Encounters

After my little encounter with Dylan, I rushed up to my room to obsess over my outfit, makeup, and hair. The typical thing a pretentious young adult with self-esteem issues would do.

"Why did I bring such shitty clothes?" I asked myself. Staring at my suitcase didn't come to a conclusion of which outfit to wear; I often just zoned out completely. I grew disgusted with myself for stressing over something so insignificant, so I threw on a white sundress.

I took so much time deciding what to wear that I didn't have any time to do my hair or makeup. Hope he doesn't like me for my looks- but then again, he did see me with sand in my mouth and still insisted on doing whatever this was.

I was just about to walk out the door to meet him when my mom stopped me in my tracks. "Where are you going? We're going down to the beach." she said, looking kind of disgusted.

I chose my words carefully. "Well I've already been down there and I don't feel well, so I thought I'd go get some ice cream."

"Oh okay. Well, be careful."

Wow, she really left me alone. I was more shocked than relieved, grabbing my purse and heading out the door.

My pace was quicker than usual and I kept tripping over myself. My hands were shaking and my face was on fire. I stepped into the elevator, realizing that I was running short on time to compose myself.

I'm having a panic attack.

I stepped into the elevator and stared at the mirrored walls, but I wasn't looking at myself. I was looking past the reflection, and reflecting into my mind. I thought about how ridiculous and pathetic this was, freaking out over something as small as going to get ice cream with a guy.

But it was Dylan O'Brien.

But he is a human being.

I was so lost in thought that I hadn't realized my little episode had passed. Just in time, too.

The elevator doors opened and I saw him pacing back and forth in the lobby. He looked up and saw me immediately, flashing that smile. He looked nice, even better than before, without all the sand in his face.

"So where to?" I casually asked as I stepped towards him. "I thought we agreed on ice cream?" he asked, looking confused. "Yeah, but there's, like a million ice cream parlors located around a beach. Duh, O'Brien."

I must've caught him off guard, because he stuttered what seemed like twenty times before he finally replied. "A-ah h-ha, y-yeah, you got me there. We'll just walk to the nearest one I guess."

Sure enough, there was an ice cream shoppe right around the corner of our hotel. "Guess you were right, Anna." He smirked.

After we sat down with our ice cream cones, Dylan attempted small talk.

"So how long are you here for?" he asked. "About a month," I replied. "Same," he said, adding, "You're acting much different than you were earlier. Care to explain why?" He licked a drip of ice cream from the cone to save it from falling onto the table. I almost lost it when I saw his tongue.

"Well I was a bit frazzled." Frazzled? The fuck kind of diction is that? I needed to get a grip on myself.

"Frazzled?" He laughed at my choice of word, hysterically might I add.

"Well I was caught off guard, in shock, etcetera. Whatever figure of speech you prefer." I had to tone down these smart ass comments, but it was hard since it's my only defense.

"Better than frazzled." He grinned. "But seriously, you're much more bold than I initially thought."

"I'll take that as a compliment. My personality tends to change according to how comfortable I am around a person." I added as I took my last bite of my cone.

He pondered on that for a moment, then finally asked, "So on a scale of 1-10, how comfortable are you with me at this moment?"

I wanted to say -3, because that was the truth. But I played it cool and shyly said "2."

He nodded, and as he got up to throw away what was left of his cone, he leaned down and whispered into my ear, "Keep me up to date on that number."

My face, no-my entire body was on fire at this point. This boy was going to kill me. It's only been one day and he has me burning up like a furnace.

He pulled me out of my thoughts when I heard him yell, "Come on! Too much to see, too much to do."

~

The remainder of the day was spent walking down the main strip, getting to know one another. A knot in my stomach loosened as I talked to him more and more. Unfortunately there were about twenty more knots that were yet to be untied. He asked me tons of questions about myself, and even though I didn't ask nearly as many as he did, I felt like I really knew him on another level.

After wandering around aimlessly, he suggested we walked back to our hotel on the beach. We walked to one of the public beach entrances and I took off my sandals, carrying them in my hand as I trudged through the sand. I didn't have the guts to look directly at him, so I pretended to glance at the sun setting over the ocean every thirty seconds or so.

After 2 minutes of silence, he said, "Let's stop here and sit for a minute." he sounded like he wanted to talk to me about something, which made me nervous, but I obliged and plopped down on the sand, him following a second later and sitting exceptionally close to me. I breathed in the relaxing silence, but with Dylan I could tell that wouldn't last long.

"So, what do you want to get out of life?" He blurted out. I turned to him, narrowing my eyes questioningly at him. "Sorry, that uh, may have sounded deep. You just seem like the kind of person to have it all figured out. I wanted to see what that was like."

I thought about that for a minute, and I was quickly confused. He was the successful actor who was looking at a promising future, and he wonders what it's like to have it all figured out, as if I do? i honestly don't know what the hell I'm doing in life, so how did I come off that way? I wanted to think more, but he had this terrified look of suspense on his face when I turned towards him.

And then it just came to me.

"No one truly knows what they're gonna do in life, they only have ideas about it. As for me? I don't have one clue, O'Brien. But I'll letcha know when I do get one." I sighed.

"You're so cute," he chuckled out. "All deep and shit."

"You're welcome, by the way." I regretted taking his question so seriously.

"I'm sorry. The question was totally serious. I value your answer, though. Seems like a big internal conflict you're dealing with." He looked over at me with understanding eyes.

"Yeah well, that's for another day." My eyes shifted to the ocean to avoid talking about it anymore.

He seemed to be in a curious mood, asking another personal question. "So earlier today you seemed like a different person, all clumsy and quiet. But now you're, I don't know- witty and quirky. You finally getting used to me yet?"

"I'm working on it. I'm at a solid 0 at this point."

"That doesn't sound like a work in progress."

"I was at -3." I turned to him and smiled.

He laid his hand on top of mine, curling his fingers around my palm. He leaned toward me while he whispered, "I'm not that special." He had a sincere look in his eye that insinuated that the comment wasn't meant for attention; It was genuine.

I looked down at our hands now; they were intertwined. Electricity formed in my hand and traveled through my body, stopping at my head and remaining there. He must've seen how red I looked, because he let a snarky laugh loose when he was obviously trying to hide it.

I stood up, offering my hand to help him up. He took it, but let go immediately once he stood up.

I felt like a bold 4 at this moment, and without even thinking about what I was saying, blurted out my long awaited question. "Are you just messing with me?" He stopped walking and turned around to face me.

"Why would you think something like that?" He seemed offended, and I regretted my outburst immediately.

"You just laughed at me a lot today..." I trailed off, digging my toes in the sand.

"I laughed because you were funny.. You're a very paranoid person, aren't you?" he asked, pointing at me and taking a few steps toward me.

I just shrugged and rolled my eyes, because he was definitely in my bubble now and I couldn't find the courage to force words out of my mouth.

Then he did something I'd never have expected.

He lifted my chin with two fingers, looked me directly in the eye and said, "I'm so glad I hit you with a frisbee."