Every Story Matters

24

♚ Austin ♚

"Are you sure guys got it?"

Both of my parents give me incredulous looks before nodding. "No embarrassing you, and no talking about college," Mom confirms. "We got it, honey. Don't worry." She faces the stove again and continues her cooking.

The soul reason as to why I don't want the subject of college coming up is not only for Scarlett, but because I know how that conversation would turn out if it gets directed at me considering that my father is here. I don't want her to witness any of it.

Sparky scratches on the door, a signal to us the he needs to pee. I open the sliding door to the back yard, and watched as he dashed out. Heaving out a deep sigh, I head up to my room, deciding that I should get ready.

About an hour later, my room is a complete mess. It's embarrassing to say the least. Why? It looks like a dang girls room when they're trying figure out what to wear. Something that I can't seem to figure out at the moment. My breathing quickens as more anxiety floods throughout my veins. I usually don't care what I wear, but today is more than what Scarlett might expect from tonight. She may think that she's just meeting my parents, but I also have another plan in mind.

"Everything alright in here?"

I snap my head towards the door, and see Nancy standing against the doorway with her arms crossed. "I'd think it's pretty obvious how things are going," I say rolling my eyes. She raises an accusing eyebrow in my direction. "Sorry..."

She nods her head pushing off of the door frame, and steps inside my room. "I'm sure your parents will like her," she starts, "and if it makes you feel any better, I approve."

I give her a small smile as a thank you, but it fades as my anxiety hits me again. "It's not just that," I tell her looking down. I glance up at her, and saw she was wearing a questioning gaze, waiting for me to continue. "I'm going to ask her to be my girlfriend."

Her eyebrows shoot up in surprise, and a smile spreads across her face. "Finally!" She exclaims. "Took you long enough."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask, standing up straight.

She rolls her eyes at me. "From the first time she came over, I knew you were interested."

I stare at her with a blank expression. At the time, I didn't think I was, but now that I think about it, I remember telling myself that she was really easy to talk to and it was nice that we finally got along. I internally laugh; I can't believe how much has changed.

My silence only confirms what Nancy had said, and she nods her head with a knowing smile. She reaches down to start to clean my room up, but before she could do anything, I stop her and took my clothes out of her grasp. "You don't have to, I got it," I tell her.

"I'm glad you're starting to take responsibility for yourself, but I just hope you don't forget that it's my job to clean and look after you." At the end of her statement, a small playful smirk plays her lips.

I let out a low chuckle, and shook my head. "You do way more than enough around here. You don't need worry about me and my messy room. I can handle it." She mumbles an "ok" before heading out the door, but I don't miss the slight thankfulness to her tone.

I turn back to my girlishly looking room and sighed. I tell myself that maybe I should just go for a button up shirt and some dark jeans since she seemed to like that on our first date. I scramble through all of the scattered clothes and dug out the ones I've been looking for, pulling them on. As I'm finishing buttoning up my shirt, the doorbell rings making my head snap up towards my closed bedroom door. Crap!

"Austin, Scarlett's here!" Mom's voice sounds from down stairs.

"Ok!" I yell back.

Panic runs through me as I hastily button my last few buttons. "Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot," I'm mumble under my breath as I shovel all of my clothes into my closet. Just as I shut the door to my closet, a knock sounds from outside of my room. I open it, and standing on the other side of the door is Scarlett. My eyes do a once over, over her body, "wow," I whisper, "you look beautiful."

A slight blush crosses her cheeks, "Thank you, you too!" She pauses, "I mean, you l-look nice," she stutters, her cheeks a tinge if red now. I laugh and shook my head. I step to the side so she can enter. As she does, she says "sorry if I bothered you, your mom let me up."

I shake my head. "No, you didn't. I was actually about to head down." That was a lie, but it would have been utterly humiliating if she knew the events that happened before she got here. I sneak a glance toward my closet making sure it was shut all the way.

She takes a long and careful glance around my room. "Out of all the times I've been here, I would have never thought your room would have looked like this."

I look around my room, unsure on how to answer that. My room doesn't have much to look at. Two of my walls are gray and the rest are white. My bed sheets are black, while my night stand is white. I have a desk in the corner of my room, a closet is to the side, and the rest of the room is filled with a bunch of old trophies and my football stuff.

"What do you mean by that?"

"It looks so...plain," she answers. I give a questioning gaze, to which she lets out a light hearted laugh and shakes her head. "I don't mean it that way. I like it." She saunters over to me and wraps her arm around my torso and squeezed. She tilts her head up to look at me, and I place a swift kiss on the tip of her nose.

Something odd flashes across her face as I do. It was only for a second, but it looked like disappointment. She flashes me a small smile before letting go. I open my mouth, about to say something, but my mom beats me to it and calls us down.

I make a mental note to ask her later.

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