Next chapter, as promised.
Chapter 18: Cliché
"Retie by top for me, will you?" Bree asked, turning her back towards me.
I obliged, one eye looking longingly towards the water where Bree's little sister Victoria was swimming.
Cassie saw me looking and mimed retching. "No. Definitely not. If you want to swim, you can come over to my house."
We were at the local pool, trying to enjoy those last few weeks of summer, and Cassie and Bree had decided to start one of their new favorite pastimes: stalking boys.
Ah, how I missed the old days where we would just cannonball off the diving board and shoot each other with water guns.
Now we were lounging on lawn chairs on the deck and watching the younger kids cannonball off the diving board and shoot each other with water guns.
Growing up sucks.
Bree gasped. "Look at that guy! Perfect ten, for sure."
"He's cuter than Nico," Cassie agreed.
"Do you want to go in?" I suggested to Susan, silently adding please help me get away from them.
She grimaced. "I'm not going in after I heard that kid tell his mom he had an 'accident'"
"He's looking at us," Cassie announced. "Holy Zeus, I think he's walking this way."
I sighed and turned to get a look at their newest victim.
Time stopped.
"Pretend he isn't there," I started begging. "He can't come over here no matter what."
Cassie ignored me and waved him over. "You can sit here!"
Curse Cassie and her Aphrodite-ness.
"What are you doing?" I hissed.
She grinned. "Being friendly."
I sank down in my lawn chair as far as I could go and prayed to Aphrodite to spare me any humiliation.
Why had I never noticed how much skin a tankini exposed?
Why was it suddenly ten degrees hotter?
Why was he here?
A shadow fell across my legs. "Um, hey."
For the second time in my life, I turned and looked up at Fang.
Zeus, please kill me now.
I finally said something along the lines of: "What are you doing here?", except not as polite.
"Nice to see you, too."
"Excuse me for a moment," I told Bree and Cassie who were wearing identical how-come-you-never-told-us-you-were-friends-with-a-guy-as-hot-as-he-is looks.
I half dragged him out of earshot before demanding, "What in Hades are you doing here?"
"It's a public pool."
"Why are you at this public pool?"
"I live here."
"You what?" Curse you, Aphrodite. Why must you pick on me?
"I moved here. My parents are unpacking stuff at home, and they asked me to take my little brother where he couldn't get in the way." Fang pointed to a little boy jumping off the diving board.
"Oh." I started laughing.
His expression was halfway between laughing with me and calling the mental institution. "Um, are you okay?"
"This situation is just so…" I tried to come up with the right word, "…cliché."
He started laughing, too. "I know."
"Just your typical romance movie scene where the girl meets the extremely hot guy from her past while her friends look on jealously."
He stopped laughing.
I did too. "What?"
He shook his head. "Nothing. C'mon, we should get back. Your friends are waiting."
"Diana never introduced us," Bree said as soon as we came back.
"Oh, right," I said. "Fang, this is Bree, Cassie and Susan. You guys, this is Fang."
Bree twirled a bit of her hair in her fingers. "Are you new? I haven't seen you around here before."
I pretended to puke behind his back, but Bree ignored me.
"I just moved here."
Bree flashed him a dazzling smile. "So you'll be going to the local middle school, right?"
More pretend puking.
"There's only one middle school."
"Right," she changed the subject. "Want to sit with us?"
He looked over his shoulder longingly. "I was actually planning to go in the pool."
My jaw dropped. "Really?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Last one in is Mr. D's gym socks."
Growing up isn't that bad after all.
Whoa, that was long, but I won't be able to update until next Monday at the earliest. Besides, you guys deserved it. :D Thanks for all your reviews!