Chapter 3

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“So let me get this straight, he has your address?” Melody asked incredulously.

“Yes! He really is a stalker!” Caroline cried.

“I’m sure he’s not a stalker. He's more like a fan. Don't fans do that?"

“No, he's stalker! How else would he be coming over today?! And more importantly, why?!”

“Ok, deep breaths, we can get through this.”

“How?!” Caroline screamed anxiously.

“We just have to put those books and movies to good use. You know the ones where they get the hot guy to stop liking them ‘cause he sucks?”

“He’s not a hot guy!”

“Well, overlooking that part, we can do it!”

“I actually thought about that...” Remember when she was thinking she could unattract him?

“We should do it.”

“Ok, how about you make yourself look ugly... wait, you have that part covered!” Melody burst into laughter.

Caroline glared. “That was not funny.”

“Sorry, couldn’t help it. Okay, all jokes aside, make yourself look as unattractive as possible and act disgusting... you know— picking your nose, coughing in his face, snorting while you laugh, talking about disgusting things that have happened to you, the works.”

“Hmmm, you seem to know a lot about this, are you a closet nerd?”

“Ahahaha. Anyway, are you going to go through with it?”

“No, who am I kidding? I’m way to cool to act like that! It’s against my cool nature.” Caroline struck a pose with her hands in her hair and stuck her lips out.

Melody just snorted.

“Hey!” Caroline was offended.

“Sorry, that was just a funny joke.”

“It’s not a joke. I really can’t do it.”

“Why not? You don’t really believe all that shit about you being cool, do you? If so, you should become friends with Jase Hemingway.”

Caroline sniffled. “Fine, I’m not cool but I’m still not doing it. I don’t believe in all that “cool” and “not cool” stuff anyway. I mean, who decides if you’re cool? The popular people? We’re not in one of those stupid TV shows, you know.”

“Well then, I guess you have an unofficial date with Jase Hemingway, sucker.” Melody took her stuff and headed for the door.

“Wait, where are you going?! I need you! You can’t leave, he’s coming here!”

“Yeah right, like I’m going to be here when he comes.” She laughed, walking herself out the door.

“I hope you know you totally suck as a best friend!”

“I love you too, baby!” And with that the door slammed behind her.

Caroline looked in the mirror angrily as if it was all its fault. She stared at herself trying to find what part attracted stupid nerds. Nope, not her skin, she was your typical light-skinned black person. If she would describe her skin even further, it would have to involve coffee and that was way too overused. She had wide, expressive eyes that fit well with her thing for dramatics. She was tall, did nerds like tall girls? Jase was taller than her anyway. She had long jet-black her, she usually left it out. Her friend said it fit her wild personality.

Caroline’s looks fit her personality. So did that mean nerds liked over-dramatic girls?

Caroline sat on the couch for a few minutes, debating whether she should hide in the bathroom and pretend she wasn’t at home. Or if she should run out the door after Melody so she really wouldn’t be at home at least then she wouldn’t run the risk of her parents snitching on her.

Damn. She had to stay, she knew it. No matter how nerdy Jase Hemingway was, he was still human. How would he feel when she was the first to show him that he’s a geek? She couldn’t do that. He still had a heart even if he was a stupid, arrogant prick.

And on cue, the door bell belted out a tune. “Ring my beeeeell! Ring my bell!”

She was the one who chose it, her dad agreed and even danced to it every time it came on. Her mother declared that she would never invite any of her friends to her house if they bought it. She and her father had agreed instantly. They hated her mom’s friends.

She hummed along with the song a little bit before sighing and taking the walk of doom.

She opened the door and let the devil in.

“Heya, Caroline. How’s it hangin’?” Jase chirped.

“It’s hanging fine,” she replied stiffly with her arms crossed.

“Oh really? So I brought some movies for while we’re hanging out? The whole Star Wars set, isn’t that awesome?!” He came into her house and welcomed himself on to the couch.

“Really?! All of them?!” She joined him excitedly. She was a Star Wars fan, who couldn’t resist the charms of Anakin Skywalker?

“Um... I mean. Oh well whatever.” She covered up.

He smirked at her.

“So do you wanna do something else or just watch the movies?”

“Let’s watch them.”

“Okay.” He went to her DVD player and put the first one in.

“Star Wars fan?” He asked when her face became excited as the theme music came on.

“Who me? Noooo,” she said unconvincingly.

“Suuuure, I believe you. I’m not a fan either.” He winked at her as if they had an inside joke.

Revolted, she moved a bit down the couch.

He only waggled his eyebrows suggestively with a grin and moved closer to her. He closed the space between them and attached their legs to one another.

She gave him a look of disgust.

He actually had the audacity to pull the “I’m just stretching, oh look where my hand landed” move on her. He settled into the couch with his arm around her as his greasy hair flashed in the light overhead.

She felt even more revolted. She tried to manoeuvre herself in a way that it wasn’t obvious she was trying to get away.

Instead, she succeeded in almost falling out of the couch. She held onto his arm to adjust herself but only ended up falling face-first into his lap.

Hmmm, he has a pretty fit arm, in fact I wouldn’t mind re-feeling those muscles, she was thinking while she lay in his lap. She was preoccupied with her finding. Jase Hemingway was actually fit under his ugly clothes and geeky demeanour.

She finally realized that she should get a move on when she looked up and saw Jase’s triumphant grin above her.

“Well, I was waiting for the first movie to be finished, at least, for you to throw yourself at me but you are at an all time high. It’s fine with me though.” He inched his head lower to her face.

She sat up so fast and moved at record-speed all the way across the room and took a seat on the floor.

“I know you want me,” he said confidently.

He looked amused. What reason did he have to be amused? Why would a geek be amused with a girl running away from him?

...Unless he was just playing with her, which was unlucky. He was lucky she’d allowed him into her house at all.

She made a puking sound that was somewhere between “blargh” and “grrrguugh”.

“Was that a moan of pleasure? But I haven’t even pleasured you yet? You want it already?”

“Ok that is it, get out of my house!”

Caroline stood up and waved her arms around madly.

“You’re so cute when you’re angry; you could put that to good use and be wild in the sack, no?”

“How can a nerd be so vulgar?!”

“I’m a nerd? Honey, I think you need a reality check.” He gave her a disbelieving look.

“That is just fresh; the nerd is telling me I need a reality check! You think you’re fucking cool! What the hell? That right there proves how much of a nerd you really are! Have you looked in the mirror lately?”

“Oh, I get it. It’s probably some psychological thing. You actually believe those things, don’t you? And here I was being nice and giving those less fortunate a chance. If I had known they were so jealous and pathetic, I wouldn’t have bothered.”

He sighed a long-suffering sigh.

Caroline glared at him for a long while before flying at him in a tackle.

She growled at him and pushed him on the ground. After that, she kicked him a couple of times.

She stepped back and took a deep breath. “Ahh, now I feel a lot better. You can let yourself out.”

A serene smile on her face, she went upstairs calmly to her room where she wouldn’t have to deal with such insolence.

Jase lay there in a heap for awhile. “Wow, that girl is fucking psycho,” he said out loud to himself after she slammed her door.

“You said it!” A loud booming voice said.

He stood up quickly and smoothed his dirty hair, his fingers came back oily. He grimaced.

A big black man with greying hair and a soft smile stood before him. He looked different from Caroline; she looked like she was Hispanic. Her father was a lot darker. And so was her mother, so where did she get that colour? He’d seen her mother at school once.

“And you must be the boy that was visiting Caroline today, right? I would say the same except without that extra word.” The man grinned.

“Ah, sorry about that sir, you’re probably Cary’s dad. I didn’t realize anyone was around.”

“Oh, I just came long enough to see her throw you to the ground and kick you a couple of times. That’s my girl. I hope you didn’t do anything to her.”

His soft smile changed into the scariest glare he had ever seen.

Jase took a step back and swallowed. “No, I was just kidding around with her and annoying her basically.”

His glare morphed back into the soft smile, “In that case, you can go up to her, she probably simmered down now. Don’t try anything funny. Or I will break you.” He said the last words menacingly.

Jase nodded uncomfortably before racing upstairs and opening the first door he saw. It was the bathroom. He continued down the hall and opened the next door without knocking.

Cary was lying on her bed, the sheets pulled up to her chin, glaring at the ceiling. He subconsciously started to refer to her as Cary. At first, he started to just to annoy her.

“Hey, your dad is bipolar. I swear, he gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

Caroline’s face twisted at the use of the word “heebie-jeebies”. He laughed silently. It was the effect he wanted.

“So was I not clear or something, what part of let yourself out, did you not understand?”

“The let yourself out part.” He crossed his arms and smirked. “I mean, who would want to let this fine piece of ass go?”

Caroline stared at him for a while.

He looked like your typical nerd but he seemed to be acting like one of those cocky jocks, like Darcy Matthews. And Caroline had a huge crush on him...

She looked over his cheeky smile, his crossed (and totally in shape) arms, and his perfect white teeth. Maybe Melody was on to something when she said he could’ve been hot.

He had long brown hair that lay in a greased mess just above his shoulder, broken glasses that were held together with tape and they leaned one way too, he was wearing regular black jeans for once paired with the ugliest shirt she’d seen in all of her seventeen years. He was weird. He was strange.

Without all of the weird stuff, he might have been hot. Wow.

After a few seconds of thinking about it, her face contorted.

Ewww, what the fuck am I thinking? She asked herself.

She proceeded to try and suffocate herself with her pillow.

He has greasy, long, ugly hair, he’s a fashion disaster, and he’s a dumb geek. As much as those words, don’t match, they fit him. He thinks he’s cool. He says things like “you’re the dumb one!” when someone calls him dumb. What does that say about him? On the other hand, he has the best marks in the school.

Maybe he was coming down with something or she was. He was not and I repeat, not hot. No matter how much her mind believed he was acting that way.

“As entertaining as it is was watching you change facial expressions every few seconds, I don’t think you should kill yourself with me standing over you. It wouldn’t look too good, would it?”

She sat up and crossed over to the doorway.

“Ok, as entertaining as you are not...” She trailed off.

“Uh... get out!” She finished intelligently. Not. She felt like a hypocrite. Maybe they really did match.

“You suck at insults.” He said bluntly.

He leant against her doorway in that sexy way only a hot guy, like say Darcy Matthews could accomplish. Okay, she knew she was over-mentioning Darcy Matthews, but have you seen him? That man is fucking sexy.

Her facial expression changed from angry to euphoric when Darcy came to mind.

“I can see that you’re either bipolar or you’re probably going through the symptoms of that time of the month or perhaps you’re on permanent PMS, but maybe, if you feel better, you can call me.” He grinned.

He had a cute dimple too. Awwww.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. I have got to stop doing that. He is not cute, sexy or anything like a jock. He’s a nerd! A nerd with ugly, cheap, broken glasses!

Stupid brain, stupid, stupid brain!

She smacked herself for good measure. A loud smacking sound rang around her room.

He gave her a weird look.

God, how pathetic was she. A total weirdo was giving her a weird look.

She sighed and gave up.

“Okay, fine whatever. Give me your number.” She stuck her hand out.

“You don’t have to beg.” He laughed.

He had a cute laugh actually; it kind of hit her and made her stomach clench. Was that normal?

“Okay, here you go, my sweet. Remember to call me at le midi!” He blew an air kiss and left her room.

She stood there before shaking her head and laughing. As much as he was not normal, he was pretty entertaining.

“What a total weirdo.” She said to herself.

This time though, ‘weirdo’ sounded endearing instead of her usual insulting tone.

Just one visit changed that.

A/N: Sorry I took forever and forever and forever and forever and forever.

It’s been a month right? Wow. I’m really slow.

Anyway, review my pretties!

...Please.

=)