Today is another b day, so I get to see Brooke today. I find I'm actually kind of nervous. I don't know how my grandma talked me in to getting the courage to invite her over for dinner. I haven't even known her for a full week and I may get to see her outside of school, away from Pete and everyone else. I probably shouldn't have asked her so last minute either. It's Friday, the day I find out if she can come over later.
I walk in to first period English class and pick up the worksheets at the front of the room before taking my desk in the back. Brooke isn't here yet, so I have a few minutes to get over my nerves and figure out how I'm going to take rejection if she says no. After five minutes the bell rings, just as Brooke enters the room and sits at her desk. Then Mr. Brown begins his normal morning speech.
"You need the papers at the front desk," I tell her.
"What?" she says, then looks at the paper on my desk and then the front of the room. "Oh, ok," she says, and begins to get up.
"It's ok," I say as I rise out of my chair, "I can get it, take mine." I hand over the two pages over The Crucible and walk to the front of the room.
"So what did your parents say when you asked last night?" I prompt her.
"Well, it took a while, but they eventually said sure. I just need to go home and feed the dog first," she replies.
"Oh you have a dog? I wish I had one."
"What's your favorite breed?"
"Either a Pug or Siberian Husky."
"Huskies are a beautiful breed."
"Yeah, I like the fact that they are one of the rare breeds able to get blue eyes, and I love how they howl like a wolf, not those annoying little yaps you get from other dogs."
"Yeah, they truly are a beauty."
"So, if you need to feed your dog before you come over, do you want me to walk you home? Then we can walk back to my house after."
"No!"
I was shocked in to silence. Did she not like me or something? Because I'm pretty sure she just yelled at me..
"Hey, I'm sorry. I just have other stuff to do after feeding the dog, like getting ready. Girls can take a while with that stuff, you know? I wouldn't want you to sit around waiting on me for an hour when you could help your grandma make a pot pie or something."
I smiled at that, and was happy to see she smiled back.
Alright, let's trade numbers and I'll leave you with my adress."
After she wrote my adress on a blank piece of paper, Mr. Brown told us to pick a partner and work on the first hand out of The Crucible, and the second page would be for homework. I looked down at the paper and found that the partner work was just answering twenty questions, and the homework was a one page paper front and back about what we've read and if we believed we could get away with such an event in modern America.
"Well, the group work looks easy," I say. "How would you like to split up the work? Ten ten? or go through them together?"
I look up to see Harry standing by Brooke. Oh, this is embarrasing.
"Hey Brooke, I was wondering if you wanted to be my partner," I saw him give me a look that said, screw off.
"Oh, I'm already working with Ayden, sorry." She looked down at her paper, turned in to me and never gave the guy a second glance. The day is off to a good start and I couldn't be more happy.
"Well," she begins, "I guess we can go through them together, have short open discussions in case one knows something the other doesn't," she said.
"Alright," I say, with a grin on my face, and so we began.
