Fate

Chapter 11: Lunches

"Will you come to homecoming with me?"

     I stared at him, not processing his words for a few moments. I flushed red when I realized that he'd just asked me to the dance.

     He looked at me expectantly, waiting for an answer.

     I nodded my head yes and stuttered: "I-uh sure! Yes!"

     He smirked at me, judging my reaction to him asking. But I could see the relief in his eyes that I'd said yes.

     "Ok then." He said. "I'll see you around Izzy."

     He smiled at me as he was about to walk away but I stopped him, standing up from my table and waving my phone at him.

     "Alex. Wait. How are we supposed to coordinate on stuff for it if I don't have your number? Here, I'll give you mine."

     Wow that was a sudden burst of confidence. Hopefully this goes smoothly.

     Alex looked at me, stunned at my newfound confidence. He smiled and pulled out his phone to trade numbers.

     "There. Now we have a way to contact each other." He said, walking back toward Ethan. "Oh and Izzy?" He stopped and faced me. "It's a date."

     I stared at him slack jawed, blushing fiercely, but managing to reply quietly: "Ok."

     Across the lunchroom I saw Conner glaring at Alex. He looked at me and we made eye contact. His face flashed with some sort of emotion but couldn't tell what it was because he was so far away. He turned and quickly walked out of the lunchroom.

     I stared after him, shocked.

     What just happened?

~~~~

It seemed like nothing was wrong with Conner on the bus that afternoon. Though, some of his usual sparkle in his eyes was gone.

I nudged him. "Conner guess what!"

"What?!" He grinned.

I placed a hand on my chest proudly. "I got asked to homecoming today!"

"Really?! That's great!" He paused. "Who asked you?"

I blushed. "Alex asked me today at lunch. We traded phone numbers and he said it was a date. Ahhh! I'm so happy! I've liked him for a little bit now so I'm really excited!"

Conner smiled at me, though it seemed forced. "That's amazing!"

"So were you thinking of asking anyone?"

"Not really. I haven't liked anyone for a while now."

"Oh that's understandable. So you're going alone then?"

"I don't know if I'm gonna go at all."

"What?!? You've got to go! It'll be so fun! You know what, since you don't have anyone to go with and Dorothy doesn't either now that I'm going with Alex, you two should go together!"

This is a great solution! Now my two best friends won't be alone at the dance!!

Conner didn't look to enthusiastic about it. He said: "Uh I don't know. Wouldn't that be a little weird? I mean if we did go, it would have to be as friends and she would have to know that."

"It wouldn't be that weird... would it? I mean, you know each other and you're friends..."

"I guess... I'll ask Dorothy about it when she gets back to school."