THE MATCHMAKER ➢ JB MZ

three

JOEY'S PHONE WENT OFF like five times, and he didn't plan on answering it. he had an idea on who it was from, so he didn't bother checking. however, it was annoying charles who was tired of constantly hearing the notification sound.

"are you going to answer that?" charles asked his best friend as they stood in the school hallway before homeroom. they were almost late since charles never fails to forget the things he needs.

"you already know i'm not," joey sighed. charles then laughed, because he knew who it was from. "she won't leave me alone. she's obsessed."

charles shook his head. "vanessa is so hot. any man would be lucky to have her."

joey shrugged and then reached into his pocket. he opened up to her text messages and began to read them out loud.

"heyyy, she said with a heart next to it, and then she asked how i was doing," rolling his eyes, joey quickly typed a 'good lol' and then hit send. she texted more, but he didn't feel like reading it all since he didn't even care. "she just won't leave me alone."

charles chuckled, although he was jealous deep down. he always liked vanessa but she dissed him so many times. she liked joey more than anyone else in existence.

"i know you like her, so i'll convince her to hit you up," joey laughed. charles joined in and then nodded.

"this is why we're friends bro." every girl that charles liked had a crush on joey, but he never liked any of them back. it made charles think about how unfair life was, but since charles was like second to joey, i guess you could say they settled for him.

pretty soon, maddie walked over to the two. "hey," she greeted both of them. charles was confused as to why she was talking to them, but joey didn't seem to mind.

"aye maddie," joey smiled at her. "what's up?"

"can i talk to you?" asked the brunette girl. that was charles's cue to leave so he slowly backed away.

joey nodded. "yeah, sure."

"what do you think about vanessa smith?" maddie questioned with a smile. joey sighed, disappointed because he actually wanted to have an actual conversation with maddie. and an actual conversation, according to joey, had nothing to do with vanessa.

"she's alright," joey slightly laughed. he was scared to say how he really felt about her, annoyed and irritated by her as a whole, since kids in this school feed off of drama. you never know who can be listening and can expose you to the school's scariest person!

"alright?" maddie raised an eyebrow. "she's alright?"

"well yeah," joey replied. "i think she's cool but-"

"but what?" she interrupted him.

"let me finish," said joey with a laugh. he was trying to stay cool around maddie, although vanessa was an awkward topic and one that he wanted to avoid. "why are you asking me about this?"

maddie tried to think of something. "no particular reason. i'm working for the newspaper and i need people's honest opinions on vanessa. she's going to have a whole article on herself and everything!"

joey slightly smiled. "well, you should put that she's alright."

"noted," responded maddie. "i'll see you in first period."

"see you." he waved to her as she walked away.

since when did maddie work for the newspaper? oh well, she did say that it was a new year and a new her. joey thought to himself, trying to put the pieces together. him and maddie were friends, not very close, but he seemed to know a lot about her.

one of his best friends, lucas triana, had a huge crush on her so he nonstop talked about her. so maybe that's how he knew most of what he knew about her.

and lucas was just as obsessed with maddie as vanessa was with joey. he even made his own ship name with her, laddie, which joey found funny. lucas was one of the coolest kids that you'd ever meet, yet he was a little weird deep down.

joey walked to homeroom, which he had with literally none of his friends. he sat in silence everyday, until first period. homeroom ended shortly and he went off to his first class. maddie was already there, throwing paper balls into the trash can.

the whole class went wild when she made it from far away, especially lucas. lucas only fell in love a little more, even over the littlest of things. the class calmed down when maddie went back to her seat, next to joey.

"hey joey," she greeted. "how are you? wait let me guess, alright?"

joey laughed. "clever. but yeah, you could say that."

maddie smiled at him.

"how's the newspaper article with vanessa?" he asked her.

"oh it's going great," maddie answered. "but it's going to take a long time. i think i can handle it."

laughing, joey started paying attention to the teacher when class started. maddie didn't have time to talk to joey about vanessa. pretty soon, it was the last ten minutes of class. maddie needed to talk to joey, if she wanted to go through with the plan.

"so joey," maddie turned to face him. "about vanessa. do you have more to say other than just 'alright'?"

he sighed. "well, she's cool."

"cool?" maddie pretended like she was taking notes.

"i know you're not actually writing that down," joey mentioned, causing maddie to laugh. "i know you need to do this newspaper thing, but why do you keep asking me?"

"you're important around here," replied maddie. "i feel like if you said something, it would be better than some random student nobody's ever heard of."

"i'm not that important maddie, really." maddie raised both eyebrows.

"i think you're important," she complimented, although she wasn't trying to. "now back to vanessa."

joey exhaled. "i think she's cool, popular, pre- pre..."

he didn't want to say it.

"say it, come on, say it," maddie tried to get the words come out.

"pretty," he said quickly, hoping maddie couldn't tell what he said or that she wouldn't hear it.

"there you go!" she cheered, which caused joey to chuckle. "cool, popular, and pre- pre... pretty." she mocked him, then started laughing.

"hey!" maddie looked at him, still laughing. joey then smiled.

out of nowhere, lucas triana walked up to them.

"hey maddie," he said, flirtatiously.

"hi lucas," she replied. she didn't want to talk to lucas, she had to talk to joey about vanessa. there was only a minute left of class anyways. "what's up?"

"not much," answered lucas. "just wanted to say hey."

well if this isn't the most awkward thing that i've ever seen, i don't know what is. joey thought. he knew lucas had a huge crush on her, but they were talking. he didn't have to interrupt.

maddie smiled and then the bell rang. "bye luc."

she turned around. "bye joey. i'll talk to you later, okay?"

"yeah," he smiled at her and soon, everyone cleared out of the room.

a/n

i ship them ngl! but please leave a vote it's greatly appreciated! this is barely even edited so watch out for typos and grammar mistakes because you already know i'm too lazy to fix them as of right now 🤐🤐