Chapter 29
"Are you coming over this evening?" Jake asked Sam during lunch on his birthday.
"If I'm invited," Sam answered.
"I'm inviting you now," Jake rolled his eyes.
"Okay," Sam responded. "Are we playing football?"
"Prolly," Jake told her. "It's a school night so Kit won't be out on a date."
"It will be fun," Sam said. "I don't get to play football with you guys much anymore."
"They're busy," Jake shrugged. Then he gave her a grin. "You know, you didn't have to dress up for my birthday."
Sam looked down at the skirt she was wearing.
"I didn't," she told him.
"Looks like it," he teased.
"I had forgotten it was your birthday," Sam teased back.
"Uh huh," Jake laughed. "Just don't wear that to play football in."
Sam rolled her eyes and went to where Ann was sitting. Ann was wearing a dress today too.
"Planning a date with your boyfriend?" Ann teased.
"No," Sam scowled. "Today's his birthday and I always go over to play football with him and his brothers."
"The only girl playing football with a bunch of guys," Ann said dreamily. "He is so cute!"
Sam nodded, acknowledging that Jake was cute. Ann was more boy crazy than Sam was at the time. Maybe because her best friend was a boy, she didn't know.
Nobody but she and Jake knew they had kissed that one time. It had been pleasant. Neither had used their tongue to make it icky as apparently Kit did when he kissed girls. Sam shuddered.
"Are you cold?" Ann asked as they gathered up their things to go play on the playground.
"No, just thinking of something," Sam told her. They went to their third grade class room to leave their backpacks and put on their coats before going outside.
Since Sam was wearing a skirt, she didn't run around too much. She was afraid the wind would pick up her skirt and show everyone her underpants.
Suddenly a boy in their class ran by Ann and lifted up her skirt.
"Dress up for Sunday," he laughed as Ann grabbed her skirt and pushed it back down.
Another boy moved in to do it to Ann and she screamed as her skirt was lifted. Sam stomped her foot in anger before rushing to Ann's aid, forgetting that she was wearing a skirt as well.
The boys lifted Sam's skirt.
"I see London, I see France, I see Sam's underpants," one of them chanted.
Sam fumed. She felt her skirt lifted again and she whirled, fist at the ready to catch the boy who did it in the nose. The boy fell back and Sam jumped on him, not caring at this point that she was wearing a skirt. They crashed to the ground, Sam flailing away at him.
It didn't take long before other kids on the playground saw what was happening and gathered in a circle around them. The boy was trying to push Sam off, but she was kneeling on his arms as she hit him about the face. Years of fending off Jake and his tickles had taught her to pin down the arms.
"Isn't that your little girlfriend over there?" Darrell said to Jake as Jake tossed a basketball towards the hoop.
"What?" Jake turned, not seeing that he had made a basket. "Oh for…"
Jake took off towards the fight, Darrell hot on his heels. Quinn and Bryan saw Jake running and looked closer, seeing what looked like a fight towards one side of the playground. Curious, they too ran towards it.
Jake broke through the group and put his arm around Sam's middle, lifting her off the boy who had been unfortunate enough to lift up Sam's skirt. Jake knew it was just a matter of time before the principal or one of the teacher's supposedly supervising recess would be there.
"Gosh, Sammy," Quinn's yelp of amusement reached Sam's ears as Jake pulled her off.
Sam struggled against Jake's hold, trying to get back to beating up the boy who was just now getting up from the ground.
"If you lift my skirt ever again, I will blacken your other eye," Sam told him as she struggled. She heard Jake's snort in her ear.
"What's going on here?" Jake's fifth grade teacher asked as he broke into the group.
"She hit me," the boy who Sam had fought.
"You lifted up my and Ann's skirts," Sam defended herself. She struggled again as if she wanted to break away from Jake, who still had her lifted off the ground and pinned against his chest.
"Both of you with me to the principal's office," the teacher said. He motioned for Jake to put Sam down. He did so gingerly. Knowing Sam as he did, he wouldn't be surprised if she lunged for the boy again. Which she did. Jake grabbed her arm.
"Leave him, Brat," Jake growled in her ear. "He won't bother you again."
Sam turned her head to look into Jake's face. His eyes were cold and his expression as stern and angry as she'd ever seen them.
Sam gulped, thinking he was mad at her.
