Arranged Fate

The next morning, the ringing of my cell phone wakes me up. I groan loudly, rolling over to grab it off my side table. I don’t bother looking at the caller ID as I click the answer button and hold it up to my ear.

“Hello?” I answer groggily.

“You’re late,” Maria sings into the phone. My eyes shoot open and I glance at the clock on my side table. It’s 12 in the afternoon?

“Shit!” I curse, sitting up in bed. “I’ll be there in… Shit!” I repeat, remembering last night’s events. I can’t leave Oliver here all alone. And I sure as hell can’t bring him with me to the mall to meet Maria. She would flip out!

“Is something wrong?” My friend asks.

“Um, no. Everything is fine. I’m going to be a little later than I thought…” I say, chewing on my lip as I look at the wall that separates my room from Oliver’s. I wonder if he even stayed… “I’ll call you when I’m on my way.”

“Alright,” Maria sighs. We say our goodbyes and then end the call. As soon as the line goes dead, I hop out of my bed and hurry over to Oliver’s door. He had closed it last night and mentioned sleeping in his boxers. Knocking was probably a good idea.

“Oliver,” I call through the door as I knock on it. I don’t hear anything from inside the room, but I finally notice the sound coming from downstairs. It’s the sound of the TV. I know I hadn’t turned it on so it had to have been Oliver.

“Down stairs, Annie!” He calls out, confirming my thoughts.

I try not to let myself smile as I descend the staircase and find Oliver lounging on couch in the clothes he was wearing yesterday. It finally hit me that if he was going to stay here for a while, we were going to need to get him clothes.

“Good morning,” Oliver smiled at me as I walked closer to him.

“You stayed,” I smile.

“I told you I would,” He says, patting the seat next to him. I gladly sit down and glance at the TV.

“SpongeBob?” I chuckle.

“Don’t judge the sponge,” Oliver says, flicking my arm. I laugh again.

“I would have pegged you more for a COPS kind of guy,” I say, leaning against the back of the couch.

“Good show,” He says with a nod. “But it wasn’t on and it looks like someone likes SpongeBob so much, that they’ve been recording every episode.” He brings up the DVR list to prove his point.

“Okay, you’ve caught me. I’m a closeted SpongeBob addict,” I say with a smirk before taking the remote from him. “What can I say? It’s a good show.”

“And I would have pegged you as Vampire Diaries kind of girl,” He joked, nudging my shoulder with his.

“Do not get me started on that show,” I groan, tossing my head back. “I used to think it was such a good show. But then, season 3 came out. Everyone knew Elena was eventually going to be a vampire. If she didn’t, there would be no show. But now, Nina is horrible at acting. I don’t know what happened but she’s just so terrible! I hate it. Damon is way too sexy for someone like Elena anyways.” I finish my rant with a long sigh.

The room grows quiet, the only sound coming from the TV. I turn my head to see Oliver staring at me with an amused look.

“Man, you can really talk.”

“Haven’t you heard? Girls talk way too much,” I say sarcastically. “If you get me going on something, I won’t shut up.”

“I’ll have to keep that in mind.” He chuckles.

My phone suddenly vibrates in my hand. Maria’s name flashes on the screen, along with a text that asks me if I’m even coming to the mall.

“Shit,” I sigh.

“What?” Oliver asks. “Boyfriend?”

I snort, “Yeah, right. No, it’s my friend Maria. We were supposed to go shopping today.”

“Great! I need some clothes since I don’t plan on going home any time soon,” Oliver smiles.

“Oh, no, slow your roll. There is no way I can bring you to meet Maria!” I exclaim, turning my body to face him. “She would go insane. She would call my dad. I would be grounded for the rest of my life!”

“Whoa, Annie, calm down,” Oliver chuckles, placing his hands on my shoulders. I took a deep breath to calm myself down before he continued. “I’ll just go with you and then go off on my own until you’re ready to go.”

I nod my head, “Okay. That works.”

I don’t know what it is about Oliver. But I really don’t want someone taking him away from me so soon.

“I’ll go get dressed then,” I say, standing from the couch. “I’ll be down in like five minutes.”

“That’s funny. When a girl says five minutes, she usually means two hours!” He calls after me as I run up the stairs.

“Same thing,” I laugh before closing the door to my bedroom. Thankful that I had showered last night before going bowling, I went straight to my closet to find something to wear. When Maria and I went to the mall, it was usually just to try everything on. So jeans and sneakers were out of the question.

I settled on a pair of yoga pants, some fuzzy boots, and a long sleeved shirt. After getting dressed, I pulled my hair into a side bun and then got to work on my makeup.

10 minutes later, I hurried down the stairs and found Oliver in the same place I left him. He looked up at me in shock from the couch.

“You’re ready?”

“And about 1 hour and 50 minutes early,” I say with a wink. “Now, come on, we have a long walk ahead of us.”

“Excuse me, walk?” Oliver asks, turning the TV off and standing up. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Nope,” I answer. “I don’t drive.”

Oliver opens his mouth to say something, but then closes it when words fail him. I stare at him with and eye brow raised before he finally finds the right words.

“I’m calling a cab. We’re going to stop by my house, pick up my car and then we can go to the mall.”

“Because going to the place you ran away from is such a smart idea,” I comment.

“It’s noon. Both of my parents will be out of the house by now. It’s safe to go grab my car,” He says, pulling out his phone. I don’t say anymore as he calls up a cab and repeats my address as I tell it to him. “They’ll be here in 12 minutes.”