The Halfway Group (book 1)

Chapter 17: The Tides of Change

Haley's POV:

It's been a few months now since our movie night at Jimmys and mine and Chloes relationship has gotten serious.  We haven't had an actual date yet, but tonight is the night we have our date.  Our actual first date at a restaurant.  Jimmy made the reservations for us and I love him for it.

"Ms. Carswell, are you with us?" Jimmy snickers as Ms. Atreyis calls on me.  "What is the answer to the problem?  What is the date that Marco Polo arrived in China?"

"Ummmm 12 days?"  Everyone laughs and Jimmy snickers, he's gonna get it.

"Mr. Carswell could you please answer correctly.  And Ms. Carswell I'll see you after school."

Fuck I have a date to keep with Chloe.

"Yes ma'am,  he traveled from 1271 to 1295, and spent 17 of those years in China." Jimmy said, I'm actually impressed he is way smarter than everyone thinks. Like way smarter than everyone thinks. 

"Thank you Jimmy, you get extra points for giving the precise years." Jimmy blushes and starts writing as class continues.  When the bell rings to go to the next class I tell Jimmy to text Chloe and tell her I will be detained for a bit.  And to wait for me. 

"Hale, I'm not sure I can do that."  He says as he smirks.

"Jimmy so help me god if you want to live to be 20 you'll do it.  It's our first legit date so I want it to be good." 

"Explains why you are wearing a dress today, don't worry I got your back."  He says as he hugs me. It sucks him being almost a foot taller than me.

I'm wearing my short black dress with and my vans, I can be cute when I want to be. 

"You look so adorable, why isn't this like an everyday thing?  You normally look like satan incarnate." 

"Boy, don't push your luck." He gives me one last hug and dashes to go meet Rachel, their free period is next so they get to have fun while I have repeat english.

Have fun bro.

"Ms. Carswell you have been excused for the class for the day, please take your stuff and go to room 213. 

"Oh....kay?"  I pick my stuff up and head out of the class and head to room 213.  Where Jimmy and Rachel have a pizza party thing setup for us... Max got out of class too and chloe is there. 

"Hey babe, hope you won't get in trouble for this but we got you out of class for the day, all classes."  Chloe says as she grabs my hand, "it was Jimmys idea.  He talked to Ms. Atreyis snd got your talk cancelled so we can go on our date when we get done here." 

"Oh my god thank you so much!!!" I hug Jimmy and kiss his cheek, I hated my next class and Mr. Jeffersons Class got boring. 

"Max is gonna talk to Jefferson for us and explain our dad is under the weather." He smiles and looks at me.  Sometimes I really do have the best brother ever. 

As we ate our pizza, Jimmy told us some jokes which incurred Chloe to beat him a bit, because they were honestly really immoral.

"Rachel, how are you and Jimmy getting along?"  I ask.

Jimmy shakes his head and makes it look like Rachel is hitting him.  When she turns to see what he's doing she glares at him.  "Oh we get along great, especially when we leave after this we will get along even better... isn't that right babe?"  Jimmy swallows hard knowing he's in deep shit.

"Now Rachel I love you."  Jimmy says as he finishes his pizza. 

"I know you do, I fucking love you too you brat." 

Jimmy and Rachels relationship has blossomed as well, they hangout a lot and go on plenty of dates.  And Max, she's just a lot happier now since Jimmy paid for her to go see her parents on vacation.  She was distressed because she missed them so much.  Jimmy does so much for everyone we all need to chip in and do something for him. 

"Chloe, Rachel, Max, can I talk to you girls privately?  Jimmy put your headphones in or something while we talk.  He does as he's told and listens to his music.

"Okay, so you guys know how he's done so much for us?  Well we need to all do something amazing for him.  He's the most depressed and upset one of us all but he looks out for us before himself.  But what should we do?"  I ponder as I think and think. 

"Maybe we should get him an amp?  He's been talking about getting another one but he doesn't want to get it yet." Rachel says as she smiles a little.  "This is a good idea what do you guys think?" 

"I like it.  We should do it, and when we give it to him, Haley you need to sing when he plays, I wanna hear that singing in person."  Chloe says and Max agrees.

"Yeah I want to hear Haley sing too, and I wanna see Jimmy play his guitar, we can do this." 

"Rache, you need to ask him what kind he's thinking about or what kind he wants most. But don't make it too obvious. Why you are asking." I say, chloe nods.
"Yeah he doesn't want to get suspicious." 

"Alright, I'll see what I can do." We convene and go back to the table and finish our pizza.  Chloe and I leave first as Jimmy Rachel and Max are still chatting at the table.

"Babe, we are going to the mall first to hangout before dinner."  Chloe says as she laces her fingers between mine.  This woman is so perfect for me, but I sense things are going to change soon... and I don't like change.  Chloe leads me to the truck as I get in I ask if it's the mall I'm used to going to and she says "You'll see babe, it's a date day for a reason. I got this all planned out."  That scares me a little.  I hope Jimmy and Rachel have a good time today.