Timing Is Everything

Chapter 3

I was dreading meeting someone in a public place where it would just be the two of us. I was this weird mixture of scared, excited, anxious and dreadful as my dad dropped me off at the library and then went to the gym (he's a gym rat). I'm overthinking everything about everything as I walk through the automatic doors and go straight for the seating area part of the library. (It's a good sign that I'm worrying so much over a guy that ONLY wants to be friends, huh.)

Last night I tried on about six different outfits with different hair styles and hated all of them for different reasons. In the end I decided on blue jeans, a plain black V-neck (that shows off the girls a bit, if you know what I mean) and my white (or should I say grey and brown) Converse. I left my hair like it usually is, all frizzy and medium length dark red curls, and did my makeup the lazy way I usually do (eyebrows, mascara and concealer) so it would look like I was trying but not anything much more than what I always do.

I also have this thing where I'm always incredibly early for meeting at agreed upon times so I had to force myself to show up five minutes after noon (I know, I want to throw up as well). Normally anyone I meet, including my best friends, never show up until about ten to thirty minutes after the agreed upon time so let's just say that I'm pleasantly surprised when I see a boy wearing black joggers and graphic t-shirt sitting on a stool by himself at that long island-bar-thing that makes people face a window.

Of course I've already rehearsed twenty different ways to sit down and start conversation without leaving time for awkward silence so I walk right over and put my giant-ass backpack on the ground beside the stool to the left of him and sit down.

"Hey." He says with a welcoming smile as I take off my black sweater and put it on the back of the stool I'm sitting on.

"Hay is for horses." I say without skipping a beat. He laughs a perfect boyish laugh (you know, the breathy ones with the deep voice) and I laugh my embarrassing weird laugh (you know, the donkey/witch/deep chuckle kind of laugh that changes every time I find something funny).

"How was your night?" He asks, completely taking over the conversation starting.

"Watched the Oilers get their butts handed to them by the Flames." I say as I start taking out my books. "How about you?"

"Not as eventful as yours," He says as he runs his hands through his hair. I take out my laptop and he adds "I didn't know that we were bringing computers."

"This is where my social homework is." I say matter-of-factly. He stares at me for no more than a second and then shoves his biology textbook at me.

"Teach me the whole unit." He asks. I open my laptop and turn it on as I quickly flip through the pages of the textbook, refreshing my knowledge of the endocrine system. Once I open up the document where I typed up all my bio notes, Jay's eyes widen at all the different hormones and what they do.

"You think that's bad, just wait until I get to the negative feedback for every single hormone." I say as he covers his face with his hands.

"That's it. I'm dropping bio thirty." He states.

"No, don't do that, it's my favorite science!" I object.

"Nope. Still dropping it." He says. He then drops his hands from his face and closes the textbook. "What do you want to do now?"

"Please just give the endocrine system a chance. What if I told you that I brought flash cards?" I plead.

"Oh, well if you have flash cards then that changes everything." He says sarcastically. I roll my eyes dramatically and open my social notebook.