Irreplaceable

24

"Mom!? Where's my yellow shirt?" I yelled down the stairs. My mom looked up at me curiously as I stood in my jeans with no shirt on.

"What yellow shirt? Shouldn't you be dressed by now? Nathan is going to be here any minute." She said calmly back. I was not calm. My hands were sweating and I was internally panicking.

"The pale yellow button-down one? I know I put it in the wash after Grams was over." I asked. My mom looked back at me with a smile now.

"Oh that nice lemon one? I ironed it for you and put it on the back of your door." She told me. I sighed in relief and ran back to my room.

"Whoa there. Watch where you are going." Lizard scowled at me as I bumped her in the hall and she stumbled a little in her heels. I rolled my eyes and gave her outfit a once over.

"Mom's not going to let you leave in that." I said as I went in my room. Sure enough, it was hanging up on the back of my door. I must've blown right by it when I went running downstairs to check the laundry room. I unbuttoned it and shrugged it over my shoulders. I watched myself in the mirror as I did it up and straightened the sleeves.

Nate was right. The colour really did look good on me. Made my skin look good and went well with my colouring. I turned towards my door when I heard two rather angry raised voices, both female, coming from downstairs. I grabbed my stuff, doing the mental check. Cell, wallet, keys. When I opened the door Izzy was stomping past me in her heels, muttering.

"Told you so. Just put some leggings on Lizard." I quipped on her way by. She glared at me and slammed her door.

"Sorry about the noise, hun. Come on in. He will be right down." I heard my mom say. I smiled when I heard a rumbling voice murmur something back. I came down the stairs and bit my lip at the sight that greeted me. God, this guy was mouth watering. How had I not noticed? Bad Bradley. My mom pulled me in for a hug but my eyes couldn't tear themselves away.

"Hey." He smirked at me, giving me a once over. I gulped. He looked like the proverbial bad boy come to life. He was wearing a winter leather jacket in black over a dark blue button down in an amazing jewel tone that really set off his eyes.

"Hey." I said back lamely. My mom was awing at us and threatening to take a picture as though we were going to prom or something. I rolled my eyes at her but sidled over to Nate's side. "You don't mind, do you?"

"What?" He asked at my quiet question. I put my arm around his waist and turned to my mom.

"You know she takes pictures of all the important times. It's my first official date." I didn't meet his eyes as my mother brought up her phone and began snapping pictures of us in our nice clothes. I was wearing a rather nervous grin as I felt his eyes boring into the side of my face. He could really be intimidating when he put his mind to it.

"Okay, one more." She said as my dad tried to step in and let us go. I sighed as though I was annoyed, but waited for the last picture before putting my jacket on to leave.

"Okay boys, have fun tonight. Brad, I want you back first thing in the morning at the latest." My dad said to us. My mom made a noise in her throat, as though she was going to protest. "Relax, Annabelle. It's Nathan. He will behave with our Bradley."

"Dad." I hissed. Dad shot him a wink as I buried my face in my hands. Nathan was just laughing at this point as he pulled me from the house.

"Let's go Cinderella. We don't want to be too late to the ball now." He teased me as we walked to the car. I was surprised when he came to the passenger side of the car and opened my door for me. Dammit. I really wasn't the prince, was I? Did that mean I would have to take it instead of give it? "What are you thinking about?"

"What?" I blinked and looked over at Nate as he started the car. He was looking over at me in concern.

"You just got a funny look on your face. I was wondering what was going through your head that made that happen." He commented casually as he pulled out of the driveway. I gulped and shook my head.

"N-n-nothing. It was nothing." I stuttered. I tried to laugh but it came out awkward and weird.

"O-kay. Now I really want to know." He was grinning as he drove up the street. We stopped at a stop sign and he glanced over at me. I knew I was blushing and looked out the window at the dark neighbourhood instead of answering him. "Brad-ley..."

"I was thinking... if I am Cinderella then that makes you the prince, right?" I mumbled. I looked back at him and he was looking a bit embarrassed as he pulled onto the next road. He was still grinning happily though, thank goodness. "You asked, dumbass."

"You are right. I just didn't expect you to be a romantic Bradley." He teased me. I know he was teasing me. After that we stayed silent for the drive. Once or twice I sneaked peeks at him as he concentrated on the road. I cleared my throat as we approached a house with a lot of cars parked and all the lights on. He pulled into an open spot on the street and we got out to look at the house. "Ready?"

"As I'll ever be." I replied nervously. He came over and offered his hand outstretched. I took it with a smile. He pulled me up to the front door and rang the bell. I put a smile on my face when the door opened. It almost faltered when I saw it was Shanta, but she waved us inside and I did my best to keep it in place.

"Hey! So glad you could make it. Nathan, we are all mostly in the living room. Hey Bradley." She said in a chipper voice. She gave Nathan a hug and offered me a hand. I shook it after I finished slipping out of my coat. Nathan hung both of them up in the front closet.

"Nathan! Hey buddy." He clapped hands with a guy on the way into the room and I followed behind like a puppy, desperately trying to keep the smile on my face as about a dozen people watched me come in the room.

"Hey everyone, this is Bradley." He said with a grin. He pulled me in front of him and draped his arms over my shoulders as people welcomed me. I could not keep track of all their names and just waved back helplessly.

"Hey everyone." I called out nervously. Nathan pulled me to sit on an open couch with him once people moved over. I blushed at how closely he sat next to me, I mean practically on my lap. It made me pretty happy that he felt open enough to do that in front of them with me. But it was still awkward for me.

"Relax. We are just here to hang out and have fun. Okay?" He whispered in my ear. I shivered and nodded at him with a small smile. He struck up a conversation with a couple of guys that he had not seen since the holiday began. I was drawn into an argument with two girls over whether dogs were better than cats.

Their arguments were invalid. Obviously cats could be trained to walk on a leash and fetch, so those were not good reasons to say dogs were better. I also had known some very affectionate cats, thanks to my Aunt Emily, and had picture proof that they were just as delightful and cuddly as dogs. The girls thought my pictures were adorable.

That led to showing other pictures in our phones, namely some memes that I had saved from Instagram and the holiday shots I took of Christmas lights in the neighbourhood. We actually had a good laugh at Chelsea's pictures of her brothers in their ugly sweaters. I found that I really liked some of his new friends.

They were nice. Most of them tried to make an effort to talk to me and get to know me. One of the guys scoffed and called me an idiot, but his girlfriend gave him a dirty look and pulled me into the dining room to get munchies to distract me. I laughed when she called him an obtuse gorilla, even if I wasn't really sure what 'obtuse' meant. Wasn't that a triangle?

Someone had the ball drop festival on the television when we came back in the room. We watched the entertainment and laughed at the comedy show that came on in between artists. Nathan found me playing a game of Connect 4 against Katie a few minutes before the count down. He pulled me over to the window.

"Ten..." We grinned at each other. "Nine..."

"Eight..." He took my hand in his. "Seven..."

"Hey Brad, you want to be my boyfriend?"

"Three..." I gaped at him.

"Two..." He grinned.

"One!"

"Yes!" I nearly shouted.