Accidentally on Purpose

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"I don't think I'm still going to continue making him hate me," I told Gina as I bit into my green apple. Bey wasn't here to join us for lunch, so I was free to talk to Gina about the progress of OBA. "We're sorta kinda friends now, so I don't know, it seems counterproductive to try to make him hate me still."

Gina had a thoughtful look on her face. "Honestly, I'm really surprised that this whole thing worked out. I mean," she dropped her voice to a whisper, "you started out with pouring your drink on him! On Apple! And now he's okay with you? That's gotta be a damn good progress."

"I didn't pour my drink on him. It was a splash! Accidentally—"

"—on purpose," she finished, rolling her eyes at me. "It's a miracle that you kinda get along now."

"I think he's just slowly getting used to my presence," I said. "After all, we're in this stupid project together. So if we can't tolerate each other..." I shrugged, before biting my lip to hold back a smile. "I should thank Principal Collin and Mr. Herberg, though, because without the project, I wouldn't even know what to do to crack him."

"Yeah, you're pretty lucky," she said, shaking her head at me with a smile. "You really couldn't have predicted the outcome." Suddenly, her gaze lifted over my shoulder, and a small knowing smile appeared on her face. "Ooh. Prince not-so-Charming approaching in three... two..."

"Taylors."

I looked up to my right and saw Jonah. "Yeah, Gibbs?"

He puffed out his cheeks, and I suddenly had this urge to reach out and poke his cheeks repeatedly. Ugh. He was so adorable. "You got a camera?" he asked.

So, there was this new project that Mr. Herberg just gave us. It wasn't as time consuming as the other (cough, crying doll, cough) project. It was just that from now on, we were very greatly encouraged to film some of our activities together—like, getting to know each other, hanging out, blah blah blah—including those dreadful days when we were finally taking care of our doll. By the end of the project, we were to give presentation about how this project has helped us with adulthood, et cetera et cetera, as well as showing a compilation of those videos we recorded as a short, sort of like a home movie.

"I can film it on my phone. You?" I asked him.

"I have a camcorder."

"Well, maybe we both should film it together? I mean, so it has two different points of views; yours and mine. Then we'll just mix the videos up together," I suggested.

"Hm," he said, slowly nodding. "Sounds good."

I nodded along. "So it's settled, then?"

"Yeah." He paused. "What are we gonna film anyway?"

I lifted my shoulder. "I don't really know... We'll get to it eventually."

"Okay."

He was still standing there, so I said, "Alright."

"Yeah." He cleared his throat, and then rubbed the back of his neck. "See you, I guess."

I cracked a smile. "See you."

He turned around and left, so I turned my attention back on Gina, who was smirking slyly at me.

"That's cute," she commented before slurping down her orange juice. "He's totes into you."

I clicked my tongue disapprovingly at my best friend. "Now you're just being ridiculous."

[]

Once I got home, I was instantly greeted by the smell apple pie baking in the kitchen.

"I'm home," I announced through the door. "Smells good."