Beaches

seven

(song for chapter: Heaven In Hiding - Halsey)

~Josh~

I went downstairs and opened up the fridge. I took a bottle of beer and right when I was about to go back upstairs I saw Tyler through the window. He stood there blowing smoke into the air. I went back upstairs and put the bottle under my pillow, then I went back downstairs and went out into the backyard.

"Hey." I said.

He exhaled and I watched as a light gray cloud floated up and disappeared into the peach sky.

"Sup." He said, putting my attention back on him.

"Uh," I started. "Where's everyone else?"

"Oh Nathan and Bianca are out on that date and Kate and Skylar went somewhere, probably the mall." He said.

"Wanna do something?" I asked.

"Sure." He smiled.

"We can watch a movie or go to the roof and just hang or if you wanna do something then..." I said with a smile.

"Let's flip a coin and see who picks the movie." He chuckled.

He smothered the cigarette out into the ashtray and we went back inside. I won the coin toss. We sat down on the couch and picked out Carrie. At the scary parts, which weren't actually scary to me, Tyler kinda twitched and inhaled oh so sharply. It was kinda adorable.

Josh stop.

I could tell he didn't wanna look scared but he couldn't help closing his eyes when he knew something bad would happen.

Josh stop.

"If you don't wanna watch this we don't have to." I said.

"Uh yeahh, maybe we should just play video games." He said.

"You scared you big baby?" I thought.

Baby? Josh stop.

I held back that remark and decided not to tease him. We went up to my room and started playing Mario Kart. It seemed to calm him down which made me feel less bad for him.

"Seriously?" I said. "Again?"

"I'm totally kicking your butt, man." Tyler laughed.

He keeps finishing in first place and I keep ending in second.

"Oh shut up." I smiled.

"Make me!" Tyler laughed as he slightly moved closer to me.

His expression changed when he realized what he had said. He didn't realize but his hand was almost on mine. We sat there quietly for a second . The moment dragged on to a minute, to an hour, to a day, to a week, to a month, to a year, to a decade, to a century. Then it all fell back to that one second.

He cracked a slight smile.

He's so... Josh stop.

"Shut up." I whispered with a smile.

"I'll kick your butt a million more times." He chuckled. "You suck at Mario Kart."

"Shut up." I laughed quietly.

In a split second, his hand was on mine. Everything began to move in slow motion. The light seemed to have a pink undertone. Everything was just so calm. Like floating in a clear, bright blue ocean in a secluded beach on a sunny day.

"Josh?" He said.

He wasn't asking a question, he noticed my mind was wondering and wanted to make sure I was y'know... here.

Within my mind adventure, he had moved closer to me. Then the front door opened. We could hear it from my room. That's when we both really noticed that we were touching hands and only a few inches away from each other.

"Tyler?" Kate said from downstairs. "Josh?"

We both stood up.

"Yeah?" Tyler called back, still locked onto my eyes.

"You guys wanna go out to eat?" She asked.

"Sure." Tyler said.

Then he left me alone in my room and went back into his.

What was that?

I slumped down onto my bed.

What was that?