belt. “How long have you been driving?”

“Just a while.” He laughed slightly. “I still need more practice though.” He started the engine. “Do you drive?”

“Yeah.” I answered. “I know how, but I don’t have a care yet.” I told him. “Ian and my mom told me that they would give me a car when I turned eighteen and already had a job.” I continued. “So I still have to find a job and wait til I’m eighteen.”

“And when is your birthday?” He asked as he drove out of the school’s parking lot.

“February fourteenth.” I answered.

“St. Valentine’s day?” He asked a bit surprised. “How does it feel to have your birthday on St. Valentine’s day?”

“Well, the only people that remember are Ian,my mom, Natalie, Josh and Harry, so I never get anything too big.” I laughed carelessly.

He gave me a quick look of curiosity. “You never get anything too big?” He repeated. “What does that mean?”

I thought a little. “It means that I only get a small cake made by my mom, and a present from herself and Ian.” I explained. “I also get a small thing from Natalie and Josh, and they go to my house to eat the cake.” I said. “Nothing too big” I smiled.

“Hmmm...” He hummed. “Who’s Harry?”

He caught me by surprise, so it took me a little time to answer. “He’s just a friend and my neighbour.” I said. “And I’ll probably ask him for a job where he works.”

“Where does he work?” He asked curiously.

“At the mall’s Starbucks.”

He gave a small laugh. “That’s where i’m taking you.” He said. “Natalie told me that you liked it very much.” He gave me a quick look with the corner of his eye and blushed slightly.

I blushed too. “Yeah, I like it.” I said. “And now you’ll probably meet Harry.”

We arrived the mall and he drove towards the parking lot. Let’s see how this lunch turns out.