Be Mine

Roses

Chapter 15

Practice was short today because coach had to go watch his daughter's varsity soccer game, so he decided to let us off the hook. "Ladies, today is going to be your easiest practice ever. Don't forget that." He yelled as we all cheered.

"So, who are you going to give your roses to tomorrow?" One of my co-captains, Alyssa, asked me. It was a tradition at my school that the week of our Spring Dance we could send colorful roses to friends, crushes, boyfriends, girlfriends anonymously, although people liked to attach little notes to them.

I always sent my roses to my close group of friends, never really having the courage to  send it to a boy I liked. "Haha, I don't know...I'm not really into anyone at the moment." I said, trying to change the subject. "Well, I heard Reese is going to send you five roses this year." Alyssa says laughing.

Ugh. Practically the whole school knew Reese Gauble was in love with me ever since he sent me Valentine's Day Cards in middle school. Reese was a family friend but we didn't have the same friend groups. He hung out with the theater kids and we had absolutely nothing in common. Every year I had to see him at our annual Christmas Party and he always got so nervous around me.

Reese wasn't a bad looking guy. He had sandy blonde hair, electric blue eyes, and a lean face. This summer he did a total 360 and became more built and lost his baby face. But, I was never interested in him because we were so different. We never had any meaningful conversations and he was always so serious. Honestly, I wasn't sure why he even liked me.

But this year, I did actually want to go to our Spring Dance. It was a tradition for my friends and I who didn't have dates to go to the movie theater and watch like three movies in a row before sleeping over at one of our places.

It was my last year though, and I didn't want to miss out on anything. Even if it was just a lame dance. I just needed to find a date.

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Monday rolled around pretty quickly, and I hadn't had any contact with Mr. Wood. "It's for the best" I thought to myself. Surprisingly I had much better self control than I thought I did.

Today was Rose day and I had bought a bouquet of creamy peach colored roses with white filler. I walked past all of my close friends' lockers, taping a rose along with a cute note reading "I love you!". I headed over to my locker, holding two roses left in my hand, unsure of who to give them to.

My locker was filled with roses of all different colors. I read through all the notes laughing as my friend's wrote silly stuff. Five of the roses were blue and I knew exactly whom there were from. Reese.

"You like the color blue right?" A voice calls from behind. I whip around and Reese is standing right behind me. "Reese, you need to stop doing that!" I yelled. He stares at me intensely, making me feel awkward.

"umm Reese would you like to go to the Spring dance with me?" I blurted out. Wait...what did I just do?

One thing that I hate is awkwardness and silence, and I usually try to fill that space up with talking. I just didn't think I would say that. He look at me astonished, as if I proposed to him. "Wait are..are you serious?" He asks, eyes wide. I didn't have the heart to say no, and besides, I did need a date to the dance. I sighed. "Yea, let's go together. It'll be fun." I hope.

He rambles on about how excited he is and swiftly turns away to head to his class. I opened my locker and gathered my books.

Suddenly, I noticed a pink colored rose with golden shimmery specks on each petal laying on my top shelf. It was the most beautiful rose I had ever seen.

There was a tiny note attached. "Meet me at the willow during lunch."

Our school had planted a beautiful willow tree outside because our principal loved willow trees. It was planted just behind our school's tennis courts.

I knew exactly who it was from.

END OF CHAPTER