The Payback or The Adventures and Pranks of Zachary O'Connor

Chapter Fifteen: Meghan and Me (and Gabby)

Everyone still studied and learned and fought and fell in love. The classroom remained the same as always, and my grades began to improve again.

It was wonderful.

I began to enjoy the little things, like how I could walk down the hall with Anti and notice him checking out girls as they passed in the hallway. However, there were those moments when Anti would kind of glaze over, and I knew that he was thinking of her. Inevitably, it happened to all of us occasionally. More so to me and Anti than to Gabby or Meghan, but they had their moments as well. I one time saw Gabby scrolling through her pictures, lingering on the ones that had Reagan in them. There was a particularly sad moment on the 27th of March when Gabby and Meghan realized they had an extra ticket (Reagan's) for the concert I had bought them tickets to on the 28th.

Unfortunately, John was not able to be around us too terribly much. We saw him occasionally whenever Gabby decided to invite him when we were hanging out, but he was busy with the return to schoolwork (he was as smart as Gabby) as well as the fact that he had friends at Bay River. I often missed John. Gabby, Anti, and Meghan were great, but John added a little bit of spice to our group. Did I seriously just say that John added "spice?" What was he, a pepper? If so, he was one hell of a pepper. One hell of a werewolf of a pepper. *nods*

As for the concert, it was by a local rock band that managed to be big enough to hit up the town venue, and I liked them well enough. I decided to accompany Meghan and Gabby, if only to keep them from dwelling on Reagan. Gabby originally invited John, but he was unavailable. It was a full moon that day, so ya know. So, on the 28th of February, I woke earlier than I would have liked (9 am) and drove to pick up Meghan and Gabby. Gabby had her own car, but ya know: WOOH! LET'S SAVE THE WORLD AND CARPOOL! Actually, it was Gabby's idea to carpool, and I soon found out why.

We had stopped at Wendy's to eat cuz I was driving, and I liked Wendy's. We were sitting in the parking lot eating our food and listening to the radio when Gabby started to piss me off.

"So, Zach, when are you going to ask out Meghan?" Gabby asked between bites of her chicken wrap.

I choked on my bacon cheeseburger. I had a terrible coughing fit and stepped out of the car so that I could spit out the meat I was desperately trying to get out of my lungs without hitting the girl that loved me, who I had literally forgotten to ask out. After my near surprise-death-by-burger-choking-me, I sat back down in the driver's seat and took another bite of my burger to piss off Gabby.

"Well?" she asked as I chewed my burger.

Meghan, who was sitting in the passenger seat, had also turned to face me.

"I, uh..." I stuttered, "I've been waiting for the right moment."

"The right moment, huh?" Gabby said.

"Yes," I replied, looking at Meghan and grinning sheepishly.

She had clearly brought it up to Gabby that I had not asked her out yet, and she was curious why not.

"Maybe I was planning on doing it today," I muttered.

"Then forget I said anything," Gabby responded.

Meghan simply laughed.

I stared at her.

"Don't worry about it, Zach. Gabby's just messing with you," Meghan said.

But now I had to ask out Meghan that day. Don't get me wrong, I liked Meghan a lot. Maybe more than liked. Maybe a lot more than liked. She had told me she loved me, and I think I loved her, too. And dating her would be totally awesome. But now I had to have the right moment present itself at the concert, or she would be pissed. I'm not one to ask people out in lame ways. I learned my lesson in eighth grade.