Ash’s POV

Great. Just great. Of course, this would happen; of course they would leave us alone; of course I would be in this big park with only Alex. The others thought it would be a great idea to just walk off without saying anything while Alex and I weren’t watching. It was like they did it on purpose like it was some joke they continued to play on us. They kept excluding us, and it was pretty annoying. I came here to have a fun day with all my friends, but now I was just going to have to spend it with Alex… again.

“Neither Lianna nor Harper is answering my texts or calls,” I sighed, “have any luck with Zack, Rian, or Jack?”

“Nope, they are ignoring the shit out of me as well,” Alex gave me a half smile and put his phone away, “if one of us suddenly dies of heatstroke, they won’t know until we go home.”

“Well, then, we better not die of heatstroke.”

“Oh damn… I was planning on doing that today!” Alex started walking towards the map.

“Please don’t, you’re my ride to school every morning,” I followed him and looked at the large board. We looked at all the different attractions and roller coasters and decided to plan out our day without the others. Just because they were going to be buzzkills and ditch us, didn’t mean Alex and I couldn’t have fun ourselves.

We stood in some lines to get on rides and just generally enjoyed ourselves. The day was gradually getting warmer and eventually I actually believed I was going to get a heat stroke. All the cues were only getting longer. We expected this to happen, but seriously, I could feel my brain going all mushy inside. It was not nice at all.

I looked at Alex, who looked just as sweaty as I felt. He was wearing a striped tank top and somehow managed to find short skinny jeans that had the ends rolled up. It seemed like a normal thing to wear on such a hot day, but the beanie on his head just seemed unnecessary. But then again, I was the one wearing the red zip up hoodie. However, I was not going to take it off, there was no way I was going to reveal that much skin. I was going to be honest, though, and say that he looked pretty damn good. But that didn’t mean anything; I was allowed to think somebody looked good without actually feeling something for them… right?

I leaned forward so my chin was resting on his chest. He looked down at me, giving him a major triple chin situation. It was like he was expecting an answer from me, but he wasn’t getting one. I felt his chest rumble as he looked back straight ahead.

“What are you doing?” he giggled in a girly fashion.

“I’m so warm,” I groaned and wrapped my arms around him, “I need water.”

“Take off the hoodie,” he pulled on the fabric and I let him go, being way too warm and sticky to stay that close to him.

“No,” I whined, “I don’t like these clothes, they are too embarrassing.”

He raised an eyebrow at me, “you seriously think you don’t look good in them? Because I swear that you look fan-fucking-tastic. I well fend off any guys that give you weird looks, ok?”

I looked into his eyes and saw he was being genuine, so I slowly took off the warm fabric, “ok… but what do I do with it now?”

“Tie it around your waist?” He suggested and moved up when people started walking again.

I did as he told me to and already felt better since nobody would be able to practically see my butt fall out of the shorts. But I was still very thirsty, and he had the drinks, “and water?”

He swung the large liter bottle at me, “here you go, just don’t finish it, because we only have that to survive this cue,” he shouted louder, “that is way too fucking long!”

“Stop complaining,” I gulped down some of the water, “you’re the one who wanted to go on this ride!”

----
Alex’s POV

I was really glad that I was able to convince Ash to take off my sweater. She looked amazing in the clothes Harper had forced her to wear, and I sort of was able to make out why Harper even made Ash wear them. Ash really was a shy girl, and Harper was trying to break her shell bit by bit. She didn’t mind my swearing that much anymore, and she was already a lot louder in class. I mean. She even screamed out when Harper showed up in art class. Maybe once she opened up, she would finally realize I was slowly falling in love with- Wait. Hang on. There is no fucking way that I said love. Nope. Not yet; not ever! But Ash already got me to stop sleeping around… so maybe it was possible....

And I was pretty happy with the view I got when Ash wore those clothes. It just made her body look that much greater. Other girls must envy her; the most amazing personality, the greatest body ever, just overall the dream girl. And here she was, with me. Well, not really with me, but still. She could have just run away or refused to move until our friends showed up.

My phone buzzed and I saw I had gotten a pretty cryptic message from Jack. It read, ‘I see you, but you can’t see me. Looks like you are getting pretty cozy with each other’.

I frowned and looked around to see if I could find my lanky, skunk-haired best friend, or anybody else that was supposed to with him. But just like he said, he could see me, but I couldn’t see him.

Ash noticed something was up, “what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I looked around again, “Jack says he can see me, but that I can’t see him. A dick move, I guess.”

“What? Let me see,” she reached for my phone, and before I could object, she was already reading the message. Her eyes went wide, “oh my god. He can see us. Why would he say ‘Hi, Ash’? This is freaky.”

I snatched my phone back before she could read any other messages that could give my feelings away. She giggled and looked at me, “Jack seems to think that ‘we are getting cozy’ so why don’t we make it seem that way.”

My eyes went wide and my heart started beating fast, “what, you mean like playing a prank on them, yeah, that- that could be cool, I mean, they did ditch us, so why not? What do you want to do, maybe we could stand closer to each other, maybe hold hands-”

“I am so going to regret this,” she mumbled and before I could even ask her more, her lips were planted on mine. Ok, so my heart started beating faster. And I just stood there in shock. Why wasn’t I doing anything! The girl I had a humongous crush on was kissing me! Well, ‘kissing me’ wasn’t really the right thing to describe it with. Ash literally didn’t know what to do, so our lips were just pressed against each other, nothing else.

My body unfroze and I cupped her cheek with one hand before slowly starting to lead a slow and careful rhythm. People around us were probably disgusted, but at that moment I really didn’t care. Ash chose me to give her her first kiss, and it made my heart flutter. She started getting a hang of what I was doing and moved her lips along with mine. It definitely wasn’t the best kiss I ever had, but it felt a lot more special like there was actually something behind it, rather than some casual fuck. I broke it apart, and Ash stood back in her original position.

“Well, that was awkward…” she shuffled up to fill the small space that formed between us and the people in front, “I’m sorry.”

“No really, it’s fine,” I smiled at her, feeling satisfied with myself, “at least it was me and not some random guy.”

She chuckled, “and now my first kiss with a guy I really want to kiss --when I find him-- won’t be that awkward. I will at least sort of know what to do.”

Ouch. Once again she made my heart shatter into pieces. I actually felt something, but clearly, she didn’t. She basically just used me. Well, it was to be expected that she meant nothing with it, we were playing a prank. But still. This was her first ever kiss! And she always said how she wanted to be sure she liked the guy she had her first kiss with. But now she literally told me that I wasn’t that guy.

Just put on a fake smile, Alex.

“Yeah,” I forced out a laugh.

----

“Ok, wait here,” Ash let go of my hand she was holding the entire time, “I really gotta go to the bathroom. Don’t you dare move one step. I don’t want to lose you as well.”

“Ok,” I nodded and already missed the presence of her skin against mine. She smiled a toothy grin at me and ran to the toilets that were just a couple of feet away.

Things had only gotten worse since she kissed me. She was hugging me, holding my hand, hitting my chest, and giving me kisses on the cheek. I knew that everybody was following us since I often felt the phone in my back pocket vibrate, but I didn’t feel like checking the messages. It already felt bad enough to know it wasn’t real, I didn’t need Jack freaking out and being all happy for me.

I turned around and saw said lanky guitarist with our other friends grinning at me. They were looking at me like they were expecting me to run up to them and tell them all the juicy details, but I promised Ash I wouldn’t move. So, instead, I motioned for them to come over here instead, and they did.

“Dude!” Jack gasped, “woah--”

“Hey, guys,” Ash suddenly appeared at my side and I just wanted to cry right there on the fucking spot. None of this was real and Jack seemed so proud of me. I couldn’t do this anymore; I felt so uneasy and didn’t trust myself to say anything.

“You guys fucking kissed!” Jack exclaimed, “Holy shit!”

“What?” Ash laughed, “When?”

“When you were in that super long cue! I totally saw you guys! You know, after I sent you that message.”

“Umm, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Alex showed me a picture on his phone, and I was pretty loud there, so I had to get closer to him.”

“No fucking way I believe that,” Jack shook his head at her, “I literally saw you guys.”

Ash shrugged and didn’t say anything else. Jack kept staring at her for more answers and eventually she gave in, “is there any significance if we did? Because I don’t think there is.”

Jack then averted his attention to me, “Alex?”

“I’ll be right back,” I mumbled and left the group to go to the bathroom myself.

Now I knew exactly what all the girls I played felt like.

Notes

OH MY GOD! THEY KISSED!!!! But it doesn't seem good... does it? Well, shit. How is this going to play out?



Before I forget (which I totally did and had to add later on), I won't be able to update for a while. I'm gone Monday to Wednesday, so I won't be able to write then. So don't expect a chapter any earlier than Friday... I might be able to post a chapter tomorrow, but I don't think I will. I just wanted to let you know that I haven't abandoned the story.