The Girl I Loved Once

Chapter 24

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I look in the back of my car to make sure I have my bookbag, Within it contained my Halloween costume for the assembly my school hosts, and it would be embarrassing to show up without one.

My friend group decided to dress up as the Avengers for Halloween and, my name is Peter, I decided Spider-Man was the ideal superhero to dress up as.  It's unusually warm for October, so I have a feeling I'll be sweaty in head-to-toe latex. But it'll show off my abs, so I'm willing to make the sacrifice. 

I pull up to Lara Jean's house to pick her up for school, a little late, and immediately she runs into my car, wearing an anime school girl costume and a robe. She sits down and spreads her robe over her lap.

"You look hot." I blurt out, immediately regretting. She looked back at me, stunned. "What are you? An anime character?" I ask. 

"No." she snaps back at me. "I'm Cho Chang."

I look at her blankly.

"From Harry Potter."

I still look at her blankly. I have no idea who she is, even with this context.

"Oh yeah. Cool." I say

She looks over at me, noticing I'm not wearing a costume. "Wheres your costume?"

"Me and my boys are going to change right before the assembly. It's a better effect if we unveil at the same time." I say proudly. I wait for Lara Jean to ask me what the costumes are, but she doesn't.

"I wish you weren't always late." She says abruptly

"Geeze sorry, I was trying to get my costume together."

"Today you were trying to get your costume together, but you're late all the time."

"I'm not late all the time!"

"You were late today, and yesterday, and last Thursday. If you're not going to be on time, I don't want you to give me rides anymore." She says. 

My good mood is ruined. I don't understand what she's so upset about, or why she's choosing to pick a fight with me. 

"Fine. That means I get five extra minutes of sleep, so, works for me." I say coldly.

"Good."

* * *

The assembly couldn't have gone any better. My Spider-Man costume was a hit, and we run around on stage staging a fake fight right out of the movie. I even try to climb up a column, for dramatic effect, but I don't get very far before Mr. Yelznik stops me. We won best group costume, which I was happy about. 

I hunt down Lara Jean partly to gloat, but also to see if she's still upset with me. She's standing at her locker, collecting her books.  The hallway is remotely empty. I lean up against the locker. "Hey," I say through the mask. 

"Congrats on winning best group costume."

"That's it? That's all you're gonna say?" 

"Huh? What else am I supposed to say?"

I'm about to respond when Josh Sanderson walks by with Jersey Mike. He's dressed as Harry Potter.

"Expelliarmus!"

"Avada Kedavra!"

"Way harsh!" Josh says clutching his chest. I'm about to stab this guy with his wand, but murder charges don't look great on college applications. 

"Uh... don't you think its weird for my supposed girlfriend to wear a couples costume with another guy?" I ask. 

She rolls her eyes. "I'm sorry, I can't talk to you when you look like this. How am I supposed to have a conversation with someone in head-to-toe latex?"

I angrily push my mask up. "I'm serious! How do you think it makes me look?"

"First of all, it wasn't planned. Second of all, nobody cares what my costume is?" 

"People notice." I huff. "I noticed!"

"Well, I'm sorry. I'm very sorry that a coincidence like this would ever occur." She says sarcastically. 

"I really doubt it was a coincidence." 

"What do you want me to do? Do you want me to pop over to the Halloween store during lunch and buy a red wig and be Mary Jane?"

I know she's probably being sarcastic, but I respond, "Could you? That would be really great."

"No, I could not. You know why? Because I'm Asian, and people will think I'm in a manga costume. She says. I nod, I understand now. "Hold this." She says, handing me her wand to adjust her knee socks. 

"I could have been someone from the book if you'd just told me in advance," I say. 

"Yeah well, today you'd make a really great Moaning Myrtle." 

I look at her blankly.

"Wait a minute, have you never read Harry Potter?"

"I've read the first two!"

"Then you should know who Moaning Myrtle is!" 

"It was a really long time ago," I say, trying to think back to the books. "Was she one of the people in the paintings?" I ask. 

"No! And how could you stop after chamber of secrets?" The third one's the best one out of the whole series! I mean, that's literally crazy to me. Do you not have a soul?" She asks me. 

"Sorry if I haven't read every single Harry Potter book! Sorry if I have a life and I'm not in the Final Fantasy club or whatever that little geek club is called-" before I could finish my rant, she snatches the wand back and yells "Silencio!"

I cross my arms and smirk. "Whatever spell you just tried to cast on me, it didn't work. So I think you need to go back to Hogwarts." I say, proud that I remembered something from the book. 

She pulls down my mask and covers my mouth with her hand. "Silencio!" She yells again. I try to respond, but she pushes harder. "What? What was that? I can't hear you, Peter Parker!" She says laughing. 

I reach out and try to tickle her, but she darts away. Soon I'm chasing her down the hall, pretend shooting webs at her and laughing all the way to our chem class. A teacher yells at us to slow down, and we do until I turn the corner into the classroom into her seat. I slip into mine. She turns around and looks at me, and I shoot fake webs at her. She giggles, and I smile brightly. 

"Settle down," Mr. Meyers says. We both nod and quiet down. During class, I pull out a Post-it note, and doodle spider webs around it, with the words, 

I'll be on time tomorrow

Scribbled in the middle. I pass it down to her and watch her open it. She smiles and puts it in her backpack. 

Screw the five minutes of sleep I'm missing out on. I like Lara Jean, and want to spend as much time with her as I can before this all ends.