Home

24

It was a rainy Saturday in April my freshman year of high school. Alyssa and I had ran all the way to her house from the park and were now completely drenched head to toe. Since I was staying over her house that night, I had an extra pair of clothes to change into. Alyssa told me I could change in Charlie's room as he was downstairs watching tv and wouldn't be in his room.

I had just slipped a pair of sweats on and had just taken off my shirt when the door of Charlie's bedroom opened and he walked in. Being caught off guard, I screamed in shock and Charlie looked up to see me in my bra. He was surprised I was in there as well so in shock he jumped backwards and hit into his door, falling to the ground.

I quickly threw on my shirt and ran over to him to see if he was okay but as I did, I saw a smirk start to form on his face. I whacked him in the arm and threatened that no one was to find out about this. He agreed not to talk about it to anyone as I was completely embarrassed. Charlie did speak however, getting my red face to lessen as I smiled. "I don't think that's anything to be embarrassed about. People see that much of you when you're in a bathing suit anyway."

This time was different, as it was now three years later and our relationship was a lot different. I, however, took it as my opportunity to get what I wanted.

He was in shock as he tried to talk. "You can't just do that to someone. What if I want to wear my shirt?" I looked at him and narrowed my eyes. "You really want to come over here and take it off me? Be my guest." Charlie went to open his mouth but then closed it again. He knew I had won. I smirked triumphantly and began to walk past Charlie so I could head downstairs, but not before I handed him his pants. "You should really hurry up Charlie. You know your mom hates when people are late for breakfast."

I went to move towards the door but Charlie grabbed both my hands and pulled me close to him. "It's cute when you think you've won. But I just want to let you know, I'll get you back for this." Charlie had a mischievous grin on his face as he looked at me before letting go of my hands.

"I look forward to it." I smirked as I turned back around and left his room, heading down the stairs.

I made it to the bottom of the steps only for an arm to wrap around my waist. Considering I had seen what Charlie did to get back at his sister when she would do something to tease him, the sudden embrace made my body tense. I heard laughing and looked up to my right to see Charlie smiling down at me. "Relax, I'm not going to get back at you, yet. Can't I just enjoy holding you without you freaking out?" I nodded my head and relaxed but I knew I still had to keep my guard up.

Charlie and I walked into the kitchen but stopped as we saw Charlie's father.

Mr. Adams looked as though his eyes were going to pop out of his head. "Isn't that a little-" It took Mr. Adams almost a full minute of debating which word he should use as he looked at us. "Isn't that um," Even still, Mr. Adams couldn't form his words correctly, only leading to Mrs. Adams laughing at him. "I think it's cute Nate. They're sharing." Mr. Adams gave his wife a pointed look as he spoke. "They aren't five Caroline and they aren't related so that shouldn't be cute."

I had completely forgotten that Charlie was standing next to me until he spoke, causing so much heat to rise to my face that you could have cooked dinner on it. "Just be grateful I even got her to wear that. She on the other hand wanted to wear nothing, considering that's how she slept last night." Mr. Adams suddenly choked on his orange juice that he was sipping which led him into a coughing fit.

Charlie laughed brining the attention back to him. "Only kidding Dad, just trying to see if you were awake."

Charlie's father glared at him while he laughed again, except his voice was so close to me, I could feel his warm breath hit my ear, making my skin tingle.

He got so close to me I could feel his lip grazing the side of my face with every word he whispered into my ear. "Although, how do you think you ended up in my T-shirt when you woke up this morning?" My eyes widened as I looked to Charlie who winked at me, along with a smirk gracing his face.

There was his revenge. Charlie knew just how to get a reaction out of me even by the smallest of actions.

My heart couldn't take all of these interactions I had been having with Charlie the past few days. He was always finding a way to make my face turn red or getting me to feel nervous and I didn't know what to do anymore. Of course I like Charlie in that way so when the pale ghost that I was looked like a tomato, it was a way to just confirm even more that I liked him. Why I had begun to feel so nervous around him all the time, I didn't know. It was a completely new emotion for me to feel around him. I had always been confident around him, but now I was basically pointing out the obvious in that I liked Charlie.

Hopefully Charlie hadn't noticed that I liked him otherwise I would ruin the friendship we had. I knew he didn't like me that way, so for me to be affected by his teasing, he was probably becoming annoyed which would probably end up ruining our friendship anyway. I just hoped that day would never come.