"You wanna know what he did?"
He jumped, startled, and nearly dropped his Spiderman lunchbox. Out of all the other kids running around on the playground, he was the one she chose to sit with? "Who?" he asked cautiously.
"Him," she said, pointing to where another boy was swinging. "Timmy. He's a meanie. You wanna know what he did?"
Did he have a choice? "What?"
"He gave me a weed!" she exclaimed.
He blinked at her in complete confusion. "A weed?"
"Ya-huh. A weed. One of the yellow ones. A dadalian. Dandialon. Whatever they are."
"A dandelion?" he asked carefully, not exactly sure how she was going to react.
"Yeah, a dandelion!" She wrinkled her nose. "My daddy said they only look pretty so that you won't know that it's bad."
"Maybe Timmy didn't know it was a weed," he said, but she was already shaking her head.
"Nu-uh. Don't matter. He gave it to me and then he said I was pretty." Even he wrinkled his nose at that one. You didn't tell a girl she was pretty. They all had cooties, and the ones with the extra cooties were the pretty ones. Yuck. "See? Then he threw dirt at me when I told him it was a weed and I didn't want it. See?" She pointed to a spot on her shirt that had a big brown spot.
"Definitely a meanie," he agreed.
"Definitely," she said, nodding firmly.
"I'm going to kick his ass!"
He blinked. "You just said ass."
"So did you," she retorted. "Hayden asked me to the dance."
"So why are you going to kick his… ass?" He might be eleven years old, but he didn't like using words like that if he didn't have to. But maybe this was a good time to use it.
"Because he asked me over AIM!"
"What's wrong with that?" he asked in confusion.
Her jaw dropped, and she stared at him for a moment before shooting him a dirty look. "Because you're supposed to ask a girl to go with you in person."
"But I asked Carrie over AIM, and she said yes."
"Just because she let you get away with it doesn't mean that I'm going to let Hayden get away with it! And just because everyone else is doing it and is okay with it doesn't mean it's okay." He stared at her, trying to figure out what she was talking about. She sighed dramatically. "It's so… gross and lame and tacky. Ew."
"Why?"
"Because it just is!" She stared him down. "Promise me that you'll never ask a girl out over AIM again."
"But—"
"Promise!"
"Alright, alright, I won't do it again."
"Good." She grinned at him. "You're my best friend, ya know."
He grinned back. "You're my best friend too."
"Ug!" He looked up from his homework as she stormed into his bedroom angrily. "Can you believe what that idiot got me for Christmas?!"
He looked at her blankly before his eyes drifted to the revolting pink puff ball in her hand. He snorted before he could stop himself. When she glared at him fiercely, the snort turned into a full out laugh. "What… the hell… is that?" he managed to gasp through his laughter.
"I think it's a stuffed animal," she said, smiling slightly herself as she plopped down on her bed, making herself comfortable. "Can you believe it? He got me a stuffed animal for Christmas. What are we, fourth graders?" She looked at the puffball before sitting it on her lap, facing him. "I don't suppose your sister would want it."
"She might," he said, still chuckling slightly.
"I mean, seriously, does he feel obligated to get me something so…"
"Cheap?"
"Yeah. It's so obvious he just fudged it because he had no idea what to get me. I mean, look at it!" She looked down at the thing before admitting, "Well, it is kind of cute, in that hideously revolting kind of way."
"Then it should get along with my sister just fine," he joked.
"That's so cheesy," she said in mild disgust.
"What is?" he asked in bewilderment, turning his attention away from the road to look at her.
"That!" she exclaimed, pointing viciously at the radio.
He listened for a moment before frowning in confusion. "That what?"
She glared at the radio. "That commercial." She put a sugary sweet voice, mimicking the people on the radio. "Because, really, absolutely every girl would just love to have to boyfriend propose to her on Valentine's Day because it's just such a romantic holiday." She scoffed. "Puh-lease. When I get proposed to, I want it to be creative and original. Not on Valentine's Day at some fancy Italian restaurant with every other poor sap in the city."
He couldn't help smiling in amusement. "So how do you want to be proposed to? Project the proposal up on the scoreboard during a football game?"
"No, that's so lame and overdone too," she said, crossing her arms. "Creative. I don't know. No flowers and romantic settings or silly messages on the broadcasting screen or – gag me – hidden in some kind of baked good. No thank you."
He laughed. "I feel exceedingly sorry for whatever guy you marry."
She grinned at him. "Don't worry, I feel the same way about the girl that marries you."
"Because chocolate totally fixes all problems in a relationship," she was muttering darkly when he walked into the room. He considered turning around and walking back out until her roommate was there to act as a buffer, but he decided against it. She'd tell him later anyway.
"What's up?" he asked casually, making himself comfortable in her computer chair.
"That dick cheated on me, and then he thought he could fix it by giving me chocolate!"
His eyes narrowed. "He cheated on you?" The surge of protectiveness wasn't unfamiliar, but the seething anger that someone would hurt her was.
"And then gave me chocolate to make it better!" she exclaimed angrily.
"You didn't… take it, did you?" he asked hesitantly.
"Of course I didn't! And then I told him what a dick he was for cheating on me and slammed the door in his face!"
He grinned, barely resisting the urge to say 'That's my girl.' Instead, he went for a simple "Good."
She narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. "You think I'm crazy. Don't you?"
"I think I'm glad I'm not on your bad side," he said cheerfully. "And I think you should've kicked him while you were at it."
She grinned mischievously. "Who said I didn't?"
He opened the door, took one look at the person in the doorway, and had to shove down a laugh. "Dude, you're fucking yourself by bringing those." The guy in the doorway glared at him. He held up his hands in self defense before wandering back into the apartment. "It's for you," he informed her blandly.
She frowned in confusion, but she got up and went to the door. He sat down on the couch, waiting expectantly for the yelling and the disgust with a grin on his face. From his place in the den, he couldn't really hear exactly what was said, but knowing her as well as he did, he could definitely guess. Which was why he wasn't surprise to hear a yell of "I've already made my choice!" followed by the slamming of the door.
"So," he said casually, looking at her innocently when she stormed back into the room.
"Shut the fuck up," she said darkly, throwing herself onto the opposite end of the couch. There was silence between the two of them for a few moments before she rounded on him. "Flowers. Flowers!"
He snorted. "I told him he was just making it worse."
"And they weren't even nice flowers!" she ranted. "They were the ugly, grocery, Oh-my-God-let-me-buy-flowers-for-my-girlfriend kind. Which are never pretty. God! If he wanted me to choose him, he could have at least pretended to have gotten good flowers for me!"
He looked at her curiously. "Choose him?"
"Yeah, the dickhead decided that I should choose between him and you. Because clearly you're in love with me, and you don't want me to be with anyone but you so you turn me against every guy that comes my way. Ridiculous!" When he didn't comment, she looked at him, frowning slightly. "It is ridiculous, right?"
"Well, I don't try to turn you against every guy that comes your way," he hedged a little hesitantly. "They do that on their own with all of the cheesy gifts."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "But?"
"But… I… Well… Oh, fuck it, come here." He actually expected her to move. At least not the first he, er, demanded it. But she just grinned broadly, got up, and sat back down in his lap. His arms wrapped around her immediately despite his confusion. "Uh…"
"Well?" she asked innocently, wrapping her arms around his neck with a grin. "What is it?"
He blinked at her before shaking his head and grinning himself. "This." He leaned in and kissed her.
And no matter how cheesy it was, she still kissed him back.
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This was inspired by a radio commercial I heard the other day that was talking about how every girl wants to be proposed to on Valentine's Day (so come down to Shane Company and get your engagement ring today!). I looked at the radio and went, "I don't want to be proposed to on Valentine's Day." Thus this story was born.
I love writing a story without naming the characters. Makes life so much easier.