"Oh my god, you're Joey Wheeler!" I stood there in awe of the man standing before me. I hadn't seen him in years, not since we both graduated from Domino High. He turned to face me, grinning coyly.
"Yea, that's me! You must want an autograph." He pulled a pen from his back pocket and twirled it in his fingers.
"Not exactly." He froze and dropped the pen, looking at me embarrassed. "I'm here to duel you!"
"Oh, well, heh! Sure!" He leaned forward, scratching his head and eyed me up and down, looking at me quizzically. "Have we met?"
I smiled, thinking of all those times during school I would sit there watching him while he took notes. His brows always pulled together in concentration as if he never really fully understood the information. He used to make these cute clueless faces when the teacher would call on him in class. I bit my lip and glanced down, hoping he couldn't see the blush rise in my cheeks. "No, not really. But we did go to school together."
"Oh, I remember you. From Domino High, right?! You were that quiet girl that sat in the front in every class. You graduated with honors and everything, didn't you? I didn't know you were a duelist! You're in the tournament today?"
"Well, it's only a hobby, but I should be asking you the same question. Aren't you like number three in the nation? This little tournament is kinda beneath you, isn't it? We don't even use duel disks here."
He scratched his head coyly again, laughing lightly. "Sometimes I just like to take a break from the big tournaments. They're kinda stressful if you can believe it. Sometimes it's fun to just slum it and come to one of these small card shop tourneys."
"So you have no problem dueling me, then, right?" I sat down at the dueling table next to us as the other duelists began their duels and gestured to the seat across from me. Some of them kept glancing up at us, wondering, I'm sure, what big shot Joey Wheeler was doing here. I was eager to get started, though. I didn't like all these people staring at me and I just wanted to duel.
"Well, yeah, I suppose." He sat down across from me, smiling mischievously. He was silent for a while, with his arms crossed over his chest, surveying me. I eyed him suspiciously, wondering what he was thinking.
"What? You think you're gonna beat me fast, don't cha?"
He laughed lightly. "No, it's not that."
"Then what?"
"Don't worry about it, let's duel!"
I was still curious as to what he was thinking, but I let it go once we started shuffling our cards. I couldn't believe it. I was finally getting the chance to duel the one and only Joey Wheeler. My high school crush and, not to mention, one of the greatest duelists in the country! I was in such awe of the moment that I lost nearly half my life points in the first two plays. I wasn't going to let him win, though, and I focused on my hand after that. I fared quite well for the rest of the duel, and even managed to take him down to 4200 life points before he blasted me away using his Graceful Dice card. He leaned back in his chair and hooked his arm over the back while I sat there clutching my last hand in my fist. He took me down so easily, I was so sure I could beat him. I had been practicing so much and coming up with so many great strategies, yet he beat me so easily. I was so embarrassed the duel was so short. I had been working on this deck for months and it wasn't even any competition for Joey's deck. I looked up at him quickly and saw him staring at me, a big goofy smile across his face. I shook my head quickly and hastily started collecting my cards. I had to get out of here.
"I'm impressed." I froze and looked up at him.
"What?"
"You. How many years has it been since high school? And you're finally talking to me?"
"W-what?"
"I'm not as stupid as you think, ya know. Everyone knew you had a thing for me. You were pretty obvious with the way you stared at me over your textbooks in phys. ed." He giggled lightly and I sat there, petrified. How could he have noticed? I always thought I was hiding it so well. "You're an impressive duelist for a novice. Most don't last as long as you did." I looked down, blushing lightly.
"Thanks," I mumbled. He grinned at me goofily, rapping his knuckles on the table. I fumbled with my cards, a few of the falling to the floor. I thought I finally had the courage to talk to him, but of course he still made me feel the same way as he always did, like a big wobbly mess. I couldn't even form a proper response to his compliments without sounding like the shy girl I used to be back in high school. I crawled under the table to pick up the few stray cards and found myself face to face with Joey. Somehow he had managed to crawl under the table without me noticing and was now on his hands and knees, his face only inches from mine. He smiled at me and took the card I had just picked up from my hand, looking at it with a bemused expression.
"Maiden in Love." He laughed lightly. "How ironic."
"Sh-shut up!" I snatched the card from him and went to stand up, but hit my head on the table. I rubbed it lightly and glanced up at him humiliated.
"Calm down. Stop being so nervous." He put his hand on mine and my heart started racing. "Can I ask you something?"
"What?" I swallowed hard, breathing heavily. This couldn't be real.
"You wanna get outta here?"
"But what about the tournament?"
"Screw the tournament. Besides, you just lost, so you're already out anyways."
"Gee, thanks for reminding me."
"Look, I'm trying to ask you out. You don't need to make it so difficult." He rolled his eyes and crawled from under the table. I was grinning from ear to ear now. He took my hand and lifted me from under the card table. "Come on. I know a great ice cream shop a few blocks over. I can teach you how a real pro duels."