In My Dreams

Ten

“Alrighty, team!” I said, clasping my hands together, “we are set and ready to wash some cars! Watch out Africa, here I come!” I pointed in some random direction.

Everyone cheered, except for Mike, who did a weak whoo! and overturned an empty bucket and sat on it.

Today was my first day to try to earn some money for my trip to Africa this summer. My friends kindly offered to help with today’s fundraiser: car washing!

We set up base in the middle of Town Square, near Foster Park, hoping to gain people’s attention.  

Everyone hung out in the back of Tyler’s truck while we waited for customers. Shay excitedly sat beside me and handed me a Dr. Pepper. “Thanks,” I said, smiling and opening the can. She hung her legs off the edge, too when she nudged me with her shoulder. She looked around; like she wanted to make sure no one could hear her.

“Soooooo,” she gushed. “How was your date with Tyler?”

I nearly choked on my drink as I stared at her with wide eyes. “How-how did you know about our date?”

“Pfft, everyone knows about it, Jay,” she waved a hand dismissively, “we just haven’t said anything about it. To spare you guys the embarrassment…” she gave me a wink. I completely dismissed all my anger towards her when I realized how much I missed my best friend. We had been distant these past weeks since she left my house that Saturday night. 

I blushed recalling all that had happened. Shay did her signature squealing at all the aww moments. After we finished, our first customer pulled up, along with a few other cars in line. I giddily got to work along with my friends.

Even Mike got on a roll. Though, most of his attention was on wooing all the pretty girls that came in. He would escortthem out of their cars and keep them company. I rolled my eyes at how enthusiastic he’d get when someone attractive came.

When I was washing the back window of one our latest cars, Tyler came and bumped my hip with his. “Hey,” he smiled.

I smiled sheepishly and continued to scrub the thick coat of dirt on the window. Where did this car go? Into a marsh or something?

“So, I guess we’re the school’s bad kids.” He ginned, helping me scrub the stubborn dirt.

“Eh, it wasn’t that big of a deal!” I furrowed my brows in concentration. “We just…trespassed.” I laughed, shaking my head, recalling the strict talking-to the security guard, Tom, gave us.

“Now, I’m not going to call the police, but you better not try to pull something like this off ever again! Or I’ll definitely be calling the police and blah blah blah…”

I don’t remember the rest because I probably dozed off after about 15 minutes of lecture.

“That was the best date I’ve ever been on, Jade.  Probably for you too.”

I scoffed, “Ha! What makes you so sure I haven’t had other really fun and super exciting dates?” I joked, looking amused. Truth was, my date with Tyler, was my first one ever. But I would never tell him that.

“Pssh, because you went with me…Your dream guy!”

I wanted to laugh, but the words dream and guy drubbed me the wrong way. I thought about MB and  his weird mood swings.

Tyler seemed to notice my forced smile. “Everything okay?”

I nodded enthusiastically, widening my grin. “Yeah, just thinking about something.”