The next day I woke up in disbelief that I was Ethan's girlfriend. The whole date felt like a dream that couldn't possibly be true. I picked up my phone and sent Ethan a text. "Yesterday actually happened, right?" I had to be sure.
"I see the excitement hasn't worn off yet. I'm glad you're this excited to be my girlfriend. Not just anyone gets that privilege." I giggled. I loved seeing it even over text. So it was true, after all. Oddly enough, I felt like watching that episode of Spongebob with the "Best Day Ever" song in the beginning. For an eighteen year old, I still had a childish side to me. Every once in a while, I would wake up and watch cartoons with my breakfast like I used to. I wondered if Ethan would enjoy that. I figured he probably would, he could be pretty silly.
"Grayson won't stop teasing me about being your boyfriend :(" Ethan texted me. I knew it. I could only imagine how much he would tease me.
"Called it! Maybe I should come over so he has a new target. Actually, I feel like I haven't had much time to get to know Grayson yet. Do you think he likes me?" I asked.
"Trust me- if he didn't like you, we wouldn't be dating. We're kind of a package deal. Grayson and I do everything together, so if our girlfriends can't hang out with both of us, it makes it really hard. It would be nice for you two to get to know each other better, though. How about you text him and see if he wants to hang out for the day, as a sort of test run?" It sounded fun, but I was a little worried. If we didn't get along, would it change how Ethan saw me?
"I'll give it a shot." I texted. No promises. I pulled up Grayson's contact in my phone. We hadn't texted at all yet. "Hey Grayson. Since I might be hanging around often now, I figured we should get to know one another. Are you up for an adventure?" I waited. I had an idea of where to go, I just hoped he wouldn't think it was lame.
"Sure, just you and me?" He texted, with a smirking emoji.
"Oh, yeah. No Ethans allowed." I replied, with a crying laughing emoji. "I hope you like Harry Potter." I said.
We pulled up in front of Universal Studios, and I was already bouncing with excitement. "I don't think you understand, Grayson. I have wanted to go to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter since I heard it was being built. They have Butterbeer. Butterbeer, Grayson." I looked at him excitedly, and he laughed loudly.
"Well, let's go then! What are you waiting for?!" He asked, and we got out of the car and headed to the gates. We got our day passes and marveled at the cool attractions on the way to the Harry Potter section of the park. It was all cool, but I was on a mission for Butterbeer and nobody was going to stop me. Grayson was really funny, and a little more exuberant than Ethan. He was a blast to hang out with. I really hoped he liked me as much as I liked him because I couldn't wait to hang out with him more.
"I'm glad Ethan found you." He said. "You seem like a good match. He's been so happy ever since you started hanging out." I smiled.
"He makes me happy too. I'm glad you guys found me on the beach. I don't know what I would do in LA with no friends right now. And actually, as weird as it sounds- I'm really happy I get to interact with your fans. They're all so funny and sweet. You guys are lucky to have such a positive, strong fandom that stays so loyal to you. But that's also because you guys work so hard, put out good messages, and stay out of drama. And that's not easy to do." I had been hoping I'd get a chance to tell Grayson that. I already told Ethan, but Grayson was the other half of the Dolan twins and he was just as responsible for his fans. He beamed at me.
"That's so sweet! I'm so glad you love our fans- it would be hard for either us to date someone who wasn't comfortable with them. It's so much a part of our lives that it would be hard to avoid." A teenage girl, obviously a fan, started freaking out at seeing Grayson nearby. "Speaking of-" Grayson laughed. He greeted the fan with a big hug and happily agreed to take a photo. For how often they ran into fans, they always took photos with a big smile and never seemed annoyed. It was pretty amazing, actually. I offered to take the picture for them so it looked a little nicer. I made sure to take lots from different angles so the fan could choose the perfect one.
"Thank you so much" She said, a little overwhelmed. You could tell she was trying to hold back tears of excitement. "I have been a fan since you guys just started out on vine, I can't believe I finally get to meet you!" She said. Grayson said "Aw" and hugged her again. "Is Ethan here?" She asked.
"No, just me today, sorry. I'll tell him you said hi, though. What's your name?" He asked.
"Omg, that would be amazing. My name is Caroline." She replied.
"Well it was wonderful to meet you, Caroline." He smiled wide at her.
"And you're Viola! I don't know if you remember, but I sent you a few dms a couple days ago about how I was glad you were reaching out to the fans. You were so sweet!" She said. I couldn't believe she knew who I was.
"Aw, thank you, that's so nice of you. You were all so sweet to me, too. I think I do remember you. I got a lot of dms but that sounds familiar." She gave me a hug too.
"So does this mean you're dating Grayson?" She asked. I wasn't sure what to say. Should I lie and say we are all just friends still or tell this fan that I was officially dating Ethan? I wasn't sure me or Ethan were ready for that. It seemed best to tell the truth, but not the whole truth.
"Nah, we're just friends." I leaned in. "Between you and me, I'm more of an Ethan girl." I said with a wink. Grayson laughed.
"Hey!" He said. I stuck my tongue out at him. The fan giggled nervously.
"Don't worry, I'm in your lane, Grayson." She said.
"Thank you! I feel like nobody is ever in my lane when we meet fans." He said with a fake pout. He couldn't hold it for long, though, and broke into a laugh again.
"It was great meeting you, Caroline. I'll be sure to tell Ethan hi." I said, and she walked back to her mom.
"Butterbeer?!" I asked. I couldn't wait any longer. Grayson just smiled and shook his head. The line was long, so Gray and I talked about our lives growing up. It turns out that growing up in New Jersey wasn't that different from growing up in Alaska. I guess all small towns are relatively the same no matter where you're from. Finally, we reached the front of the line.
"Two butterbeers please." Grayson said, not letting me pay.
"So I guess it's a date, then?" I asked. "Ethan's gonna be mad." I said.
"Let him be mad." He replied. I laughed. Grayson handed me my butterbeer and we walked to the replica of Hogwarts to take our first sip. It was delicious. Butterbeer was just as magical as I had always imagined. Grayson and I looked at eachother with our butterbeer 'staches and laughed.
"You've got something on your lip." I said.
"So do you." He laughed. We took a selfie like that, holding up our butterbeer in front of Hogwarts to send to Ethan. He would get a kick out of this.
"We're having butterbeer at Hogwarts without you." I said, and sent him the picture. He replied almost immediately.
"YOU TAKE ME TO MINI GOLF BUT YOU GO TO HOGWARTS WITH GRAY?! What kind of girlfriend are you?" He replied. I showed Grayson and he cracked up.
"A cute one" I replied with a kissy face.
"Yeah, and good thing too." He said. He sent a picture of him sitting in the foam pit alone.
"I'll bring you a souvenir, promise." I sent, then put away my phone. "Where to next?" I asked Gray.
"To the Hogwarts Express!" He exclaimed. This boy was too much. I followed behind him through the crowd to board the train. I was just glad he was enjoying my idea so much. We rode the train and wandered through the various wizarding shops throughout the park. I bought myself a replica of Hermione's wand and and a hufflepuff scarf. Yes, I was a hufflepuff.
I got Ethan a some candies from Honeydukes and a few secret things to prank Grayson with from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. Grayson bought a stuffed Hedwig that could turn it's head and spent the rest of the time mimicking owl noises and making it talk to me in the third person. How these boys were so famous, I didn't know. I guess their sense of humor worked on vine, though. After several hours, we had explored all there was to explore. It was time to head home and eat some food to recover from the butterbeer-induced sugar high we were both experiencing.
"Thanks for putting up with my nerd rants" I said as we walked to the car. "I might like Harry Potter just a little bit."
"Well you had to put up with me playing with my Hedwig puppet for the last hour, so I'd call it even." He said, petting the stuffy's head. I laughed.
"You're so freaking weird." I told him.
"So are you. At least we're agreed on that." He smiled. I was glad today went so well. I knew how important it was to Ethan that we became friends. And I think we are well on our way there. Grayson drove us to the warehouse after we picked up some food for the three of us. I had an idea as we pulled up, and turned to Grayson.
"Are you up for pranking Ethan?" I asked. He raised an eyebrow, intrigued.
"I'm listening." He said.
"Let's pretend we had a fight over something- hmmmm… aha! I asked about your 'nothing matters" tattoo and you explained what it meant. I told you I disagreed with your outlook and we had a fight about it. Ooh! I even have some eye drops in my purse to make it look like I cried. He'll be so upset that we fought." I smirked. He gave me an evil smile.
"You're diabolical. I love it." I put in some eye drops and smeared my undereye makeup just a little to make it look like I had tried to fix it after crying. Then I gave Grayson one last smile and took a deep breath to get into character. As we shut the car doors, Ethan greeted us at the door.
"So how was your day at Universal?" He questioned. Then his face grew wary as he saw my red eyes and our serious, forced smiles. He walked beside me, leading me by the small of my back with his hand. I could see him glancing over at Gray with a worried expression. Don't smile. Don't give it away.
I felt bad, actually. Ethan seemed really concerned. I could tell he disliked being in the middle of our argument and disliked even more than we wouldn't tell him what happened. When we got inside, Gray left to the editing room and Ethan pulled me aside. "What happened? From your texts, it seemed like you were having a great time." He said gently.
"We were. But then we got in a fight a-and." I pretended to hold back tears, wiping under my eyes. "I'm so sorry, Ethan. I know you wanted it to go well. Please don't hate me." I said.
"It would take a lot for me to help you. Unless you really hurt Gray's feelings, it's just an argument. Surely, it can't be that bad." He said, though he didn't seem convinced. I could tell how loyal he was to Grayson. He felt bad that I was upset, but knew he would be upset at me if I had hurt Grayson. I admired that. Sure, I was looking forward to the day we had been dating long enough that he felt that loyal to me, but I couldn't expect it that fast. Grayson had always been his best friend. He kissed my forehead and left to go talk to Gray in the editing room. I was really starting to feel bad now.
Apparently Gray was fine with it, though. I could hear them talking tensely under their breath. Grayson knew Ethan's limits better than I did, so I took comfort in the fact that he was carrying on with the prank.
"No, Ethan! It's not all good. She doesn't even like the way I live my life. How can we be friends if she insults me and argues with what I believe?" Grayson shouted. Ethan sighed. He dragged Grayson out to the main area of the warehouse and over to me. Grayson and I couldn't look each other and not laugh, so we avoided eye contact. Ethan thought it was out of anger.
"Look, can we just talk this out?" Ethan asked. "Maybe it is all a misunderstanding." He said.
"Oh, no. there are no misunderstandings on my part." I said.
"None on my part either." Grayson said, really struggling to not smile now. "Only one misunderstanding here." He said. Ethan looked confused.
"How does that work?" He asked. "How is there a misunderstanding if neither of you have a misunderstanding?" He furrowed his brow.
"Because you're the one with the misunderstanding." Grayson said, smiling now. "You just got PRANKED!" He yelled at Ethan and we both burst out laughing as soon as we looked at each other. Ethan glared as we high fived each other and laughed about each other's facial expressions.
"That was so hard! I barely kept a straight face." I said and Grayson agreed.
"You guys actually suck." Ethan said, but there was relief in his voice, He was glad we had a good time and there was no tension between us. Ethan started chasing Grayson around to give him a noogie and I laughed as they both ended up wrestling in the foam pit. When they finished, they both came down to me and Ethan wrapped his arm around me. "Okay, how was your day ACTUALLY?" He asked.
"It was so fun! I have always wanted to go there. And we met some fans. They were all super sweet. One girl in particular, Caroline, was awesome. I told her I would say hi to you. So hi from Caroline." Ethan smiled.
"Maybe I'll dm her later." He said. That would be so sweet. If he didn't, I would to pass along his hello.
"I got you candy!" I said. I handed him a chocolate frog, Burtie Botts every flavour beans, acid pops, cauldron cakes, and exploding bonbons. He hugged me and said thank you. I secretly hoped he got all earwax flavored jelly beans.
"Look at my owl!" Grayson said in his little kid voice. He swooped it up and around Ethan's face excitedly and make more owl noises. We all laughed.
"Seems like you guys had fun." Ethan raised his brows.
"We most certainly did." I smiled and Ethan and kissed him. "Now let's eat, I'm starving!" I ate dinner with them and then headed home to do some schoolwork. I had been severely slacking on my work and I needed to be caught up before Michael's funeral this weekend. I practiced my song a few times before I went to sleep. I dreamed of Ethan and the wonders of Harry Potter all night long, except right before my alarm went off for class.
I had the same driving nightmare as before, only this time it didn't even start with good memories. I was just stuck next to Michael unable to say goodbye or warn him. Ethan had helped keep away the sadness I felt, but he couldn't keep it away forever. The hurt I felt always found a way to creep back. It's only been a week. Maybe the funeral will bring some closure. But I knew things like this took time. It was okay to be unhappy. It was better to be honest than to hold it all inside. I just had to take it one day at a time. Life couldn't always be butterbeer and adventure. Sometimes you have to go through the rough of it to appreciate the good. That's how I would get through it.
