Hearts ✓

Nine 💕

You're not as bad as I thought, but only when you're real

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"No, he didn't do that, he didn't do a confession as a part of the bet." Lauren pointed out. "Confessions are a fundamental part of the dare, but this timing doesn't quite add up."

Lauren flicked her chocolate brown hair behind her as she stretched up, only to sprawl back down. Over the last few days, she had taken a liking to my fluffy duvet and had wrapped it around herself loosely.

Ever since this bet happened, I had been wary of which things that Jake was doing were real, and which were not. My brow furrows as I think of possible situations wherein it was either. "I can ask the others to see if it's a common pattern for other guys." She notices my discomfort.

"Thanks."

I yawned as I lazily brewed coffee for myself. I hadn't had enough sleep to deal with childish boys, hence the need for caffeine.

Being one of the fiercest competitors for the spot at being valedictorian, I made a mental note that if I ever had to make a Valedictorian speech, I would give my kind friend, caffeine, a shoutout for always sticking with me.

Lauren says that she needs to leave a moment later to catch up on her exercise and although I claim that with a body like hers, you don't really need to exercise for another twenty years, she wants to remain fit. Halfway out of the door, she urges me to come along with her to loosen up my mind.

She had a point, I really did need a distraction at this moment, all I seemed to be able to talk, or even think about was that stupid dare. I nodded to her in agreement before changing into my exercise gear.

While the run was relatively peaceful, as it always was on weekend mornings, it doesn't seem to be the magic potion that tears me off all the thoughts weighing me down at the back of my mind. The breeze is lovely, it's blowing onto my face keeping all my stray hair flowing backward. I'm panting hard from all the running while it is simultaneously cooling me down at a steady pace.

Three kilometers later, Lauren and I both part ways. She heads off to the gym to let loose, and I decide that I'm too exhausted to continue. Although I would go if it takes my mind off the dare, the real, and the fake, I know it's not going to, so I don't bother going.

Soon I'm met with an unbearable amount of buzzing coming from my pocket. I fish around it only to come up with an unknown number calling my phone. I debate not picking up, but after weighing the pros and cons, I decided that it's worth a shot.

"Hello?" I start, staring into the grayscale background of my apple phone with a red button dangling awkwardly under the six white rimmed ones standing above it. I circled my index finger on the thumbprint detector suppressed under the home button.

"Hey." A very familiar deep voice answers from the other end. The voice is light and airy, almost has a slight tingle of playfulness embedded into it. The mystery voice belongs to none other than Jake.

"How'd you get my number."

"I asked around?" He says as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"So, why did you call."

"To ask if you'd want to check out the beach."

I hope this is you being real, my mind says, but to Jake, I reply, "Well, why not."

"Great!" He says, at the very same time his car drives up beside me.

"I cannot even begin to believe this." I roll my eyes at him.

"No girl can resist me." He brags brushing his hair with his hand.

"Says the guy who can't resist himself." I do my infamous eye roll while opening the door to his semi-luxurious midnight blue car.

"Ouch."

The beach is only two blocks away, so it doesn't make sense that he decides to blast Despacito using a speaker.

"Please turn that deaf-making machine off, especially when it's playing a death-sounding song that I've heard at least a million times in the last week."

"Don't you dare insult Despacito." By now, I can't even manage to detect if he's being sarcastic, or if he is actually defending an overused song.

Jake makes a swift left turn which jerks me upright, and just like that, we've reached the beach. Teenagers loom the area in clusters, but there aren't a lot of them, most people are sprawled, facing downwards, trying to get a tan.

Seeing my flustered look, Jake simply laughs and tosses me a paper bag. I skim through its' contents only to find a swimsuit, I don't take it out so I don't know if it's a one-piece or a bikini. Jake had serious planning skills. "Where'd you get this?" I asked him.

"The store. Like regular sane people do."

"Okay, why did you get one." I feel my eyebrow dancing to its very comfortable arched position.

"I actually don't know, I just saw a nice one while I was passing by and told my sister to get it."

"You told your sister to buy a swimsuit for a stranger, and somehow she should casually know my size."

"Okay, when you say it like that it sounds stupid."

I roll my eyes. "That's because it is."

"But it's not!" He exclaims. "I swear, girls have these magical powers that they use to guess each other's sizes, and for some reason, it's always right."

"But thanks." I start. "For this, I mean."

I go to the nearest changing room and begin undressing only to find out that his sister bought me a bikini. For crying out loud. I huff as I put it on, but Jake was right about one thing, it was a perfect fit.

After a few minutes, I come out to find Jake in his own swimming trunks and already laying on the sand. Slowly, I smuggle the bucket out of his sight and grab a bucketful of water. I quietly approach him, and at the moment when he turns to face me, I splash water on him.

He just stares at me. "You're so on."

He picks up a lone water gun and aims it straight at me, I try to jump out of its range, but to my dismay, he's faster than me.

Soon enough, our bodies are dipped halfway underwater and we're busy splashing water at each other. It's actually quite fun, both of us are laughing our heads off, casually dipping ourselves in completely every so often.

I think this may be a bit of the real Jake, and I like it.