I Am You

Chapter Twenty-Three

The next morning, I woke up to the sound of my phone ringing.

'Hello?' I said lazily.

'I knew it! I knew you'd be sleeping. Get up!' Nat screamed from the other side.

I flinched and drew the phone away from my ear.

'I'll be ready by the time you get here.' I said, finally sitting up.

'You better be. I'll be there in half an hour.'

'Okay, see you then. Bye.' I said before ending the call and going into the bathroom.

After I freshened up, I went to the kitchen and helped myself to a bowl of cereal. Nat arrived shortly after I was done with my breakfast. We started working on our project while listening to some music.

'What are you doing tonight?' Nat asked after a couple of minutes.

'I don't have any specific plans. Why?' I replied.

As if on cue, I got a text from E.

'Hey, let's have dinner tonight at my place. The gift I've been working on is ready!' it said.

'Let's get dinner together. This new place...' Nat started, but trailed off as I showed her Ethan's text.

'Oh, okay. We can go tomorrow.' she said with a smile.

'Hey, we should go tonight. I'll tell Ethan to postpone. I'm sure he'll understand.' I said.

'What? No, don't postpone! We'll go tomorrow.' she said, slightly panicking.

I narrowed my eyes at her.

'What?' she asked, trying to mask her jumpiness.

'You're clearly not good at keeping secrets. Just tell me.' I deadpanned.

'Shit.' she mumbled. 'I just don't want to ruin Ethan's surprise. He has worked way too hard on it.'

'You know about the surprise?' I asked, widening my eyes.

'Better yet, I've seen it.' she giggled. 'Ethan sent me its photo this morning.'

'And you didn't tell me?' I gasped. 'Show me!' I exclaimed as I tried to snatch her phone away.

'No, are you insane? Ethan will strangle me.' she said as she stuffed the phone in her bag.

'Whose best friend are you?' I asked, crossing my arms.

'Yours, obviously. And that's why I don't wanna ruin the surprise for you. Ethan has put a lot of thought into it. Trust me, it's beautiful.' she said.

'Fine.' I pouted.

We were finally done with the project at five. After Nat went home, I took a nap because I had some spare time before I had to get ready.

I woke up at six. I put on a white oversized shirt with a pair of dark blue jeans. I moisturised my face, put on some mascara and concluded my "makeup routine" with a tinted lip-balm. I put on my white sneakers and headed out.

As I got in my car, I heard the other door open. I looked up to see Dylan getting into the passenger seat.

'Oh my god!' I yelled.

'What?' he asked casually.

'What are you doing here? Why am I seeing you? Why now?' I asked frantically.

'You tell me.' he said calmly. 'I wouldn't be in this car if you didn't want me here.'

'Is that supposed to be an explanation? I'm even more confused now.' I said, sighing.