Sweetest Confusion

Chapter Eighteen: 20 Questions

"Daniel! Come in! I've just got everything ready." I pulled him to the living room where I had laid out sleeping bags and I also brought my fluffy teddy bear that Daniel had given me for my fifth birthday. I'm not sure how it lasted that long, considering I used to take it everywhere I went when I was smaller.

"You still have Sir Tom Biscuit Marshmallow?" he asked taking the bear from my hands.

"Yes Daniel I do. Come with me I have something to show you." I grabbed his hand and pulled him to my room. He stood at the door of my wardrobe while I went to the very back. I separated the dresses to find a small hidden door. It opened once I had unlocked it.

I pulled out a deep red box, that was also locked with a padlock. I unclipped a key from my bracelet and inserted it in to the lock. It clicked open.

This whole time Daniel was looking at me carefully. I picked up the box and walked over to the bed, looking over my shoulder- indicating that he should follow.

He looked at me with questioning eyes. "Open it." he did as I said. At first he was shocked by what he saw, but then it melted to recognition.

"You kept ALL of this?" he asked me, his face full of awe.

"You were my best friend, of course I kept all of this!" Daniel began rummaging through the collection I had kept in there. Inside were letter, sketches, dried flowers, pictures. There was even a small bottle of sand from the sandpit in Daniel's garden.

Daniel took the box an laid it on the ground, sitting down beside the bed. He patted a spot next to him and I slid down too.

"Let's play a game. 20 questions. I'll start. Do you still play soccer?" I asked.

"Yeah, but I also took up other sports as I got into Middle School. My turn. Are you in an sports teams?"

"Well here in California there is a surfing team, which fortunately I am part of." replied smiling as I remembered one of our surf competitions.

"A pretty girl like you isn't in the cheerleading team?" From the tone of his voice I could tell he was serious.

"The cheerleaders are just greedy for popularity. Most of them just want power and the hottest guys. I don't want that. I just want to do what I like, and I like surfing. With cheerleading you have all the attention and expectations to live up to and I don't want to have to do that." I sighed after I finished my answer.

"Wow, that was deep. I totally get what you mean though because I am in some of the major sports teams and with that sort of responsibility comes power." Daniel said. "But don't you ever feel the need for that power in situations?"

"Sometimes, but there are always different approaches to deal with a problem and having power doesn't necessary work for you."

"Hey you asked me two questions, my turn now! Do you play any instruments?"

"I used to play the piano, but my life became too busy with... things so I had to stop. I do occasionally play when I'm stressed or something." he told me, wistfully.

"Ok Daniel why did you decide to come all the way across the country to spend senior year here?" I asked the one question that was bugging me for a while now. His face paled slightly before he regained his composure.

"I wanted change. I knew that some of the best opportunities are here in California and so I here I am. Plus Jamie wanted me to come down for so long because he always comes down to Michigan." Something about what he said made me think he was lying. I didn't want to believe him, but since he was my best friend it was hard not to.

"So Maddi what do you do in your free time?"

"I usually ring up Josh to go surfing..."

"Is Josh your boyfriend then?" he said.

"No my surfing partner. He was the one who taught me how to surf and so it's just a ritual we go together. I love surfing! I could surf all day long if I could." I giggled.

"I know you haven't stayed in California very long but what has been your favourite thing here?" I asked, pointing to my chest and winking.

"Hmm... That's a hard question." Daniel rubbed his chin pretending to think. "It was probably going down to the beach and meeting Victoria."

"What?!" I exclaimed, upset that he didn't choose me. He laughed at my expression.

"Of course it was you! I haven't seen my best friend for years and you think that I would choose Victoria over you? How could you think like that?" he placed his hand over his heart in mock hurt. I playfully shoved his shoulder.

"Let's take a break I'm hungry!" I exclaimed jumping up and dusting invisible dust off my pants. I skipped down the stairs with Daniels laughter following me down.

The kitchen was full of my favourite snacks including... Oreos and Twizzlers! I grabbed a packet of Oreos and chucked it at Daniel while grabbing one myself. Daniel took two glasses out from the cupboard and I took out the milk.

"Twist it, Lick it, Dunk it!" we both shouted before eating our Oreos. We both laughed for a long time as we remembered the last time we did that.

"Ok back to the questions. I think its my turn! Did you ever have a girlfriend?" I asked cheekily, wiggling my eyebrows.

"Yeah I did. Like you said there were expectations I had to live up to so the head cheerleader, Claudia was my girlfriend for a while, but truth be told I never liked her. There was one girl though. I liked her for so long that I was scared of what she would say. She wasn't popular like I was and my friends told me to forget about her. But I didn't want to, not after all the history we had. But she left and I never saw her again." he said, sadness filling his eyes.

"Aww that's so sweet..."

"Until now..." he interrupted. My mouth hung open. "Yes Maddi. I'm in love with you. Always have. Always will." I was not expecting that. My best friend had fallen in love with me.

******************************************************************************************

There it is another chapter for the weekend!! oh and thanks to @StepAwayFromMyElbows for her very cute name for HER own teddy bear :)

So Daniel finally confessed but what will Maddi say?? How will she respond to this??

Guess we'll have to find out later!! I hope you guys liked this chapter. I promise you things are going to get better. And as you can tell she is starting to get a bit suspicious.

I wish this chapter was longer, so I might go back and change. If I do I'll let you know!!!

Tell me what you think and dot forget to COMMENT/VOTE/FAN!!!

Thankies