NATALIE

Week 4

"Do you wanna get ice cream with me after school?" I ask Tommy as I take a seat on the edge of an empty cafeteria bench.

He drops down next to me. "What, like on a date?"

I smirk. "You wish."

Tommy shrugs. "I'm straight."

Shame.

The cafeteria noise picks up, and I have to wait a few seconds before I open my mouth again. "So... ice cream?"

Tommy nods eagerly. "Hell yeah. You can pretty much get me to go anywhere if you feed me." He pauses. "Wait. You are paying, right?"

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I'll pay. Cheapskate."

"Hey, don't you have a football thing after school?" he wonders.

I nod. "We were gonna have a game, but it got moved to tomorrow. We just have regular practice today. How 'bout you? Do you have cross country?"

"Yeah."

"So we'll go after," I decide. "I'll find you after practice. There's a place pretty close to here that's in walking distance."

"Okay, cool... Get it? Because... ice cream?" Tommy groans and facepalms. "Wow, I need to find out whose influence that is and delete them from my life."

"Ya know, the first time I saw you, I thought you were a secret gang member or something," I say, more to myself than to Tommy. "Not a guy who makes barely acceptable puns."

"A... gang member?"

I shrug. "Yeah. Has anyone ever told you that you're intimidating?"

Tommy looks down at his plain gray t-shirt and jeans. "Uh... no? But I've heard a lot of 'rude', 'cynical', and 'pain in the ass'."

"I'd agree with all of those things."

"Shut up," he retorts to prove my point. "I think I'm pretty normal, I just don't smile as much as the average person."

"You've probably smiled, like, once in the past week that I've known you."

"That's probably accurate."

"So have you made any other friends here?" I ask. "Ya know, with your inability to look happy."

Tommy ignores my half-insult. I think I'm starting pick those up from him. "I've talked to a few people. There's a guy on my cross country team who's pretty nice, I think his name's Boston? I'd hang out with him, but he's always with a curly blonde-haired girl, and she kind of terrifies me."

I laugh at the thought of Tommy being scared of someone else. "Yeah, that's Elle from our poetry class. Energetic, wannabe teacher's pet, and I'm pretty sure most people are afraid of her. She can be okay, but she hates me most of the time."

"I think a lot of people hate you most of the time."

I frown. "Wow, thanks for tearing down my delicate ego."

"Yeah, well, someone has to."

"Maybe you don't have friends because you insult people all the time," I point out helpfully.

"Nah, the insults are reserved just for you."

When the bell rings, we go our separate ways. I run into Delaney, and my mood is okay enough to deal with her. I drop her off, and I sprint to my own class. I make it through the door with a split second to spare.

I sit down in my assigned seat, fix my eyes on the clock, and start counting down the minutes until after football practice.

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