Chapter Ten

And that's the end of the story. It was a happy ending for everyone. Our mission at the Sharing went perfectly, and not only were we able to stop the dating project, we were able to capture Visser Three and end the Yeerk invasion. After which, I went home and made out with Rachel and Melissa Chapman at the same time.

Okay, not really. But I wish this story could have a happy ending. Whenever Visser Three gets involved, things stop being happy fast. And of course, whenever cute girls are involved, you always seem to end up saying something stupid that you regret. Well, not regret, but you wish you could have said something different, something better, and...I'm not making any sense, am I?

Anyway. I should probably tell you what happened so you can judge for yourself whether or not I have anything to regret.

Because as you can guess, that's not the end of the story. I mean, it would have been nice if I was finished with the whole Melissa Chapman/dating fiasco, but life is rarely that simple.

Mistake #1 was letting Melissa see me the next day. Why? Because I'm so irresistibly cute that she decided she absolutely had to have me. At least, I'm pretty sure that's what she was thinking, because she caught up with me at my locker.

"Marco! Hey," Melissa said.

"Oh, hey, Melissa," I said, a little wary about talking to her. "How's it going?"

"Lame," she said. "I've got a quiz in English next period, and I totally haven't studied for it."

"That stinks," I said. "What's it about?"

"It's about the existentialist movement in the 1920's or something stupid like that," she said. "I don't suppose you know anything about it?"

"Sorry," I said. "I only know about the Romantic Movement. I can help you study about that one any day."

I couldn't help it. I must have been on AutoFlirt. It's like AutoPilot, only a lot hotter.

Melissa smiled at me and gazed into my beautiful eyes. No, seriously. That's what she did.

Mistake #2.

Melissa's face fell. "Your eye...it's all better."

The black eye I had was gone, thanks to our morphing escapade the other day. See, whenever you morph, whatever injuries you have go away. It has something to do with DNA, I think. Ask Jake or someone else who pays attention in science class.

"Um...I'm a quick healer?" I guessed.

"You had a black eye yesterday, and today it's back to normal," Melissa said. "Sorry, Marco, but no one heals that quickly."

I shrugged. How do you explain a black eye healing overnight?

"Sorry, I have to go now," I said. "See you later."

"Really?" Melissa asked, raising an eyebrow. "You're not hiding anything? You know, I bet my father would be interested in your magical eye."

I looked at Melissa, and she gave me a snarky grin. Threatening to turn me into her father? That was evil. That was devious.

And it was totally hot.

"Do you always threaten guys with detention if they won't talk with you?" I asked

"Only the cute ones," she said.

I smiled. "Fine. Let's skip class together and talk about it."

"Skip class?" Melissa's smile faltered. "I can't do that. If you skip class, you get sent to..."

"Vice Principal Chapman," I said. "Something tells me he'll go easy on you."

I probably didn't mention it before, but I am the smoothest operator in the planet.

See, that's the thing about being a jokester. When you can make a joke about anything in half a second, nobody is too impressed. But when you use the exact same split-second timing while flirting, it is the perhaps the most impressive thing on the planet.

Example:

"So really, Marco. What happened to your eye?" Melissa asked.

"I didn't realize you spent so much time looking into my eyes," I said instantly.

She laughed.

See? In a half-second, I went from being questioned to distracting her with a joke. Humor is a powerful weapon.

"I cleaned my eye up with some makeup," I said, pretending to seem reluctant to spill my secrets. "I was really embarrassed that you saw me looking beat-up, and...I wanted to look nice for you."

"That's sweet of you," Melissa said.

"You're lucky, though," I said.

"Why's that?"

"You always look nice, so you never have to worry about makeup."

No girl can resist compliments like that.

Melissa and I talked for the rest of the period. Things pretty much went smoothly the whole time. She was sweet, and I made jokes in an attempt to seem like the most attractive person on the west coast. Eventually, though, the bell rang, and we had to go back inside.

After all, when you're a girl, skipping two periods in a row is a bad thing.

"Thanks for talking with me, Marco," Melissa said. "I really enjoyed it."

"Me too," I said. "But, one thing before you leave."

It was time to move in for the kill.

Or in this case, kiss. Same difference.

The art of kissing is very finely-tuned. One must feel it, and—

Jake:

Hey, everyone, it's Jake. I don't want to interrupt, but Marco went on and on about kissing for five whole pages. I tried telling him that Scholastic would never print something like that in a children's book, but he didn't listen.

So I had to cut it all out. Sorry.

Marco:

Get out of here, Jake. This is my story. You're just jealous that I know more about kissing than you do.

In any case, Melissa and I kissed. My lips were on hers, and my mind automatically started thinking about her, what a nice girl she was, how cute she was, that sort of thing.

Mistake #3.

Melissa's eyes went unfocused, and she collapsed onto me, not moving a muscle.

I recognized the symptoms immediately. She was in an acquiring coma.

See, whenever you acquire an animal's DNA, they go into a trance for a little while. It's almost like somebody has knocked them unconscious for a few seconds. Good thing, too, because I needed those few seconds to realize that I had become the only person in the history of the world to acquire someone's DNA by kissing them.

"W...woah," Melissa said, coming out of the trance. "That was...that was weird."

Not exactly what you want to hear a girl say after you've kissed her, but whatever. I've heard worse.