In Or Out

Chapter 7

The picture is a clue for what's going to happen at the end of this chapter! (It's also my beautiful bow that I just got for my birthday that I love sooo much!)

Chapter 7.
"What's he doing here?" Hailey asked, her voice small.

"He was just asking me a question... about homework." I saw all three of them roll their eyes. Yeah, I was a pretty horrible liar.

"A kiss?" Jake repeated. "Who kissed?" I guess he hadn't heard about this morning. I can't say I was surprised, two 'nerds' kissing wasn't exactly the news of the school.

"Carter's girlfriend Naomi Thomson and Charlie McMillian." Hailey stated. Okay, maybe more people knew about it than I expected.

"Whew," Jake said, putting his arm around me. "for a second there, I thought that my little Bren kissed some guy." Then, the reality of the situation sunk in. "Dude. Your girlfriend kissed another guy?"

"I don't know, that's what I saw at least." Carter sounded frustrated. "That's what I was going to talk to Brenlee about."
Jake had a confused look on his face. My face paled. I forgot that they didn't know about my new friends. I shot Carter a look. Don't tell them. I led him away from the other two.

"He came onto her, not the other way around." I figured there was no way to sugarcoat this.

"That... I'm gonna kill him!" Carter growled. I catch him as he ran towards his car.

"Carter! Wait! He didn't know..." He didn't stop. I sighed. What was he even going to do? He doesn't even know where Charlie lives... I hope...
I turned around to see my friends staring right back at me. Well, this ought to be interesting.

"Okay, cut the crap. We've seen you around the school with the geeks. What happened to you?" Hailey said. Jake, once again, looked confused. Ugh. He's so oblivious.

Wait. I had never had negative thoughts like these enter my head about my best friend. It must be all of Naomi's ranting about the popular kids. She definitely has some spunk.

"Well," I sighed, finally beginning my explanation. "I met Charlie in the library one day, and we hit it off." I could tell that my cheeks were turning red while I remembered how we met and how I started to like him.

Hailey gasped. "You have a crush on the nerd!"

"I... No I don't!" I refused. I was hyper aware of Jake standing right beside me. I had somehow managed to always avoid talking about crushes with him. Good thing too, since I have liked him since we met, when we were like 5.
Hailey, being the good friend she is, let it drop. I knew it wasn't over, though when Jake turned to me.

"Wait. Brenlee Larson likes a boy? That's never happened before! Bren, why didn't you tell me?" His face morphed into a pout. "I thought I was your bestest friend ever." One thing that not a lot of people know about Jake is that he can be super childish. It's one of the things that makes me love him so much. The moment was broken by Hailey shaking with laughter. I gave her a dry look. Don't you dare give it away. I've hidden it for this long. Thankfully, Jake just dismissed it as Hailey being Hailey.

"So, tell me about him. What was his name? Charlie?" Jake asked excitedly.

"I don't like him! And why are we still out here?" The two looked as if they just realized that we were still in my driveway. As we walked inside, my brother Ryan got up from the living room.

"Well, that was interesting." He smirked. I cursed under my breath.

"You heard all of that huh?" I said scratching the back of my neck. When I was little, my mom told me that Ryan and I were gonna be stuck together for our whole life, so there was no point in fighting. Since then, we have only snapped at each other maybe once or twice. He's pretty annoying sometimes, but I still love him to death.

"So, who's the new guy, you know the one that dropped you off? I thought you liked Jake." I blushed. So it was that obvious that I was developing feelings for Charlie.

"He's... just my friend!" I tried to defend myself, but failed miserably. He nodded and gave me a look that said yeah right.

I smirked. Time to change up the game. "So what's up with you and that Samantha girl?" He blushed. Like actually blushed! He was adorable. I had sorta looked over his shoulder while he was texting one day and saw the name Samantha with hearts around it. What guy puts hearts around a girl's name in their phone? Apparently my thirteen year old brother.

"I... I gotta go." He said, racing up the stairs. I laughed. Oh, middle school love. I wondered how Charlie was, I really wanted to show him something. I decided to text him, hopefully Carter hadn't followed through with his threat.

Brenlee: Hey, wanna come over? I have something I need to show you.

His response was almost instantaneous.

Charlie: Wow Bren, I didn't know you felt that was about me. Just kidding, I'll be over in 10, yeah?

Brenlee: Oh shut up. I'll see you in a minute!

---

"You're something else, Brenlee." I didn't know whether to take that as a compliment or an insult, so I simply looked at Charlie and gestured to the two bows and arrows on the table next to me.

"Want to try?" He nodded and reached for the recurve. I knocked his hand out of the way.

"Nuh uh. Nobody touches my baby. You," I gestured to the simple longbow in front of me, "get this one." He pouted, which was kind of cute, and picked up the longbow. I showed him how to stand, how to knock the arrow, and how to hold the bow.

"It's okay if you don't hit the target on the first try, almost no one does." He nodded, listening intently. I told him to go ahead and take his first shot. I was amazed to see that his arrow landed almost right near the bullseye.

"What... How did you...?" I sputtered. He boyishly grinned. "It's not beginners luck, I've been. Doing archery since I was twelve." I nodded, surprised that he didn't tell me earlier.
"Let see you shoot some with your 'baby' huh?" He asked, almost making fun of me.

I huffed and picked up my recurve. I got into stance and knocked my arrow. I took a deep breath and shot. The arrow landed on the outside of the target, and I was humiliated. I could hear Charlie start to laugh and I almost shot him a glare, but I realized he was moving closer.

"Better luck next time." I felt his breath on my ear. I was so distracted, I didn't feel him take my bow out of my hands.

"Hey!"