From Teammates to Best Friends to Boyfriends?

I pulled out my school athletics jacket of my closet and pulled it on in a happy mood. The weather man said that it was supposed to storm today, but the rainy weather didn’t put a damper on my mood. Nothing could unless Garret tells me he changes his mind.

Last night, Garret called me like he said he would and told me he would go on the date! He said he’d give it a try and I was happy that he was trying for me. Who knows, he might like it; the idea of us being a thing or whatever. I know I do. So I told him the date would be on Friday and that I would give him the time when I actually planned what we were going to do, but he doesn’t know that I hadn’t actually planned something. I told him it’s a surprise, but I can’t come up with anything cool and fun honestly. Last night, I spent like an hour thinking of what we could do before I fell asleep.

I was picking up Garret this morning and I didn’t want to be late, so I headed to the kitchen and grabbed a Pepsi and a pop tart and headed to the living room. Sammy was sitting on the couch with a bowl of Fruity Pebbles in his lap.

I sat beside him and noticed he was watching Scooby Doo. “Hey, bro.”

“Hey.” He said very quietly. I could tell something was upsetting him. He’s usually a very happy kid in the morning.

“What’s wrong?” I opened the pop tart package and began eating one. Sammy sighed.

“I don’t want to go to school today.” He admitted.

“Why?” What about school could be bothering him? He’s only in the third grade.

“We started learning how to write in cursive and there’s this girl that makes fun of the way I write. She says I write like a kindergartener. And she showed me her paper and her writing is so pretty and mine’s crap and her friend laughed at me.”

I chuckled at his little story and said, “Don’t sweat about it. She’s probably just likes you or something.”

“But why does she make fun of my cursive?”

“Uh, girls have better handwriting than boys, Sammy. I promised you if you looked at Justin’s handwriting, its bad looking too.” I said, just trying to get a smile back on his face. If I’m happy on this cloudy day, then I want my brother to be happy right now too.

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

He smiled. “Okay. I’ll look at his paper today and see.”

I nodded and drank my soda before going back to my room to get my backpack.

“Where’s dad at?” I asked Sammy once I was back in the living room.

“Momma and daddy went to work. They said you had to take me to school.”

I tilted my head.

“Really? They didn’t even tell me.” I frowned.

Sammy laughed. “They told me to tell you when you got up, but I forgot. But then you just reminded me.” He giggled.

“Well, are you almost done? I have to go pick up Garret before I drop you off.”

He stood up and walked to the kitchen to go put his bowl in the sink. He came back to the living room and grabbed his backpack.

“Ready!” He shouted.

I chuckled and we headed to the door. I locked up and made my way to my truck. Sammy was already standing by it, ready for me to unlock it.

“Hurry up, slow poke!” He stomped in his spot, getting impatient.

I laughed. “What happened to not wanting to go?” I muttered. When we’re in the truck, Sammy turned the radio to his favorite station, a country one. I was okay with it, but some songs can get annoying. When I pulled up to Garret’s house, I texted him I was outside and a few minutes later, he was coming out. He was wearing a school jacket too, but his had a different design on the front. I still laughed at the fact that we kind of matched though. Sammy scooted over to sit in the middle and Garret came in. He seemed a little surprised to see Sammy. He always liked Sammy and Sammy always liked Garret. I was glad that they got along very well and Sammy even once said Garret was like a second brother. He smiled at Sammy and said hey to him and looked up at me and gave me a smile too. I tried not to let the fact that Garret was acting normal get to my head, but I couldn’t help it. I was just really happy that he was okay with me liking him. I bet other guys wouldn’t act like he did if their best friend admitted they had feelings for them. And because of that, I’m happy that Garret’s my friend, and he an understanding guy.

I drove to the elementary and dropped off Sammy. He waved us off and walked inside. I drove away from the elementary and headed to the high school that was about fifteen minutes away and on the other side of the main highway. Garret quietly hummed to a pop song once he changed the station. I glanced over at him a few times, but I don’t think he noticed because he was staring out the window and it looked like his mind was elsewhere.

I wanted to thank him for being so kind yesterday and okay with the situation, so that’s what I did right before we left my truck. I stopped him from getting out by placing my hand on his shoulder. He paused and looked at it and I pulled it back, feeling like he wanted it off. I suddenly felt out of place, even though I’m in my own truck.

“I – uh . . . I just wanted to say thank you . . . for understanding and nice about it yesterday. You could have pushed me away and hate me, but you didn’t. I’m still shocked that you even agreed to the date; giving me a chance. I just wanted you to know that.” I said this all while looking at my steering wheel. I couldn’t face him while I was confessing this to him.

“It’s okay, and you’re welcome.” He said in a sweet voice. I looked up and turned my head to see his was giving me a comforting smile. He could probably tell I was still nervous about talking about my feelings and thoughts. He gave my knee a pat, which excited me for some stupid reason and grabbed his backpack.

We got out and headed to the gym, where we knew our friends would be. Chandler and Liam were sitting down on the bleachers. We walked up the bleachers to where they were and Liam made eye contact with me first and smiled.

I had called Liam right after school yesterday to tell him how I confessed to Garret and he rubbed it into my face about how he was right that I would feel relieved. When he switched his attention to Garret, Garret said hey. Last night, I told Garret how Liam knew about my feelings for him the whole time. Garret said he had a feeling that Liam did and laughed about it. He told me how Liam almost gave me away, and I told him how I already knew. I loved how Garret was acting okay with all of this.

I got out my phone and texted Liam: Garret knows that you know, dude. Told him last night . . . but don’t talk about it in front of Chandler.

I put my phone up, and a few seconds later his phone went off. Meanwhile, Garret and Chandler were talking about tomorrow’s game. Which reminds me, I still need to talk about quitting with Coach. I figured I would play tomorrow’s game and on Thursday I would go to Coach and quit.

Liam looked down at me since he was sitting on the bleacher behind me. He nodded and turned back to the other’s conversation, but I just sat there and played a game on my phone and waited to be dismissed to go to first period.