How Pizza Saved My Love Life

17. "Say it, baby."

"You still keep your skateboard in the basement?" Joe asks, making me smile.

"Yeah, let me go get real quick." I open the car door and sprint to the house excitedly. Fumbling through my keychain, I finally pick out the right key and jam it in the keyhole.

"Aubrey, is that you?" My mom calls.

"Yeah, mom. I'm just gonna grab my skateboard real quick." I say hurriedly.

"You haven't skateboarded in ages." She says as a matter-of-factly.

"I know. Joe is outside, though, so I don't wanna keep him waiting for long." I walk to the basement, hearing her footsteps following behind me.

"You two are talking again?" She asks interested.

"Mom I promise I'm gonna tell you everything if you help me find my skateboard." I turn around giving her a puppy-dog look.

"Honey." She smiles.

"Yeah?"

"It's right next to you." She points at the corner on my left.

"Right." I laugh. "Thanks, mom!"

I go back outside to find Joe taking out his skateboard from the trunk of his car. He has always kept it there so he can use it whenever he wanted. I would do the same except...well I don't have a car.

"Back already?" He starts to balance himself on the board.

"Yeah, mom helped me find it." I lay down my board on the ground and try to remember how I used to get on it.

"You need help over there?" He offers when he sees me struggling to stay balanced. Don't judge me, it's been almost 2 years now.

"How come you don't have trouble at all?" I ask surprised that he is skating smoothly against the asphalt.

"I may or may not have been skating for the past three weeks." He answers me. "Kind of got my mind off of things."

"Well, come help me then." I feel a little bad for Joe. I didn't mean to break his heart at all. The fact that he had to distract himself with skating makes me feel guilty. We should have been skating together but I was...honestly I don't know what I was.

He gets off the board and walks to me. He helps me on it and then holds my waist to steady me. My hand was wrapped around his right shoulder as he slowly let go of me.

"Come on. You can let go of me now." He says when his hands were off of me completely.

"Right." I says as I slide my hand off of him and start to gain balance.

I start to remember how the process goes and soon, me and Joe are racing. It felt nice to have him back. It was nice to do something we used to do all the time before. This felt strangely normal. There was no tension, no awkwardness, or unease. It was just me and Joe having a great time.

"Slow down, I'm getting tired." He exhales loudly.

"Alright, grandpa." I smirk and he gives me the finger.

We get off our boards and sit in the middle of the road. It wasn't a very busy neighborhood so there were barely any cars passing through. It was peaceful and serene.