Thomas POV

The next few years were...well, they were a torture. We've all been through that stage, right? He loves her, but she's his best friend, he waits patiently that, somehow, she notices him in a "more than a friend way", convinced that, just because he did it with her, she will do the same with him...bullshit. Yeah because, unlike these romance movies or books or other shit like that make us see how love is supposed to be, (surprise surprise) it doesn't end with the "Happily ever after" or other cheesy crap like that. Love is NEVER that simple, and I realized it when, while sitting on a bench outside of school with Krista and Nadine talking about movies and spoilers, I had the immense pleasure to watch her fucking Nick "prick" Mossman with her eyes from afar, while also being delighted by a wonderful comment about how him staying in Juvie made him, and I cite, "so hot"...

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!

I mean, seriously, what's "So HoT" about an asshole that ended up in Juvie for being an asshole? Like, seriously, is there a particular reason that girls are into pieces of shit that you know are gonna treat them like shit? The same girls compalining about not finding a nice guy sometimes are also the ones pining over the piles of immense, stinky, gross and brown shit, like Nick "shit" Mossman, and they end up being so damn surprised if those pieces of shit treat them like garbage!

Nadine: "I should go in there and be like 'Excuse me, where are the beta fish? Could you put your penis inside me?'"

Yeah, I would have lived perfectly good without hearing her say that...and feeling the need to point out the obvious, I interjected

Thomas: "Okay, firstly, ew just no; secondly, how can you even like him?"

And, of course, Nadine being Nadine, said

Nadine: "How can you not? He's the hottest guy in school!"

Hearing your crush say that another dude is "the hottest guy in school" is...yeah well it makes you feel like shit. Now, I never thought of myself as a stunning looking guy, okay? But in those couple of years my looks were definetely better. Sure, I still had one or two pimples here and there, I wasn't that tall, I surely didn't have the amount of muscle mass I wanted, and I would've preferred if my jawline was sharper and more chiselled, but hey...I'm a normal human being. I still rocked my short haircut, but I decided to let them grow more, and fortunately only two/three months were sufficent.

Thomas: "But how can you like someone without even knowing them?"

Then she said something that confused me and really took me by surprise

Nadine: "Well, do you know Kristine?"

I was baffled

Thomas: "Ehm...no, I don't."

Nadine: "Then how come she can't stop eye-fucking you in class?"

In case you're wondering who's the girl Nadine just mentioned, it's Kristine Baxter, one of the top students of our class, a genious in science, who was also given the gift of beauty. AND, she was crushing on me...an ugly loser who has been deemed as a desperate case since he couldn't keep his mouth shut with his bastard professors (except Mr. Bruner, he was the only one I liked simply because he too teased Nadine, and I just loved to watch their banters). Of course I didn't know she was crushing on me at that time, not that it would've made any difference since I was crushing on Nadine, so I merely laughed when she told me that THE Kristine Baxter had a crush on me

Thomas: "Yeah, right!"

Nadine: "I'm serious! I swear everytime I glance at her she's just staring at you! I'm ready to bet that she even touches herself thinking about you when she's alone at home!"

I, still smirking, said

Thomas: "Yeah, sure Nadine, whatever you say."

Then she did a totally Nadine move: she pointed her finger in the distance and said

Nadine: "Oh look, there's Kristine! Hey, Kristine!"

I turned around and I saw her, Kristine Baxter, with a couple of her friends. Realizing what was going to happen, I turned towards Nadine and whisper-yelled

Thomas: "What the hell are you doing?!"

Nadine: "Helping you get some!"

Answered her with the same tone, then I heard footsteps behind me, so I turned around and I saw Kristine right in front of me, and I, being an embarassed little ass, blushed

Kristine: "Hey, Nadine. Krista. Thomas...it's good to see you."

How did she know our names? Well, we were known around: Nadine because of her strange antics, Krista for being her only friend, and I for being Krista's loser brother. But Kristine was a really nice person, and when she said that it was good to see me, I blushed again from embarassement because I knew Nadine had something planned

Thomas: "H-hey, Kristine! It's good to see you too!"

Then Nadine made her move

Nadine: "You know, Tommy here thinks you're pretty awesome and wanted to know if you wanted to hang out sometime."

Now, the boldness of Nadine and her always speaking up her mind without hesitation was one of the things I loved the most about her, because she was transparent, honest, there was no mistery behind her, and as a guy you learn to love it when you don't have to practically read your crush's mind to know what she was thinking. But when Nadine said those words I just wanted to punch her in the face...in a friendly not-so-friendly manner of course, because I never even for a second thought about hanging out with Kristine. Sure, I found her awesome, but I had no interest in her, and I hated to lie to people, but most of all I hated hurting them, so when she diverged her gaze on me with a teasing look and asked me

Kristine: "Is that so? Do you find me...awesome...Tommy?"

I, obviously knew that at this point I was bound to hang out with her and to answer

Thomas: "Well, ahaha...uhm, yeah I...kinda find you awesome, but you don't have to hang out with me if you don't want to...I mean, I'm a loser after all, so-"

Kristine: "Who said I don't want to?"

She interrupted my rambling in a way I couldn't possibly imagine, since nobody wanted to hang out with me...ever. Then she smirked and said

Kristine: "Besides, you're not so bad yourself, cutie."

Thomas: "Uh...I...uhh...w-what?"

My mind was absolutely blank, I didn't know what to think when one of the most famous girls in the whole school not only basically said that I was awesome, but also called me "cutie", so my stutter came to the party. Hearing my stutter she chuckled lightly, I must say, in an adorable way. Then she stared at me with a flirtatious look on her face and said

Kristine: "Well, if you do want to hang out, or do any other thing, with me..."

She then took my hand, borrowed a pen from Krista's pencil box and started to write

< 555-9977 >
< Call me anytime, cutie >

Kristine: "I am just one phone call away~ ...now I must go, bye girls, see you Tommy..."

I stared at her retreating figure with my mouth agape. Don't judge me, the next time a total hotbomb gets right in front of you with those "fuck me" eyes, basically calls you awesome, gives you her number, flirts with you, and you manage to keep a straight and collected face, only then try to approach me mockingly. After a bit, still with a puzzled expression on my face, I turned around to look at Nadine, who had a proud smirk on her face, while Krista was failing miserably to hold her laughing after taking a look at my face

Thomas: "...What just happened?"

Krista laughed even louder now, while Nadine put a hand on my shoulder and told me innocently

Nadine: "No need to thank me, and remember: use a condom."

Of course Krista couldn't stop laughing, but after we made eye contact she immediately shut up. Then I looked at Nadine, and confused I asked

Thomas: "What exactly was the point of doing that?"

Then she smiled at me and with determination in her eyes, she said

Nadine: "The point was to finally show you that you're not the loser you think you are."

Okay, that surprised me like, a lot, because Nadine was never the cute of the group, she was the one with the snarky remarks and the hard teasing, so that's why, when I heard her words, I not only was stunned, but I felt a warm sensation in my heart: the girl I had a crush on didn't consider me a loser, and she wanted to prove it. You think this is pathetically cheesy? Well...it is, but fuck you, what do you want? My little heart fluttered for at least the millionth time while I was with Nadine, and I won't say sorry for it. The only problem in that situation? Yeah, exactly: she wasn't the one who flirted with me, AND she was the only one I wanted to date and do all of those cheesy things that all the couples do. I was brought back to reality when she looked up, over my shoulder and, with a completely different expression, said

Nadine: "Oh, my God. Would you please look at that stupid shirt my brother's wearing?"

Then I turned around and saw Darian with his group of friends, he was wearing a very, very tight shirt, like you couldn't see his nipples through it!

Nadine: "Oh, you can see his nipples."

See? I'm not the only one noticing. But I suppose I can't really blame him: I mean, if I had his physique I would want to show it a bit. You see, for many girls having a beautiful body is something that doesn't require going to the gym at least four or five days a week, sometimes even for two years, in order to see even the slightest bit of muscle mass growth. So I completely understood Darian and I didn't judge him for his choice of clothing. I guess Nadine just wanted another reason to say something bad about him

Nadine: "How does he not realize that all that does is scream, 'I have a body complex worse than a girl.'"

So I told her what I thought

Thomas: "Well, considering the amount of time he spends in the gym, I don't blame him for wanting to show off a bit his results of years of work. I mean, have you seen how some girls dress? At least he doesn't wear shorts or sleeveless T-shirts."

And Nadine answered

Nadine: "Yeah, but it has become OCD. Like, You should have seen him: he had a conniption 'cause my mom won't by him creatine anymore since it fucks up your kidneys. I was like, 'I know, Darian, I know: what does mom expect, you to win people over with your personality?'"

And I interjected

Thomas: "So you mean that Nick won you over with his personality, and not because he's 'the hottest guy in school'?"

Then the bell rang and we started heading inside. While we entered the school I couldn't stop smiling at the fact that the next lesson was with Mr. Bruner, and that meant that he and Nadine would've had a funny banter. And when we got inside the classroom that's exactly what happened

Nadine: "Hey, so, uh, just a heads-up, but yesterday when you were giving your lecture, you were like, 'oh, blah, blah, blah and then the north seceded from the union.' You meant to say the south seceded. You accidentally said the exact opposite. I didn't want to raise my hand and be all, 'excuse me, these kids are pretty confusable.' Just thought maybe you'd want to know."

I just loved how casual these conversations were for them, it was like those two were great buddies, and not just a student and a teacher

Mr. Bruner: "Oh."

Nadine: "Yeah."

At that point the only missing thing was a bowl of popcorn in my hand and a counch to sit on

Mr. Bruner: "Now, I know that it was a long lecture and you probably don't recall, but, uh, was there any point during it when you thought to yourself, 'gosh, I wonder what it's like to actually have a life?'"

At that I just laughed hard, like really hard from behind Nadine, and he gave me a smirk. The bastard knew it was a good joke and a nice comeback, and he knew that she knew it, and she knew he knew...whatever, everybody knew okay?! God this whole thing is driving me crazy...

Anyway, as I was saying, Nadine picked on rather quickly on the conversation and answered with a straight face

Nadine: "No...no, I was too concentrated on how you were effing the whole thing up."

I snickered at this, and so did Mr. Bruner, who answered with a smirk on his face

Mr. Bruner: "Well, I understand that. But just know that I haven't given up hope, not yet."

We then went to sit down at our spots, which were located in the third row. Once she was on her chair Nadine slumped on her table and puffed, visibly tired of the cruelty of life...while I was simply recovering from the hard laughing from before. Suddently, like completely out of nowhere, an asian guy that was sitting near Nadine (on her left side there was me, that guy was on her right side) spoke to her

???: "Hey."

Nadine: "Hey."

???: "I like your sweatshirt today, it's nice."

Now here's a lesson for every girl reading this: if a guy you don't know just compliments you out of the blue, unless he's gay, he wants to hit on you, and this wouldn't be necessarily wrong, unless the guy wasn't trying to hit on my crush. Pointless to say that the paper I was holding was crumpled in my hand in less than a second when I realized what was happening, and do you want to know what was the worst part? I couldn't do anything without sounding suspicious or jealous...I WAS jealous, but I didn't want her to know that.

Nadine: "Thank you."

???: "Where'd you get it? The little sweater...the-the sweatshirt.

Oh my God, could this dude be any more embarassing? Like, you could see from a mile that he was trying to hit on her, and I knew that Nadine noticed it too. Anyway I'd like to move on from this situation, so fast forward. Me, Krista and Nadine were at her place, talking about the maniac. Well, I was in the bathroom, but once I came out I heard his name

Krista: "What's his name?

Nadine: "Erwin Kim."

Krista: "I don't know him."

Nadine: "You'd freaking love him, he's adorable."

They were in the kitchen, I reached them and took an apple, throwing it up and catching it a second later

Thomas: "Oh, so he's the creep who was trying to hit on you."

Then I bit the apple and went to sit on a stool, while Nadine threw me a smirk

Nadine: "Ohh, don't tell me you're jealous, Tommy."

Yes, I freaking was, I wanted to punch him so hard in the face...but of course I couldn't say that

Thomas: "Oh no, I'm just worried for him: he must be crazy to put his life on the line like that."

Nadine: "Ha ha, very charming...cutie."

She was teasing me...she was teasing me for what happened with Kristine, and Krista's laughs weren't helping me. That was the moment to act like an adult, so, as a responsible adult...I threw the apple at Nadine, who ducked down and stood up a second later, she stared at me with mouth agape and wide eyes, an incredulous look on her face

Thomas: "Oh shut up, Miss 'Oh, personality is what matters, except if your name is Nick'."

There you go, Nadine, right back at ya! Then, Nadine's mom, Mona Franklin, came down the stairs dressed like she was ready for a date with someone, and turned out I wasn't actually wrong about that

Mona: "Oh! Oh, good, good, good, good, I caught you, I'm so glad. Oh! Do you like this dress? Does it look bad? I think it looks kind of bad: it's kind of poofy and...I don't know...do my arms look bad?"

I'd like to point out that she said all of this so fast that the only thing I heard clearly was "Do my arms look bad?". I mean, considering her age she wasn't a bad looking woman at all, and if we add the fact that she also lost her husband in this massive equation, she was a very nice looking woman. Don't look at me like that, I didn't mean in a MILF sense, you perverts. Anyway, Nadine had her signature "I don't even know where am I" look on her face when she said, in a very unconvincing tone,

Nadine: "No."

And apparently Mona was on the same page as me and, lowering her hands and having a defeated look on her face (you know, that "bruh, seriously?" look), said

Mona: "Yeah, you don't sound very believable, and you're making me nervous, Nadine."

Then Nadine collected herself and said with conviction

Nadine: "Your upper arms are breathtaking."

Again, considering the elements I listed before, yes, she was a nice looking woman

Thomas: "Where are you going, Miss Franklin?"

Yeah, always show respect to the adults, little brats

Mona: "Well, it's last minute, but Brent called me, the-the dentist one..."

Oh yeah, like I knew who the hell she was talking about

Mona: "...and he asked if I wanted to go to Manzanita for the weekend, and I thought 'you know what? I deserve to be a little selfish once in a while' so..."

Nadine then interjected

Nadine: "Is that one of the, um... 'match.com' guys?"

And then I knew who the hell she was talking about

Thomas: "Oh, you mean the one with the dog?"

And, before you ask me, yes, I helped her edit her profile. Well, my initial advice was to just go to a pub or something like that and strike a conversation because, you know, I'm not a fan of these sites: it all sounds too fake for me. Yeah, I'm old fashioned, so what? Anyway, Mona confirmed and, after she sent us her goodbyes, she put Nadine in charge of the house, and she put me in charge of Nadine. Basically I had to make sure she didn't fuck up in some way. Unfortunately none of us was put in charge of Darian, so when the little party of us three (a party that involved alcohol, of course) turned into some sort of October fest with all of Darian's friends, let's just say I wasn't that surprised. It got to the point that Nadine, drunk as shit, was yelling them to leave the pool, and then she started bickering with Darian

Nadine: "You said you weren't gonna drink until after soccer. You failed, failure!"

It was actually a bit funny, but actually I was more worried than anything, considering that the "alcohol" Darian had in his hands wasn't alcohol, but orange juice

Darian: "Dude, I'm not drinking. It's orange juice, genius."

Exactly. Then he turned to me and asked

Darian: "How drunk is she?"

And I answered, still looking at her

Thomas: "She just said that your juice was alcohol. I think 'way too much' is the correct answer."

But she defended saying

Nadine: "I've had one drink, okay? Now you get your friends out of the pool."

She definetely didn't have just one drink

Darian: "Uh, no."

Nadine: "Okay, then I'll call the cops."

That was enough

Thomas: "Oh no missy, I won't let you make an ass of yourself with the cops, c'mon let's go."

I walked forward and took her arm in a gentle but firm way and started leading her upstairs

Nadine: "Where are you taking me? You want to fuck or something?"

"...yes, but not Drunk Nadine" I thought to myself. Well, what answer did you expect? I continued to lead her to her bedroom to put her to sleep while she kept talking

Nadine: "I mean, if you want to fuck I at least wanna know it..."

Thomas: "I'm not going to fuck you, Nadine: you're drunk."

Finally we reached her bedroom. I made her sit down on her bed and then went to her drawer to pick a pajamas for her to put on, but before I could pick one I heard sniffling, so I turned around and saw her crying. Immediately I moved to sit in front of her and I hugged her

Thomas: "Hey, hey, what's wrong?"

She sniffled a bit more and then answered

Nadine: "I don't blame you, I wouldn't even fuck me if I were you. How do you even like me? What's wrong with you and Krista? I don't even like me. I heard my voice on a voice mail yesterday, and it was like, 'how can anyone stand listening to you?'"

I parted enough to look at her in the face

Thomas: "Hey, I really like your voice, you can send me as many voicemails as you want."

Nadine: "I hate the way I look when I talk or when I chew gum. Don't ever let me chew gum, okay? Don't let me chew gum. And then, I had the worst thought. I got to spend the rest of my life with myself."

I hated seeing her like this, I absolutely hated to hear all of that. For me she's always been perfect, and even if it was the alcohol that made her talk like that, I intended to let her know that

Thomas: "Hey, look at me."

I used my two fingers to lift her chin and make her look at me

Thomas: "You are perfect, Nadine. You hear me? There is not even the slightest thing in you that is less than perfect, and whoever thinks differently can go fuck himself. Can you repeat that for me?"

Nadine stared at me with wide blank eyes, her drunk state was evident, and that was confirmed when she, out of the blue and with a large smile on her face, said

Nadine: "You have a funny nose."

That made both of us laugh for a few seconds

Thomas: "Oh, do I?"

She nodded with the same smile plastered on her face

Nadine: "Yes, you do."

Then she touched my nose with her fingers and kept talking

Nadine: "It's like it's slim and large at the same time...it's a funny cute nose."

Then she giggled a bit and I, after a chuckle, asked her

Thomas: "And what else do you find funny and cute about my face?"

Then she looked at all my features with, might I say, a strange expression on her face: her smile slowly disappeared and she studied each frame and curve on my face with her mouth slightly agape, all the while tracing my face with her fingers. I didn't know what had gotten into her, but the atmosphere in the room had significantly changed. My heart started to beat faster and my breaths were more rapid. She scooted closer to me until there were only a few inches of space between our faces, she placed both her hands on my cheeks and said

Nadine: "Your cheeks...they're lean and soft...and..."

Then she shifted her hands' positions. She placed her left hand on her lap and with her right one's fingers she touched gently my lips

Nadine: "...your lips...they're rosy...and full...and..."

She trailed off and, before I knew what was happening, she gently placed her lips on mine. Despite her drunken state, that was a beautiful first kiss. After a few seconds my eyes closed and I gave in, kissing her back with the same gentleness and passion. When our lips touched I felt literal electric waves, my heart was hammering inside of my chest at this point. Our lips molded perfectly together, as if they were made for each other. She released a small whimper in my mouth, everything was perfect...but then she parted from the kiss and slumped on my chest, snoring. To say I was speechless would be the understatement of the year, and in that moment I remembered an important factor: she was drunk. She wasn't thinking straight while she was kissing me. If she wasn't drunk she would've never kissed me. That thought was enough for me to gently lay her on her bed, cover her with her blankets, and kiss her on her forehead with tears in my eyes. I closed the drawer and took a couple of blankets and a cushion, then I walked out of the room and turned off the light. I didn't see Krista, nor Darian around, and I figured they already went to sleep, so I positioned myself on the sofa with the blankets and the cushion and tried to sleep. That turned out to be more difficult than I thought: I couldn't stop thinking about that kiss, that beautiful kiss that turned out to be fake, given the drunk state of my crush. In the end, after many, too many silent tears, I managed to fall asleep, my last thought being

"Shit...I love her."

A/N: hey there, guys! Sorry for the delay, here's the next chapter. I hope you liked it. Also, another thing: finding animated gifs that work with Wattpad is nearly impossible, so I won't even try anymore. Tell me what do you think of this chapter, was it worth the wait? See ya ❤️