One More Year

Chapter 25

I pull away to sit up, but Cam grabs me and pulls me in closer instead.

"I should've been honest with you since the beginning." He kisses my forehead and this time I really do pull away from him and sit up.

My throat tightens and my stomach takes a dive, I meet his eyes again, "What are you talking about Cam?"

Taking a deep breath he sits up as well and searches my eyes before shaking his head defeatedly. The anticipation is killing me!

"Okay, so remember that party where Austin was saying Thomas wanted to have sex with you?" He asks searching my eyes, but I nod to let him continue. My tongue feels too heavy to speak and say anything. "I said I wasn't there when he said it. But I was and I've had this big crush on you for years, but you were just so god damn shy-"

"You had a crush on me? Like you knew who I was before our senior year?" Some of the pent-up tension in my stomach starts to ease up.

Smiling softly, he says, "Yes. In elementary and junior high. But I didn't take the guts to actually try and speak to you until sophomore year. I came up to you to say hi while you were walking to one of your classes, but you didn't even look up at me. You walked straight into your class."

Not being able to hold it, I giggle because there were multiple times guys tried talking to me, but there was no way I was going to be able to hold a steady conversation. So I remember not even looking up at whoever tried to speak to me. 

Cam tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, "Since that day I noticed you everywhere and you didn't even look up to talk to anyone. It's when I realized you were still as shy as you were when we were younger. You only ever hung out with Penelope and if you did hang around other people, it was people that usually came out of the same AP classes you were in."

Smirking, I tell him, "You were stalking me?"

Something in me feels excited to know, he paid this much attention to me. 

Rolling his eyes, he leans down to peck my lips, "Not intentionally. I just always happened to see you. I didn't think I had a chance. You were this good nerdy girl and I was this fuck up."

"You're not a fuck up." I frown which causes him to smile bigger.

"Since you told me you were hiding from Thomas when I followed you in the library. I took a chance I wasn't sure was going to work and asked you to fake being in a relationship with me. I knew if I asked to get to know you better and with my player reputation, you wouldn't take me seriously."

"But," I'm so confused, "You were being kind of mean and rude."

He smirks, looking at me amusingly, "I learned very quickly that getting you mad got the real truth out of you because being nice usually made you put your walls up and make you shy."

"Then why say you wanted things to work out with you and Zoey?" I lift my chin more determinedly. 

A part of me deflates, thinking he really wanted to be with her from the start.

He chuckles a little, "Cookie, you didn't even want to agree to this when I first brought it up. I was stupid enough to think bringing up Zoey was a good idea. Which, I mean, Zoey is already a headache and made things seem like that's what it was, but she knew I never had real feelings for her."

Trying to remember how that day played out, I look down at my hands, "That day. You asked me not to be too clingy and then got mad when I said I've never been a girlfriend before."

Smiling softly, he pulls me in his arms and I can feel his heart beating on my cheek against his chest, "I was trying to play it off like I'm into Zoey, but I was mad because I wish I would've gone about it a different way. At that moment I regretted asking you to do this with me, thinking it was fake and when you told me you like feeling special... I felt like the dumbest person on earth. I'm so sorry for all of it." He kisses the top of my head.