Chapter 4: Shopping

Nessie's POV

After the baseball game the following morning I turned down an invitation to Ana's pool party to celebrate our win. I didn't even know why people continued to invite me to pool parties. I always turned them down. Always making up some excuse about already having plans.

The reason I never went to pool parties? Well I suffer from something called aquaphobia. Which is an abnormal fear of water. I nearly drowned at the beach back when I was six years old and ever since then I've been deathly afraid of the water. Even simply visiting the beach brings on massive amounts of anxiety just by looking at the ocean. A real shame since I live in Florida and the beaches here are amazing.

Water was just something that I simply avoided at all costs however. Whether it's pools, lakes, or the ocean. Showers were about all I could take when it comes to being in water.

Nobody knew about my phobia though. Except for Chelsea anyway. As my absolute best friend she was the only one that I could trust with my secret. I just knew that if word got out and if Leslie and her cronies were to find out it would just give them a lot more ammo to bully and make fun of me.

The thing I hate most about High School is all the gossip that went around. When there was something or someone worth gossiping about it spread like wildfire and everyone knew about it. The subject could be from anything like who's dating who. Who cheated on who. Who is possibly pregnant now. I hated hearing rumors about other girls being pregnant. As far as I'm concerned it's no one's business if someone is pregnant or not. Why shame the girl because of it?

That's why I held onto my secrets like precious gems. Like my poor grades or my fear of water. Until recently I'd held onto my secret about being adopted. Before the video went viral only my family and my closest friends knew.

"Hey Nessie!" I looked up to see Joyce running up behind me. Joyce King had always been a mystery to me since she and her family moved her from New York six years ago. She had come from a very rich family that owned a bank back in Rochester, New York. When her father decided to expand the business they moved here. At first I assumed she was going to be a stuck up snotty rich kid but she wasn't. She wasn't the type of girl to flaunt her well or anything. In fact she was another great friend of mine. Which is more than what I could say for her twin brother.

Michael King was as stuck up and snobby as any kid could be. He was also a bit of a male chauvinist pig. Always making comments that "women belong in the kitchen," or "women are there just for men's pleasure,"

"So Nessie how is the search going? I mean has the video worked yet?"

"No. Not yet but I'm still hopeful. The views are growing every single day,"

"That's great. I hope you find your parents,"

"Thanks Joyce. So what are you doing today anyway? You're not going to the pool party to celebrate?"

"Nah I think I'd much rather go shopping instead. You want to come with?"

"Yeah sure. Why don't we invite Chelsea to?"

"Oh she's busy,"

"With what?"

"Oh she didn't tell you? My brother asked her out yesterday,"

"What?" I was shocked. Beyond shocked actually. I knew she liked Michael, and she never believed me when I told her what I'd heard him say about women. But somehow I never imagined her going on a date with him.

"Yeah it happened yesterday,"

"Well no. She forgot to tell me I guess," I sighed, disappointed that she wouldn't say anything. She thought I could do much better than crushing on Joshua? Well I know she could do hell of a lot better than King.

I shuddered. I didn't like it one bit. Besides being a male chauvinist pig something about him always creeped me out. The way he would look at me. The way he'd smile at me once he was done staring me down from head to toe.

Then there was one time he claimed to "accidentally," touch my breast. I knew damn well that was no accident but when I reported it the school didn't do shit about it. I'd never even told Chelsea about that but now I'm thinking maybe I should've. That was another one of my safely guarded secrets. One that I was too ashamed to tell anyone, including my best friend about.

I shuddered again.

"Nessie are you okay?" Joyce looked worried. Amazing how two siblings could be so drastically different.

"I'm fine let's just get to the mall,"

She smiled happily. If there's one thing I could say about that girl is that she loved to shop. Hell she wanted to buy all my stuff for me whenever we went shopping together and that's one thing I'd never allow. I'm not the type of person that will take advantage of someone just because they're rich. Joyce was a great friend and I liked her for who she was and I didn't want her or anyone to think anything different.

After a few hours we stopped at the food court for a break.

"Hey Ness don't look now but there's a hot guy staring at you,"

"What?" I asked thinking she'd lost her mind.

"To your right several tables over,"

I looked and I swear I almost choked on cheeseburger when I saw the over six foot tall, half naked man, staring at me as Joyce had said.

I had to force myself to look away. Never did I think I would see a man more handsome than Joshua but boy was I wrong! This man most definitely took the cake! I could actually feel my heart reacting to seeing this man!

"Oh shit he's walking over here,"

"What?"

"He's coming-oh hi!"

I turned and was almost face to face with him. "Um, um, um," was all that would come out of my mouth. He just smiled.

"I'm Joyce and the speechless one over here is Nessie. What's your name?"

"Nessie huh?" the guy answered. "I'm Jacob," the man shook my hand and I remained speechless like a stupid idiot.

Wait a minute did he say Jacob? Because I mentioned a Jacob in my video. Could it be him? He looked to be about my age or maybe a little older. So I guess it's possible we could've been friends as kids? I didn't know. The only thing I did know is that I was still frozen in time. Speechless. Making a complete and utter fool of myself.

"Um hi?"

Joyce laughed and I just glared at her. Giving her the eyes of death.

"Well I'm new around here and I was wondering if you new of any good places to eat dinner at?"

"I could think of a few. Cool maybe you could come with me? I don't know anyone and I hate eating alone,"

"I-I mean yes!"

"Thank you Nessie. Here's my number," he gives me a piece of paper labeled "Jacob's Cell," with a phone number written on it. "I'm looking forward to your phone call already and getting to know you more,"

"What the hell just happened?!" I nearly shouted when he walked away.

"You somehow just scored a date with the hottest guy to ever come to Jacksonville that's what. Despite the fact that you-"

"Made a complete and utter fool of myself? Yeah I know,"

"Lucky you!" she retorted. "He didn't even seem to notice me. Oh wait until I tell Chelsea about this she won't believe it! Guess I'm not the only one going out on a date tonight,"

I was still in shock. It all happened so fast that I didn't know how to react.

"Now we need to go buy you a whole new outfit just for tonight!"

I groaned. All this girl needed was an excuse to shop and she was there. Like me she loved playing baseball and was another great player on the team. However she was extremely girly when it came to things like clothes, shoes, and shopping. If shopping were a sport she'd be an MVP. I don't think she has an equal anywhere in the world.

"Lucky you. You get a date and I get to go home and do what? Work on my family history report,"

"How is that coming along anyway?"

"Doing a lot of research on what happened to my great grandfather Royce King II is very interesting to say the least. All I managed to find out so far is that he was engaged to some girl named Rosalie Hale. Then she mysteriously died a week before the wedding. Then not along after marrying my great grandmother that same year he turned up dead in some hotel. No one knows who killed him or why. It's been a family mystery for generations. One that may never get solved I guess. Oh well. As long as I get an A that's all that matters. Enough about me though we need to get you ready for that date!"

"Oh come on I barely said any words to the guy! How do you know I even want to call him and tell him a place and time!"

"Because I know you. Duh. You liked him and you want to see him again,"

Well she wasn't wrong there. That was certain. She smiled in a smug way knowing she was right.

After two hours had passed we found an "acceptable outfit," as she put it and left.

When I got home I checked the number of views and saw that it had gotten to nine million. I felt my stomach drop. This really was showing no signs of slowing down any time soon.

"Hey Nessie you have mail," mom said as she tossed me an envelope. It was from Italy. That was weird I didn't know anyone from Italy.

I accidentally dropped the mail from Italy before I could open it. Lucky decided to shred it to pieces for some reason. Oh well. It probably wasn't important anyway since I didn't know anyone from Italy.

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