Chapter Three
of Less Than Three

(Tucker's POV)

I walked up to my friends, then sat down, placing my cafeteria tray on the table in front of me. I looked down at my "lunch" and grimaced. It looked like plastic frog puke. I glanced around, wordlessly pushing my tray away. I faced my friends as they chuckled at my actions.

"This lunch is gross, today," I stated the obvious. I don't know why, but I had been doing that lately. Stating the obvious. Moving on. Danny laughed as he picked at his bowl of Jell-O.

"Any lunch including the ingredients of any food that has a face is gross." Sam bluntly pointed that out as she took a bite of her vegetarian pizza.

"That's not what I meant," I eyed Sam as she continued to chew on her clearly edible meal. "I was saying that my 'lunch' doesn't even look like it's food." I rolled my eyes as Sam did the same, then turned to Danny.

"What did you get?" I asked, gazing at his home-brought lunch. It looked edible. Yay!

"My dad packed me some of his all-time-famous Fenton Toast, for some reason," Danny answered as he swallowed some of his food. Hey, if it looked safe to eat, I would stuff it down my throat. No matter what it was. And Fenton Toast was an exception.

"So…" Danny cleared his throat, looking anxiously around the cafeteria. I watched him as he cracked his knuckles nervously, acting very jittery.

"Hey, man, what's wrong?" I heard myself say. Uh-oh. Didn't mean to say that out loud. Whoops.

"Oh, nothing…" Danny replied, not looking me in the eye. I could've sworn he was hiding something. So, I continued to pressure him into telling Sam and I.

"No, seriously, Danny," I met Sam's gaze, silently asking her what she thought was wrong. She just shrugged, starting to take a swig of her milk carton. I knew something was going on, but I just couldn't place my finger on it. "Spill."

Danny sighed, finally caving in. "I got an email, last night," he started, fiddling with the end of his paper bag. As soon as he said those six words, Sam stated to choke on her milk, coughing and wheezing like there was no tomorrow. I somehow found this funny (don't ask me how) and started to laugh. It was like a conspiracy! As soon as Danny acknowledged that he had gotten an email the previous night, Sam started to choke on her beverage. Like she knew something about it. Also, like he wasn't supposed to say anything about it.

Danny stopped mid-sentence, turning to get a good look at Sam. Her face was red and blotchy, her eyes puffy. It looked like she was dying! If I didn't know any better, I would've sworn she was blushing. But, she was choking. I decided to let her off the hook, yet I was going to keep this event in mind.

"You okay?" Danny finally asked, pounding her on the back, but that caused Sam to wheeze some more. After coughing for a full ten minutes, Sam concluded the happening with a jolt of a sneeze and a tiny reassurance of an "I'm fine, I'm fine," said in a whisper.

"Anyway… I got an email, last night," Danny continued, picking at his toast.

I cut in, "Sam made that point."

Both Danny and Sam glared at me as I shrunk into my seat. Jeez, what was up with these two? "Moving on," Danny muttered before clearing his voice. "I got an email that said something I couldn't understand."

I watched Sam as she involuntarily leaned in, like she was hanging on his every word. Like he was going to say something that she had been waiting years for.

"Well," Danny looked Sam and I in the eyes before going on, "it said that the person who sent it to me 'less than three'-d me." I glanced up to find Sam clutching her stomach like she was sick, her skin being as pale as cement. I found this interesting.

" 'Less than three' ?" I wondered aloud. "What the heck would that mean?"

"I know!" Danny agreed. "I couldn't sleep, last night. That email freaked me out. I mean, some stranger emailing me and telling me that they 'less than three'-d me. What the heck?!" I could clearly see that Danny was upset about not knowing what the email meant. It bothered him as much as I did. But, there was something he was not noticing.

Sam.

Every word out of his mouth caused Sam to turn paler and paler by the second. I took this into consideration. What would Sam know that would make her this sick to the stomach? Unless… No… That couldn't be it.

"So, Sam, what do you have to say about this?" Danny turned to find Sam whiter than before. He gasped suddenly, but then seemed to ignore the fact that his best friend was as pale as snow. But he was also oblivious to Sam loving him, so it didn't make that much of a difference.

BRIIIIIIIIIINGGGGGGG.

The bell rang for dismal. I watched as Danny left the cafeteria, and Sam scurry out the door.

And then it hit me.

Love. Heart. Writing in the back of journals…diaries…notebooks… But how would you write them on a computer screen? Using symbols. Just like: a less than symbol and 3.

I less than three you. Less than and three equal a heart, and a heart equals love.

And Sam loves Danny.

Boy, was she clever. Danny would've never known what that meant. But, that was because he'd never try to look to deep into the phrase.

I took one look at Sam, and wordlessly told her I knew. She grew even paler, her cheeks redder than blood. She knew I knew. But we both knew that Danny didn't know. It was working out perfectly, the way she wanted. By the way I saw it, Sam didn't mean to send him that message, but she did anyway, without knowing. But she was intelligent enough to put her confession in a way Danny wouldn't be able to understand. She told him, but he didn't comprehend the message. But it was okay.

Because Sam got to finally let out her feelings, anyway.