---

In the Last Chapter…

Jason and Rose walk home together, and learn everything about each other’s relationship to Sarah: Jason learns that Rose was upset that Sarah got over their breakup so quickly, and Rose learns about Jason and Sarah fooling around. Jason saves Rose’s sketchbook from a rainy, wet fate, which earns him a lot of respect. Sarah and Ryan become an official couple, though that doesn’t stop Sarah and Jason from sexting one night, much to Jason’s everlasting shame. Before the bus ride to Regionals, after giving her his phone number, Jason confesses to Rose about the sexting session. Mrs. Chadwick lets the team know that if there are any unnecessary dramatic shenanigans during the Regionals tournament, they’ll be punished. Hazelwood wins against Shrewsbury, but loses to Wordsworth Collegiate. At lunch, Rose walks away from the table and joins another briefly, and won’t tell Jason why…

---

North High was our next opponent. Even if we weren’t told which school was next, the sight of Mr. Turner and the glare coming off of his soon-to-be-bald head was a good indication. Bro was even wearing a completely different dad sweater.

“Well well, familiar faces!” he said warmly as his team filed into the library where we were meeting up. “I guess we’re all ready to get started then…”

He started arranging things on the table as I looked over the team. I didn’t really remember any of their names… except Sammy, that one girl I talked to during Districts. Y’know, the one everyone thought I was hitting on. She was looking even better than ever – hell, she looked like she shouldn’t have even been there. She oozed “popular kid” energy, but had a bleached streak running through her dark brown hair – enough to label her as an individual. No wonder she was doing Quiz Bowl instead of popular girl shit. 

Right as I was about to look away, Sammy looked right at me. Shit. I was caught blatantly staring at her. I had to salvage this, any way I could.

“Yo, did you have that, uh, hair dye thing when we saw each other at Districts?” I asked, motioning towards my own hair.

“Uh,” she began awkwardly, “nope. This was new, I got it a week or so ago.”

“Oh. It looks cool!” I replied, then looked at her teammates. Maybe there was some way one of them looked different so I could point them out too. Now that I had to point out Sammy’s dye job, I just knew the others would crawl up my ass about it. There was just one problem: I barely remembered what any of the others looked like the last time I saw them. There was nothing I could point out.

“Thanks,” Sammy said in the meantime, then paused. “So, uh, think you’re going to win against us twice in a row?”

I looked from her teammates to her, and lowered my eyebrows. “No, I was thinking I’d just sit quietly and just accept defeat this time around. Y’know, shake things up.”

I internally cringed as soon as I said it. I wanted that to sound joking and maybe even cool, but that definitely came across as a dick move. Sammy’s expression didn’t change, but she did reply. “That’s a good strategy,” she replied, then smirked. “After all, then it’s less humiliating when you lose.”

I smirked back. “Oh, it’s on,” I threatened her, just in time for Mr. Turner to announce that the game was set up and ready to play. 

“From Hazelwood, our current players are Jason, Ryan, Rose and Candy. Your alternates are Jack and Sarah. From North, our current players are Nicole, Sammy, Hank and Finn. Your alternates are Crystal and Noah. Do I have those names right?”

“Of course you do, Mr. Turner,” Sammy giggled. She was definitely some kind of teacher’s pet. Either that or she was the type to fall hard for her teachers. Which would have sucked – obviously I had zero chance with her, but yeah, I had to admit at least to myself at this point I had one of those “woah you’re cute” crushes. The kind that would go nowhere because she went to North and I went to Hazelwood… oh and because we barely knew each other and she didn’t like me. Minor detail.

“Here we go, everyone,” Mr. Turner told us. “40-point snapshot to start the round. What sea lies west of Denmark and east of Great Britain?”

Ryan buzzed in. “The North Sea.”

“Correct, Hazelwood. What television personality is sometimes known as the ‘Mayor of Fl-‘”

Hank or Finn buzzed in. “Flavortown? That’s Guy Fieri!!”

Mr. Turner chuckled. “Correct, North. What city was home to composers Leonin and Perotin in the late 1100s?”

No one said anything. From the alternates table, I heard Jack mumble, “oh goodie, an easy one,” sarcastically. 

“Time. The correct answer was Paris. Dendrology is the scientific study of what organisms?” A silence wafted through the room. “Nobody? Time. That would be ‘trees.’”

Well hey, at least the scores were even…

***

My hands were clasped together, and my eyes were straight forward. I wasn’t even looking at my teammates. I was just doing my best to count the scores. I didn’t want to admit it, but North had picked up the slack this time around. They were plain and easily beatable before, and now they were… just plain. Even worse, for some reason this round was full of the hardest questions we could ever be asked.

“What set of stories are told by ten young people fleeing the Black Death in Florence in a work by Giovanni Boccaccio?” Mr. Turner asked.

Yeah, great example. Clearly, no one here brushed up on Giovanni Pinocchio before coming here, because for the umpteenth time, everyone stayed silent. “Nobody? Wow, this packet was full of some hard ones,” even Mr. Turner felt the need to say. “The answer was The Decameron.” He shuffled his papers and cleared his throat. “Okay, that was the round. Let me just go ahead and tally up the numbers. Feel free to, uh… talk amongst yourselves.”

Ryan turned to the other three in the main table, in one of those big sweeping “Ryan is turning to the other three at the main table to tell them Something Important” ways. Not knowing where else to look, I turned to Rose, who gave me a shrug that wordlessly told me, “What? Stop looking at me.” 

Fuck everything. Instead of looking at anything that would give me a victory, I just resigned myself to looking at the fucking ceiling. At least the ceiling couldn’t get angry at me. I did my bit for a few seconds before I heard a voice – a less-than-familiar voice – call out, “Hey Jason.”

I looked down to see Sammy from the other alternates table smirking at me. “Are you looking for a victory up there? ‘Cause you’re just as likely to find it there as you are from this game.”

My mouth opened in shock. That was… bold. Still, my gamer instincts kicked into high gear. “Yeah? If you ran your mouth half as well during the actual game as you do after, maybe you wouldn’t need to worry yourself.”

Sammy… laughed in response. Laughed and folded her arms, gesturing to Mr. Turner, who cleared his throat. He chuckled and adjusted his glasses. “Okay – oh boy. Um, alright! The results are in, I checked them twice. North High managed to come out on top this time, with 400 points. Hazelwood High came so close though, with 390 points!”

The result from North High’s end was instantaneous, with many of the group outright cheering. On our end, the realization we were just knocked out of the tournament for good hit us all hard. I had to admit, losing by one fucking question hurt, and I could see at the main table, Jack made this grimace-like expression with his tongue out, like he was over-acting eating a piece of bad food. Candy shook her head slowly, but Ryan… just stared straight forward, expression unchanged, like he was having a PTSD reaction or something. Sarah, naturally, had her arm around him, rubbing his back supportively. She was more concerned about him than anything else. 

The weirdest one was Rose. When the announcement hit, she hid her face in her elbow, but she… laughed. Silently, but visibly, she laughed. I looked back from Rose to Sammy, noting that Sammy had only laughed moments before. By the time I looked at Sammy though, she was celebrating alongside the other alternate at her table. She happened to lock eyes with me, and her smile only got bigger. She shrugged innocently, still maintaining her smile.

Fuck, her eyes were pretty. I felt myself melt a little and shrugged back, no doubt sporting my own kind of smile. Sammy seemed to accept that, and went back to her team, her smile never disappearing from her face. Her little dyed streak in her hair looked so good. I kept staring at it, until I felt something elbow me in the side.

I turned to see Rose looking at me with one eyebrow lowered. “You’re practically drooling,” she commented dryly. 

“”Oh, am I making the school look bad again?” I teased back.

“Nope, but you do look like a guy with a serious crush,” she noted, leaning back in her chair.

I shifted and, to my horror, felt myself blush. “That’s so uncool,” I lamely replied. “Because like – I mean – not even.”

Rose, never moving her head, moved her eyes to look at Sammy again, then back at me. “Can’t say I blame you,” she added with the same dry tone, then winked again. 

I blinked and furrowed my brow at her, then immediately eased it. Right, she was a lesbian… or at least into girls. Hey, maybe we could be friends that gawk at girls together. That could be cool. Maybe having a lesbian friend had its perks. I guess if I was in the Quiz Bowl team, I basically already had a lot of lesbian friends. We practically had better representation than the Gay-Straight Alliance club. 

Figuring the jig was up, I turned from my defiant scowl into a sheepish smile. I didn’t know what to say beyond that, so I just shrugged. Rose saw my smile and returned it with one of her rare smiles, as if she was pleased I was actually admitting it to her. Hey, it was nice to trust each other with that kinda thing, so whatever. 

With that, Mr. Turner made some more announcements and got up, beginning to take his team with him. Sammy almost went with them, then, at the last second… turned to one of her teammates and quietly told him, “I’ll be right with you guys.” She jogged up to… me. Like, me. “Hey, Jason,” she began. “Don’t feel too bad. We still gotta win one more game to qualify, so, y’know.”

“Oh, o-okay,” I replied, my blush likely still evident on my face. Fuck, this sucked in a weird way, but also, Sammy… wanted to talk to me. Cool. “Who’re you against?”

“I think Wordsworth Collegiate?”

I had to laugh. “You’re fucked, Sammy.”

“Oh no,” she laughed back, and ruffled a hand through her hair. “Well, we had a good run I guess. We’re still gonna try.”

“Yeah,” I replied with a nod. I wanted to say more but nothing was coming to mind. 

“And, uh… don’t feel too bad about losing. I think you’ll feel better about it in a few minutes anyway.” Sammy smiled, then turned to Rose and smiled at her too. “See you later,” she said, already walking away.

Would we even see her later…? A few minutes…? I turned to Rose with probably a baffled expression on my face, to see her stony expressionless face. “Wow, she’s talking in riddles, huh?” Rose asked with a plain expression.

“…What’s going o-”

“Okay, guys!” Chadwick called. “I know this wasn’t the result we wanted, but we do still have one last game to play. I know that this game means we have no chances of making it to Counties and that’s unfortunate, but that’s no reason to stop here and quit having fun, right?”

“Hear hear,” Jack replied, miming raising a glass. 

Candy nodded too. “Let’s do this,” she said chipperly. “Where do we go next?” 

“Uh…” Chadwick checked her clipboard. As she did, my eyes drifted to Sarah and Ryan. Sarah was still supportively rubbing his back, and Ryan was still staring forward. I don’t think he moved at all since the announcement that we lost. I wasn’t even sure he took in a single breath since the news hit. “It looks like we’re staying here, and we’ll be going against… Bancroft.”

Ryan exhaled slowly and calmly when he heard the name. “Bancroft,” he repeated in a calm voice. In a fluid slow motion, he stood up from his chair. “Don’t know why they bother still coming. They lose every year.” He started moving like a zombie. “I’m going to the bathroom. I know where it is. I’ll be back in a minute.”

We all watched silently as Ryan practically floated out of the room. As soon as the door was closed behind him, people started murmuring.

“Is he going to be okay?” Candy asked Jack.

Jack shrugged. “No clue. Last time I saw someone act like that was in Dawn of the Dead.”

Rose quietly got up and walked over to Sarah, I guess to tell her something. My phone buzzing in my pocket took my eyes away from them. Must have been Hailey giving some kind of update about when I get home tonight. Especially with my shit-tier flip phone, no one bothered texting me anyway except maybe Sarah when she was horny, and she was sitting at that table and grappling with our loss. I opened my phone to see I had a new text message from an unidentified number.

Hey jason! This is sammy. Sorry we beat you guys so bad 😉 I wanna make it up to you. Wanna do something sometime? I can drive.

Every word beyond “Sammy” in the text message made my breathing go a bit faster and a bit weirder. I didn’t even realize it, but I started holding my mouth while looking at the text. Sammy… texted me. The chick was asking me out. How did she even get my-

“Yo, Jason,” Jack called out to me. “Is everything good, dude? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Somehow, he was able to tear my eyes away from my phone screen. I looked up at him, then on instinct, my eyes trailed over to Sarah and Rose. Rose had finished whispering something into Sarah’s ear and was now just staring at her, gauging Sarah’s reaction.

And Sarah’s reaction was a spectacle worth fucking gauging. As Rose leaned back, Sarah’s eyes went from wide to narrow to whatever adjective would best describe “target acquired.” She breathed in and out a few times, then ominously asked, “What?”

Rose just shrugged, maintaining her famous stone face.

“You…” Sarah stammered, then swallowed. “…fucking… evil bitch!”

“Woah!” Jack instinctively emitted with a disappointed tone, then everyone looked at Chadwick. Sure enough, her head turned nearly ninety degrees like a survival horror game villain as soon as she heard what was effectively Hazelwood High’s Mark of Cain. 

Sarah sensed Chadwick’s presence immediately, and pointed a finger at Rose while looking desperately at Chadwick. “She threw the game!!” she accused. “She deliberately threw the game!!”

“I’m sorry?!” Rose scoffed in astonishment.

“”She just told me, Mrs. Chadwick, she said it right to me!” Sarah babbled in desperation. “She didn’t answer a question all game, think about it! She was doing this because she… because she hates Ryan!! You saw how it affec-”

Chadwick held up a hand, and Sarah immediately cut her words off like Chadwick controlled her powers of speech. For emphasis, Chadwick quietly added, “No more.” She sighed and added, “Sarah, you and I are going to have a word in the hallway, right now.” She started moving with purpose, and Sarah, possibly sensing her fate, meekly followed afterwards. Once the doors were closed behind them, much like with Ryan, we broke out into murmurs, although they were much more animated.

“Yoooo~!” Jack gasped in pure shock.

“What did you do?!” Candy asked Rose in awe.

“I didn’t do anything!” Rose argued. “I just made the point that I hadn’t performed as well as I could and it sucked how we were off by ten points, that’s all!” She shrugged. “Sarah took it from there, I guess. It was actually kind of crazy.”

“Loco!” Jack agreed. “Sorry she called you the b-word though.”

“In front of Chadwick too, she hates that word,” Candy added in a concerned tone. She opened her mouth to say more, but the raised voice of Chadwick rang from the hallway into the room. “Oh my God,” Candy murmured.

“I have a funny feeling,” Jack mused, staring at the door, “that Sarah is going to be sitting at the alternates table for the last game.” I stared at the door too, not even knowing how I felt about all this shit. I mean, Rose… could be a bitch. If she did do something…

By now, Rose had rejoined me at the table, looking at me as if whatever happened with Sarah didn’t just happen. She looked at my hand and her brow furrowed. “Why do you have your phone out?” she asked in a weirded-out voice. “You never do that.”

Oh holy shit, right. Sammy. “I uh… um…” I felt myself flush. Rose, for her part, just stared at me. “No reaso-”

I felt my face go blank in real time. I just asked myself now how Sammy could have gotten my number. She clearly got it from someone, and only two people on the team had my number, and they were Sarah and-

“Rose,” I said calmly.

“Yes, Jason?”

“How did Sammy get my phone number?” I asked patiently.

Rose tried as hard as she could to keep a stony expression, but eventually, a smile won out on her face. She even started to rotate back and forth with her hands behind her back, in some kind of schoolgirl nervous way. “Dunno,” she obviously lied. “But ask me about it on the bus ride home.”

My jaw dropped. Rose… got me a date with Sammy?! “Wait, how-”

“Bus ride home,” Rose repeated, losing her smile. With her eyes, she gestured around her, then to the door. On cue, the door swung open and a stern-faced Chadwick marched in, followed by Sarah, who was trying to hide her face from us. Clearly during whatever the fuck happened out there in the hallway, she let a few tears fly. Hey, been there. It seemed to practically be fucking tradition for our team at this point.

Ryan came in shortly after. He walked in, seemingly only barely losing his zombie-like persona, though it quickly changed and he snapped back to reality as soon as he saw Sarah slumped over her desk. He ran over to comfort her, without even knowing what the fuck happened. Hey, if nothing else, I guess it was nice he was being a good boyfriend or whatever.

No one got to say anything further, because at that moment Bancroft’s team waltzed in, and even from looking at them it was clear Ryan was right. These people looked like you could walk over them just by asking politely, and their teacher didn’t look any less airheaded. Our team was uncharacteristically silent as we all assumed the position. Chadwick took her place at the head of the table and cleared her throat.

“Hello and welcome to your final game of Regionals today. My name is Mrs. Chadwick, and I will be your quizmaster. Before we begin, I just want to state for the record that Sarah of our team, the girl at the alternates table, has chosen to be absent for the whole game for personal reasons,” she began. Our team at the main table looked at each other with serious yet knowing looks – we all knew it was a tasteful lie. Sarah was banished to the Shadow Realm, but the other team didn’t have to know she was being punished, I guess. 

“So, this will be the final game for Bancroft and Hazelwood at the Quiz Bowl Regionals. Both teams have two losses, so this game will not impact the outcome of the tournament. In other words, this game may be treated as purely for fun.”

In a voice I barely heard – and therefore Chadwick definitely couldn’t – I heard Ryan scoff. I turned to him to see he’d recovered from his zombie state, but was still clearly crushed.

“On Hazelwood’s side we have Rose, Ryan, Jason and Candy. Your alternate for this game is Jack. Because one of our members won’t be playing, whoever will be placed at the alternates table for round two will come back during round three. On Bancroft’s side we have Jenny, Ali… Artemis… and Tyson. Your alternates are Eli and Owen.”

“Don’t blame me, blame my parents,” the dry voice of one of the four told Chadwick. Jack gave a hearty chuckle. “You can call me Artie if you want.”

Chadwick gave a polite laugh, then went over the formalities and told us to grab our buzzers. “Here we go! Forty-point blitz to begin the round. What Chinese city, a major tech hub, links Hong Kong to mainland China?”

Rose buzzed in. “Shenzhen,” she answered.

“Correct, Hazelwood,” Chadwick confirmed. “What novel, often credited with assisting to spark the american Civil War due to building abolitionist sentiment, was written by Harriet Beecher Sto-”

Rose buzzed in again. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”

“Correct again, Hazelwood,” Chadwick reported. I began to stare at Rose and truly think about today. She was answering these questions with ease, borderline boredom, and yet… she didn’t answer a single question all last game. And she left during lunch. And she only got my number today. And Sammy texted me today. And-

I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder, and whirled around to look at its source. Candy was looking at me expectantly, and no one else was saying anything. I looked around, then realized I missed something. “Uh, could you repeat that?” I asked.

Chadwick looked from her paper to me. “No I can not,” she replied diligently, and opened her mouth to speak again before the other team buzzed in.

“Uh, would that be… the Half-Life series?” one of the guys asked.

“Yes it would! Correct, Bancroft,” Chadwick replied.

Fuck, I loved Half-Life. I probably would have gotten it easily… Jeez, okay, thinking about conspiracies could wait. I needed to get my head in the fucking game.

***

“In what country would you find the world’s deepest lake, Lake Baikal?” Chadwick asked.

Rose buzzed in. “Russia,” she answered confidently.

“Correct, Hazelwood,” Chadwick replied. “Who is said to have caused inflation in the Middle East by giving out so much gold on his hajj in 1324?”

“Ooh,” Jack said instinctively, hitting his buzzer. “That’s the big man, Mansa Musa!”

“Correct, Hazelwood,” Chadwick chuckled. “That’s the round, everyone! Let me just figure out the numbers here.”

It was really nice actually staying in until the end of a round for once. I guess I had Sarah to thank for that. I looked back at her – she still looked like a sad sack. Odds are she didn’t really give a shit about playing in this last game, and it was just the shame factor that made her so sullen, but still. God, even while just sitting sadly, her ass was the stuff of-

An elbow to my side took me away from my thoughts about Sarah. I followed the jab to its source – it was a jab instead of a gentle tap, so of course it was Rose. “Where were you this whole game?” she asked, although she was clearly working overtime to make her tone sound playful, even with her lack of smile. “You missed like three whole questions about video games. Isn’t that your thing?”

“I could have asked the same of you last game,” I fired back. “Maybe I’ll tell you why I missed the video game questions on the bus back or something.”

Rose just looked at me with one eyebrow raised while Chadwick cleared her throat. “Okay, the scores are in! Congratulations to Hazelwood High, who won this game with 440 points! Bancroft took second place this time wiiith… 310 points.”

I heard Rose scoff-chuckle next to me, and looked out of the corner of my eye to see the beginning of a smirk on her face with her arms folding. I slowly inhaled. We were not fucking Wordsworth Collegiate. Not on my fucking watch.

I elbowed Rose back. “If you want me to sit next to you on the bus home, shake their hands,” I told her quietly but authoritatively. “This was the last game. Let’s be courteous.”

Rose looked at me with probably some kind of bitchy riposte prepared, but when she turned to look at me and saw my facial expression, she hesitated. 

I took swift advantage of her hesitation. “Do it as a favor to me.”

“I already did you a favor today,” she practically whispered, but… not with a defiant tone.

I shrugged. “Yeah, on your terms. Just, please, do this one thing because I asked. It would mean a lot.”

“Jeez,” she replied, and we both looked at Bancroft’s team. 

I reached my arm out. “Good game,” I told my opposite number as I shook his hand.

“Not really. You guys mopped the floor with us,” he sighed.

I shrugged. “Sometimes you get a lot of questions you know. This was our lucky game. You guys still did good,” I told him. It got me a polite smile. Next to me, I saw Rose awkwardly stretch her arm forwards and shake the hands of the other teammates.

“Yeah,” she began awkwardly. “Sorry this one didn’t turn out so great. You’ll, uh, get ‘em next time.” The other team shook our hands, said their goodbyes, and left the room. After the door was closed, Rose moved her neck around and reached into her pocket, pulling out some kind of container of hand sanitizer. “Happy?” she asked grumpily, thoroughly sanitizing her hands.

“Thrilled,” I replied sarcastically. I looked beyond her to Sarah, who was openly giving the both of us a death glare. I felt my expression change to something else, and I just shrugged at her. I didn’t do anything to piss Sarah off, so she could knock it off with the glare any time now.

“Okay, everyone,” Chadwick said, turning to us. “First of all, you all did a great job today. You may not be moving on, but you tried your best and you’re all winners in my heart. I for one would be happy to keep doing Quiz Bowl practice for the rest of the year, even if we don’t do any more tournaments, as long as I have enough support from you all.”

“Hell yeah,” Jack instantly replied. “I wanna keep doing this. Tournies are fun, but I just do this for the quizzy part.”

“I’m in,” Candy said with a smile. 

“Nothing better to do,” Rose replied.

I chimed in. “Oh hell yeah. Saves me from having to actually go home at the end of the-” I caught myself. “I mean…” Fuck. I didn’t really think about how that would come across, especially with the other shit they knew about me. I could feel several pairs of concerned eyes on me, and I hated every second. “W-”

“You are such a baby,” Rose said with a slightly louder voice than usual, then turned to Chadwick. “I’ve been to his house before. His parents make him do chores when he gets home, like, simple chores, and he told me before that he puts it off for as long as possible so that he doesn’t have to do actual work.” I just stared at her. She looked back at me with this disapproving annoyed face.

“Rose,” Chadwick replied sternly. “It’s the end of the tournament, and I would really like the pettiness to be dialed back here.” She turned to the rest of us. “Well, that’s enough support to keep going, though it would be great if all six of you wanted to keep going.” She turned to Ryan and Sarah.

“Uh, maybe,” Ryan said with a shrug. “I guess it would be nice practice for… well, it’s my last year, but… maybe I’ll…” He sighed. “I dunno.” Sarah, for her part, said nothing, and clearly looked away when Chadwick locked eyes with her.

“Okay, well… consider it,” Chadwick replied diplomatically. Before long, we had stood up, said our goodbyes to Regionals, and were on our way back to the bus. As usual, Rose and I found ourselves walking next to each other.

She glanced at her watch as we walked. “Almost one,” she observed. “With the bus ride back, there’s barely going to be any school left when we get back to Hazelwood.”

I couldn’t even pretend to be interested in small talk. “How many favors are you gonna pull for me today?” I asked incredulously.

“Huh?”

“Rose…” I began, then lowered my voice to a whisper. “Why’d you lie about going to my house?”

Rose looked at me, then straight forward. “Bus,” she said simply. I sighed, accepting my fate, and walked on until we were on the bus, sitting down next to Rose. Annoyingly, even then, she wanted the bus to be moving once we began to talk, so that the engine’s sounds could mask our voices. Luckily, the bus didn’t take long to get going, and within seconds of us moving, Rose’s headphones came off. 

“Ooo-kay,” she exhaled. “Lot of ground to cover. First of all, unless you’re a sociopath and a great actor – and for the record you’re neither – you clearly only told me about the parents hitting you stuff in private. You don’t like talking about that shit. Do you know a lot about tennis?”

I stared at her, dumbfounded. “Do I know a lot about tennis…? Fuck no I don’t know a lot about tennis, what kind of question is that?” I asked.

“You could have just said ‘no,’ Jason. I was just going to say, you talking about home was clearly an unforced error, and you wanted to walk it back. So I jumped in to help,” she reasoned back.

“But like… Okay, let’s leave that alone. What the actual fuck is up with Sammy?”

Rose couldn’t help but smirk a little when the name was brought up. I took the opportunity to playfully add, “And I know you did something, because I think you’ve smiled more today than the rest of the entire time I’ve known you.”

“Fuck, I know. I’m losing my edge,” she joked. “Okay, so. Whatever I say to you next, stays between us. If it gets out, I will genuinely never talk to you again.”

“Jeez, alright, fine, I’m no blabbermouth,” I replied defensively.

Rose stared at me for a bit. “Well, I could tell a couple things from Regionals. Number one, North was coming back, which meant the girl you were obviously drooling over was back. Number two, Sarah really wanted me to get in trouble, and if you have a nemesis wanting to get the drop on you, especially if they’ll stop at nothing… sometimes the best strategy is to get them first.”

I stared at her. “The penny’s refusing to drop, Rose,” I told her.

“The penny’s refusing to drop,” she repeated, marveling at my wording. “Say hi to the fifties for me. Anyway, I kind of improvised something. During lunch, I was thinking of how to get Sarah to blow up first, especially in front of Chadwick, so that she would get in trouble for starting a fight with me. But I needed to do it in a way where she got upset first, and I looked innocent. You, uh, may not like me for this next part.”

I furrowed my brow. “I can guess you went to Sammy when you left the lunch table,” I said slowly. “Only you and Sarah had my number. It was pretty obvious you… gave Sammy my number, I guess. But like, why does that help you, and… did Sammy even want my number?”

Rose smirked again, and looked down at the floor. “Sarah was half-right,” Rose explained quietly. “I did throw the game. But it wasn’t to do anything to Ryan. Sarah just knew that saying the real reason out loud would have looked nuclear-level bad.”

“Rose…”

“During lunch, I told Sammy you had a crush on her-”

“Rose!!”

“Shh,” she accosted me. “I told Sammy that you had a crush on her, and thanks to you apologizing to me, I was guilt-free when I told her that you were a nice guy and she should take a chance on you. And I told her, if she was willing to go on a date with you, I was willing to… keep quiet during our match. Not intentionally lose, per se, but give them the push they evidently needed. We still could have won if any of the others answered even two other questions, so I upheld my end either way.”

“…And she agreed?” I asked, baffled yet fully understanding this.

“Yup!” she said. “No offense, I don’t think she would have come onto you as strongly, or like, at all if I didn’t-”

“Yeah, thanks Rose, I got that,” I cut in annoyedly.

She shrugged. “So I played wingman, and gave her your number. After the match, and what Sammy said to you, I knew it was done. And so…” She let a smirk bleed through. “And so…” She chuckled. “Heh… I… uh…”

“Rose.” My tone was both worried and ominous.

“I, uh, let good ol’ Sarah know that I asked Sammy to ask you out if we lost, and mayyyybe I told her about how hard it was going to be for her knowing you were going to replace her with Sammy in your mind so soon, and how if she knew how much it sucked for an ex to replace her so quickly, maybe she shouldn’t do the same for others.” She gave me a sheepish smile as she finished.

“You… used my situation with Sarah to hurt her? You used me like a pawn to hurt her?”

Rose’s face changed. “That’s… certainly a way to look at it,” she replied slowly. “Another way to look at it is that I scored you a date.”

“Uh… y-yeah, I suppo-”

“By the way, correct me if I’m wrong, but you haven’t even texted her back yet,” Rose flatly added. “Not nice to keep a girl waiting, right?”

So, this wasn’t even about getting me a date. Rose learned about how Sarah and I were doing stuff, and…

“Wait, what even was the end goal here? Did you just want Chadwick to blow up at her?” I asked.

Rose looked at me. “Um, to be honest, your tone here has shifted, so I don’t know if I even want to tell you any more of this.”

I slowly breathed in. It was true, Rose was showing off a bit more of her… well, her evil side today, and I wasn’t good at hiding how I felt. Fuck, Sarah was still a friend of mine. Plus, it wasn’t Rose’s place to just cut me off from Sarah, even though no doubt she took sheer delight in doing so. “Yeah, tell you what,” I said. “I won’t judge you if you keep talking, as long as you won’t judge me if I try to make sure me and Sarah are still fine.”

Rose stared at me. “If by ‘still fine’ you mean ‘still sexting,’ no deal,” she told me matter-of-factly.

“Sorry, why do you care this much again?” I asked her.

“Because the way she acted after our breakup broke my heart, and she’s got both of my best friends in Quiz Bowl wrapped around her little finger, and I want her taken down a peg,” she said as if it was obvious.

“Ah, so Chadwick getting mad at her was the icing on the cake,” I murmured. “The real reason you did all of this was to break her heart right back.”

“Well deduced, Sherlock,” Rose replied sarcastically. “And don’t flatter yourself. You’re her fuck buddy, and she probably only likes you so much because you give her so much attention. You getting a girlfriend isn’t breaking her heart. It’s just… giving her a taste, key word being ‘taste,’ of her own medicine.”

“And what if I don’t approve of the way you made this decision for me and sought out to hurt someone that I still consider a friend? Especially since now thanks to you, Sarah knows I blabbed to you about what she and I have been doing?” I asked Rose angrily.

Rose donned an “I can’t believe you” expression and shifted her body to look out the window. “Then stay mad at me,” she replied dismissively, looking out the window and pointing her back at me. “And then go and text Sammy back that you don’t, in fact, want to go out with her. But you’re you, and you obviously won’t both date Sammy and keep doing stuff with Sarah. I never made the choice for you, but I did give you an option. Go ahead and choose whatever one suits you more. Sorry if I was trying to do something that would help both of us.”

“Yeah, by hurting Sar-”

“Headphones are going on,” Rose told me, and told me nothing more. I looked at her back, then at Sarah sitting next to Ryan – she had her head on his shoulder. I stared at Sarah and did what I hated most: thought about things a lot.

Sure, Sarah was my friend, but I knew as well as Rose that I hated Sarah cheating. If anything, us doing this shouldn’t have been an option in the first place. I just did it because I… had the option to. I had a lot of fun, but yeah, it was guilty fun. I would have preferred it any other way. Sarah now knew that Rose knew about us, and that was probably the worst thing Rose did here. Well, no. The worst thing Rose did to me. The worst thing she did to Sarah was hit her with a haymaker and watch her blow up, knowing that Sarah couldn’t divulge the real reason she felt betrayed. Rose was clever, but she wasn’t being… moral.

I stared at my phone. Sammy. Maybe we were a fuck-awful match, and she did really only want to go out with me to make her team better, but like, I didn’t exactly need a girl to get on her knees and plead with tears in her eyes to go on a date with me. A date was a fucking date. It didn’t need to be this huge be-all-end-all thing. Sammy was hot, and I definitely had a huge crush on her. And now, I had a big opportunity I never would have had otherwise, and definitely never would have again. Plus, if I said no to Sammy to be… “loyal” to Sarah, who was in a relationship… yeah, that was actually its own kind of fucked up.

I looked back at Rose. Rose knew my moral stance on this, I bet. Sure, she was being evil towards Sarah, and that was definitely a factor, but like… Ultimately, she was trying to stop Sarah from continuing to cheat on Ryan. With me. Fuck, I was helping a girl cheat. Rose was basically giving me a clear out there, maybe even because she got evidence, this very morning, that I wouldn’t stop it on my own even if I wanted to. She didn’t just want to hurt Sarah… She wanted to stop her bad behavior.

I chewed on Rose’s words. She wasn’t making this decision for me, but she was giving me an option. And I did kind of roundabout let Rose know I wasn’t happy with what I was doing with Sarah either. Maybe what Rose did wasn’t the worst thing in the world. It was petty, but… Sarah was getting more and more aggressive with Rose specifically. All Rose did was give me the option to stop doing stuff with her.

I stared back down at my phone, then my eyes eventually trailed back to Rose. Sighing defeatedly, I nudged Rose. Her reflection in the glass looked at me, but she didn’t move. I nudged her again. She rolled her eyes and took off her headphones and held them slightly  above her ears. “If it’s another speech, save it.”

“I’m sorry,” I told her. “You’ve done a lot for me today and I was just… nervous about… fuck, I dunno. It just felt off. But I can see where you were coming from, and it’s true, you did a lot for me today. Not only with the Sammy shit, but covering my ass about my parents too.” I shrugged. “I got worried about this, but like, you’re probably just trying to end the cheating, which… which I respect. You’re still hurting her, but like, you’re hurting her by, I dunno, making her stop doing more bad stuff.”

“Your apologies are long-winded,” Rose observed, still holding her headphones. 

“Okay,” I replied with an indignant shrug. “I’m sorry I got all suspicious. I still think what you did was mean, but I can deal with that. You did a lot for me today. I owe you one.”

Rose lowered her headphones and shook her head. “You saved my sketchbook,” she said softly. “I still owe you, like, nine hundred ninety-seven.”

I gave her an, ‘Oh really?’ face. “Well then, if you’ll let me cash in another… can you help me draft a good response to Sammy?”

Rose smiled, again. I think she probably broke her personal record for the number of times she smiled in a day.

***

“Hmm,” mom replied. “Well, be home at a reasonable time. And maybe next time, maybe think about going to her town. Making the girl drive is weird and emasculating.”

I closed my eyes slowly even as I adjusted myself in front of the mirror. “She lives in another city, mom,” I told her, “and I don’t own a car. I don’t see how else-”

“Don’t talk back to your mother,” dad barked from the couch. That was it, the ultimate comeback. Fuck Quiz Bowl, I should have been in the Debate Club with such amazing debaters for parents. Make a dumb, obviously wrong point, and accuse anyone who replies of just ‘talking back.’ No wonder dad liked Fox News so much.

Even the normally-nosy Hailey was quiet after that exchange. With her eyes, she told me to not listen to them, and hopefully, to enjoy myself tonight. For my part, I just shrugged. This was just a date. Sammy probably didn’t even like me, but just wanted to win. Game recognize game.

Once Sammy had arrived, I left – without saying goodbye, obviously – and went outside to see a Honda Civic with its lights on. I approached the car cautiously, and heard an unlocking sound. Well, either it was Sammy or an even more interesting story, so I opened the door and hopped in. Sure enough, the beautiful sight of a particularly dolled-up Sammy and the intoxicating scent of a feminine perfume greeted me.

“Hey!” Sammy greeted me peppily. “Wow, crazy to see you like this, huh?”

“What, you mean like, not in a Quiz Bowl game, or…?” I replied. Not my best opening line.

Sammy chuckled. “Uh, yeah, that’s what I meant,” she clarified.

“I didn’t really picture you as the Honda Civic type,” I admitted, looking around the car. Even with Sammy’s perfume working its magic, the Civic had Old Car smell and clearly had a few things broken.

“Yeah, sadly I have this thing where I can’t afford to buy cars when I’m still in high school and don’t have a job,” Sammy replied. “This lil’ beauty is what we like to call… my dad’s car.”

I scoffed. “Daddy’s girl, huh?”

Holy shit, I sucked at talking to girls. Why the fuck did I say that…? “Sorry, I didn’t mean- that, uh, wasn’t cool of- you know.”

Sammy watched me stumble over my words. Her eyebrows were up, and… she was slightly smirking at me even still. “You’re not even losing a Quiz Bowl game this time,” she joked to alleviate the tension. “And yet still, the banter! What gives, Jason?”

“Um, I dunno why I said… uh… wow, ten seconds in and I’m blowing it, huh?” I could feel myself go pink. My place was right there. Maybe I should have just bailed right then and there.

Sammy clicked her tongue. “Uh…” she offered, then a beat of silence passed between us. “I mean, whatever. I guess I’m kind of a daddy’s girl. So, y’know, points for observation…?”

“No no, don’t go along with it, you’re supposed to shut me down when I say rude shit like that, right?” I reasoned.

“Oh, I’m supposed to shut you down, huh? It’s my responsibility, is that right?” It was weird. She was saying the words like we were arguing, but every word of hers dripped with… humor. It was like talking to Jack or something, except a more, like, smug Jack. It was like I was being tested. “Tell ya what: let’s make it even. Are you a daddy’s boy or a momma’s boy? Full honesty, and we’ll call it even.”

“Wow, is this a date or a therapy session?” I asked semi-jokingly, semi-nervously. What kind of fucking date was this?!

“You started it!” Sammy playfully accused.

“Uh, maybe we shouldn’t – um, neither.”

“Oh, come on, that’s a cop-ou-”

“No, like,” I cut in, nervously shifting. “Neither. I don’t, um, get along with… Uh, my parents… suck. They fucking suck. There.”

We sat in the car in an awkward silence for the next few seconds. Even Sammy’s smile was gone. “Should we start over?” Sammy eventually asked.

“We either start over or I go back to my house,” I laughed out of embarrassment. “And uh, you fulfilled your end of the… yeah. Um, no worries if you’d rather, uh… go home.”

“Do you want me to go home?” Sammy asked.

“Fuck no,” I replied instantly. “I dunno if Rose let you know this, but I have a, uh-” My eyes met with hers and it felt like the breath was sucked out of my body. I felt myself blush, and turned away out of instinct. “No, I, uh, like seeing you. I’m just, uh… I guess I’m just bad at all this.”

I heard Sammy smile again. “Massive crush,” she said eventually. “Yeah, Rose told me. And, well, I’m not gonna send you back home if your parents fucking suck. Plus, I had to travel a decently fair distance to see ya, so even if it’s weird, weird is better than boring, don’t you think?”

“I… do, yeah,” I replied lamely. 

“Cool! Then, start over,” Sammy replied. “Open the door, get out, and get back in. And uh, since we’ll be starting over, lemme give you a freebie: say something nice about how I look. I liked that thing you said about my hair last time.”

I couldn’t help but smile. “You’re teaching me how to date, huh?”

She giggled. “Is it mean to say you could use the help?”

“It’s true, and that’s good enough for me,” I conceded, and opened the car door, then stepped outside, closing the door behind me. Before opening it again, I slowly breathed in and out. Okay, I was nervous, and when I’m nervous, I default to mean. Cut that shit out, Jason. Be nice.

I opened the door again. “Hey, Jason! Crazy to see you like this, huh?” Sammy said with a slight joking tone as I got in and shut the door behind me.

I stared straight forward. “Uh, when I saw you, it felt like my life just started or some shit,” I gushed. “Like, I thought I got crushes before, but I saw you and went all, ‘nope, that’s what a crush feels like.’ Every time I see your face, it’s like, I dunno if I’m even worthy to look at it. So I’m gonna say things or act weirdly and I’m sorry for that shit, but like, it’s because I really like you, uh, inside and out, like, y’know, you’ve also got a great sense of humor, like, obviously, and uh… thanks for taking- you know, taking a chance. On me. Y’know.”

“Holy shit,” Sammy laughed. “Okay, you know what? I did ask for that. And for the record, I could have said no to this date, but I didn’t,” she informed me.

“Did you guys end up winning at Regionals?” I asked gingerly.

“Oh hell no. You were right. Wordsworth Collegiate mopped the floor with us, and then gave the most country club-ass laugh when the scores were announced,” she admitted, half-humorously, half-bitterly.

“Oof, so you have to date me and didn’t even win, huh?” I chuckled along with her.

“We didn’t even win, you’re right there,” Sammy replied, then smiled at me, although this smile wasn’t humorous. “But no, I didn’t have to date you. I could have chickened out. Believe me, I’ve done worse. You’re not the first guy to find me hot, and you’re not even the worst first impression I got on a date.”

“I find that hard to believe,” I scoffed.

“The other guy didn’t save it. You did. I liked the honesty,” she replied. “My turn. I think it’s fair to say I didn’t get a crush on you, but you’re clearly a good-looking guy, but more importantly, I like that you kinda just talked to me like I was a person. Especially knowing how tongue-tied I apparently make you.” She shifted the gear. “Is it cool if I start driving?”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“I don’t live here. You do,” she replied smugly. 

“Oh fuck, you’re right,” I chuckled. “Um, I dunno, standard date shit. Burgers?”

Sammy chuckled. “I haven’t eaten yet, so sure, let’s do some ‘standard date shit.’” She started to drive away from my place. “You’re navigating. Anyway, I also like how you have a personality and it’s hard to turn-”

“Left at the lights,” I cut in.

“Thanks – hard to turn off. Like, I dunno, fakeness I think is the most unattractive trait a person can have. Fakeness and two-facedness.” She shook her head to move her hair out of her face, and stopped at the red lights, putting on her left turn signal. I looked at her and nervously exhaled through my nose. She chuckled and added, “And yeah, stuff like that is hard to fake.”

“Uh, yeah, fakeness sucks,” I agreed. “I like when people say what they mean, you know?”

“How honest would you say you are?” Sammy inquired.

“Uh, I dunno. I guess it’s not up to me to decide,” I replied. “What about you?”

“With the right person? Hella honest,” she replied. “Think you can match me?”

I paused. “Uh, sure?”

“What did Rose get from getting me to ask you out?” she asked. “Is she your ex or something?” The light turned green and Sammy sped away. 

The hard left turn caught me by surprise. “Um, I, uh…”

“Match me,” Sammy giggled.

“Why do you want to know?” I asked nervously.

“Because no one does that for no reason, and maybe I don’t know Rose that well, like, at all, but she doesn’t seem like she would just wanna be your wingman for nothing,” Sammy concisely explained. “This date shit is nice, I love a change of pace, but it’s still weird, right?”

It was actually really cool that she said that. I practically breathed a sigh of relief. “Uh, yeah, it’s super weird,” I agreed.

“Right? So, real reason, let’s hear it,” she told me enthusiastically.

“Um…” I stammered nervously. “First of all, in two streets you’ll be taking a right.”

“Nice deflection,” Sammy laughed. “So she’s your ex, right?”

“Nope, uh, she’s not. We’ve never done anything. Um, so I do know the reason, but it might be, y’know, private to them-”

“I’m probably never going to even see them again,” Sammy pointed out. “C’monnnn, I wanna know!”

“Are you just nosy?” I asked playfully.

She held out a wrist to me, with the other hand focused on driving. “Arrest me, officer,” she joked back. 

“Fine, you wanna know the whole damn story and basically be my living diary?!” I asked in a fed-up tone.

“Those dates are always the most interesting,” she giggled, putting both hands back on the wheel. “Hit me with it. Ooh, wait, A&W? Is that where we’re going?”

“Yup, that’s it,” I confirmed. “So-”

“Good choice. That’s like my favorite burger place. Good taste,” Sammy replied. “Okay, go.”

“Thanks. Uh, okay, so…” I began, taking a breath in.

“Just as honest as the second time you got in the car. Remember, I enjoyed that shit,” Sammy replied, egging me on. She was definitely some kind of drama-hog, so what the hell. If she was never going to meet these people, and she wanted full honesty…

“Okay, so Sarah, the other girl on our team – the tall redhead – me and her have been, uh, fooling around for a while. Everything but… I can’t believe I’m doing this… Everything but full-on fucking. Then it turns out, uh-oh, she and Rose are exes! Rose and I started out by fighting a lot, but I guess we’ve come to really respect each other as friends. Just friends, by the way. I don’t even know if she’s into boys.” As I talked, Sammy pulled into the parking lot, not saying a word. “It was a secret relationship, like, between Sarah and Rose. Rose isn’t out – I think – she just goes with the flow. Sarah I think is definitely not out but she’s bi or something, because she’s now with R- well, because she did stuff with me, actually, obviously, I guess. But now she’s with Ryan, like, officially, and Rose doesn’t like how quickly Sarah moved on, even though Rose was the one to break up with her. Rose also disapproves that Sarah and I were fooling around – she didn’t, like, find out, I told her. I also don’t like that Sarah was doing stuff with me on the side while she was, like, pining over Ryan and shit, and even after they got together, she wanted to…” I gulped. Full honesty. “Okay, no, we did fool around over, like, phones and text messages and shit, while they were together. Ryan doesn’t know, he didn’t even know me and Sarah did anything ever. But Rose knew, and she both wanted to get back at Sarah and, I think, put a wedge between me and her. So I think she set us up and she’s hoping we end up exclusive because then nothing will even tempt me to do shit with Sarah because when I’m the other guy it’s easy but I don’t think I would ever cheat if I got with someone.”

Sammy was looking at me with an ear-to-ear grin. “Wow, the fucking lore of your group,” she marveled. “Where does Jack fit in? Does he fit in anywhere?”

“Nah, he’s our go-to joker. He’s not even involved with anyone in the group, he has some outside girlfriend.” 

Sammy blew a raspberry. “Boring,” she joked. “And that short Asian girl?”

“Candy? Big lesbian. Out of the closet, I think. Had – or has – a big crush on Sarah too. Sarah doesn’t know.”

“Damn!” Sammy replied enthusiastically. “I thought for sure she and Jack had some kinda-”

“Right? Me too! Turns out, nope. Guys and girls can be just friends without anything more, even if it looks like it. I guess me and Rose are like that too.”

“It’s crazy that Sarah does or did something with, like, every member of your group except Jack,” she reflected.

“Why Jack?” I asked.

“Full honesty moment, and don’t feel bad when I say this, but he’s the hottest person in your group by far,” she admitted.

Jack? Hot? I guess I was glad someone saw it, even if her saying that definitely made me feel jealous. I shrugged. “Maybe he can tell she’s trouble,” I joked. “I’m amazed how well you’re taking this whole news that I used to do shit with Sarah and-”

“Well yeah, I’ve been there too,” Sammy enthusiastically replied. “Don’t even get me started on me and Hank.”

“Why, is the full honesty thing over?” I asked, a little slyly.

Sammy slowly smiled at me, then looked at the A&W. “Burgers first,” she replied, then undid her seatbelt.

***

“And, he actually tried to take the condom off mid-sex and hoped I wouldn’t notice,” Sammy scoffed. Her burger, which had a grand total of two bites taken out of it, lay on the table before her. In front of me sat my empty burger wrapper, even though my jaw almost joined it on the table once or twice. 

“That’s so fucking… like, isn’t that criminal?” I asked.

Sammy shrugged. “I mean, we aren’t eighteen yet, so I dunno what the technical term is, but I do know it’s a complete dick move,” she replied. She grabbed a fry and nabbed a bite of it. “It’s whatever,” she told me with her mouth full. 

Sammy’s boldness wasn’t just for show. She was very happy to inadvertently let me know that when it came to the experience department, she blew me right out of the water. Even though she wasn’t too crazy – she did it with three guys, which wasn’t nothing but wasn’t a hundred – I still realized I felt really sexually intimid-… well, I mean… nah, I felt fine.

“Good news was, I did fuckin’ notice, and I noticed before it was in. So, long-winded way of saying it, but I have still had nothing but safe sex my whole life.” She smiled triumphantly at me even as she finished off her fry. 

“Your life sounds fucking bananas,” I laughed. “I mean, before Sarah I never did anything at all. I just, like, sat at my computer and played games all day.”

Sammy nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, you did give me gamer vibes,” she replied. “How’d you go from gaming to Sarah?”

“Uh, parents took away my computer pr- God, it sounds lame when I say it like that,” I admitted.

Sammy shrugged. “You already told me your parents suck, I could have guessed that meant they were controlling,” she replied. “It also tells me why you were nervous around me and why you feel like you need to be rude when no one’s saying anything.”

Jeez! “Well, I wouldn’t put it like that-”

“Cool, then now you know,” she replied, and gave me a smile. “I may not be smart, but I know what I see. Besides, I’m here with you, not some guy from my school. That’s gotta count for something, right?” She picked up her burger and took a bite.

“What, you like rude guys?”

“Nah, no I don’t,” she replied with her mouth full, then set the burger down and wiped her mouth. “I dunno if you are rude; you were just nervous. You were – okay, fun fact about me, I kind of like to cold open all my dates talking about this kinda shit. Like, ‘full honesty, here’s what I did with other guys before you,’ as a kind of a way to see how they’ll react. It’s weird. I kind of expected some kind of shaming from you, but you were really chill about it.”

I couldn’t help but think of that first conversation with Sarah while we were at the library. I chuckled internally, realizing that just like at the library, I was rock hard below the table listening to Sammy talk about her sex life. “I’ve… had practice listening to people talk about sex stuff,” I told Sammy honestly. “Me and Sarah used to… before we started, we kinda talked openly about that stuff.”

Sammy narrowed her eyes, looking at me, not bothering to take another bite. “She came onto you, offered to do some no-strings-attached stuff, you said no but maybe later,” she guessed.

I moved my pointer fingers around each other in a circle. “Other way around,” I corrected her.

“Dammit,” she laughed, pretending to hit the table. “Well, whatever. Either way, I like that. So many of the guys at my school get, like, angry or jealous if I go on dates with them and tell them about my previous… boys.” She shrugged and took another bite.

“I feel like that’s, I mean, reasonable,” I argued. “Like, I find you incredibly attractive. You’re telling me about doing stuff with other guys. I mean… jeez, I’m feeling jealous for sure.”

Sammy nodded mid-bite. “Yeah, but you’re jealous in a nice way,” she told me. “Other guys are all like, ‘I forbid you from talking about other guys,’ or even like, ‘do you still have him on insta? Block him. Block him or we’re done.’ Shit like that.” She looked at her burger, shrugged, and wrapped it up neatly, then put it in the paper bag it came in. She took out some gum from her pocket and popped a piece in her mouth, then offered some to me. I shrugged and took a piece, beginning to chew.

“I’ve kinda given up on dating guys at my school,” she went on. “But, like, I want to date.”

“Ah, so you accepting this date wasn’t entirely charity,” I replied jokingly.

Sammy grinned. “Yeah, this wasn’t your make-a-wish date, don’t worry,” she counter-joked. “And I mean, I can see why Rose likes you. As a friend, I mean.” She chewed and thought to herself. “Maybe I want to hang out with her too.”

“If you do, remember that she’s maybe in the closet and didn’t agree to me blabbing on her behalf,” I reminded Sammy seriously. “Like, she has the shortest temper on the planet. You really need to be careful around her.”

Sammy nodded as I talked. “Okay,” she eventually conceded. “If I ever see her again, I’ll keep all that in mind,” she added, getting up. “Let’s go back to the car.”

I nodded, sighing internally as I noted the time. Quick date. She wanted it to end quickly. That was never a good sign, but whatever. I mean, I never thought I would get to go on a date with her, period, so this was still nice. 

“Should I be worried about you wanting to hang out with Rose?” I joked.

“Huh?” Sammy asked, stopping and turning her head.

“Oh, nothing, I was just… bad joke about, uh… like, if you got a crush on her or something.”

Sammy laughed and turned back around. “Not every girl in Quiz Bowl is gay, Jason,” she laughed. “I’m straight.”

“Oh,” I replied, not even knowing what else to say. “I guess with the company I keep, I forgot that was even an option.”

“You’re funny,” she laughed. “What about you? Do I need to worry you’ll steal Hank from me?”

“Yeah, point taken,” I laughed. “I’m straight as an arrow too.” The two of us reached her car and got in, closing the doors behind us. “But uh, we don’t exactly need to worry about stealing anything. I mean, I totally get that this date wouldn’t have happened if Rose didn’t ask you, and, y’know, we live far away from each other, so I totally get if…” I expected Sammy to cut in, but she just looked at me, without judging, from the driver’s seat. “…If you’d prefer to just… leave it there. Like the second guy you were with. Y’know. ‘This was fun, let’s leave it at that.’”

“I ‘left it at that’ with Scott because of the possessiveness thing,” she laughed. “Why, what do you want?”

“Me?” I asked.

Sammy laughed with a pitying expression. Yeah, okay, it was the dumbest question in the world. Jeez. “Don’t look at me like that, I’m nervous,” I chuckled defensively. 

“Still, huh?” Sammy laughed. “I’m used to my guys being a bit more confident.”

“I’m confident in… some ways,” I replied. “Besides, you like guys that are honest, and I’m honestly being myself and not trying to be someone I’m not just to impress you, so… right?”

The last thing I said visibly got through to her. Sammy cocked her head, narrowed her eyes, and donned an entirely new smile. I was used to smiles from her – and fuck, were they ever cute – but this one was new. She didn’t say anything for a bit. “I liked that,” she eventually said in a quieter voice. “Okay then, I’ll work with it.”

“Uh…” I stammered. “Thanks, I think.”

“Can I kiss you?”

“Wh-” I felt my heart skip a beat. “M-me?”

Sammy’s smile was undeterred. “Knock it off with the nervous questions,” she told me tenderly yet seriously. “Tell me what you want.”

“Uh… y-yeah, you can k-kiss me,” I replied.

Sammy grinned triumphantly, then softly giggled, and moved in, closing the gap between us. Her sweet lips made contact with mine and it was like fireworks went off in the fucking car. From the moment her lips made contact with mine, everything clicked. It all felt so fuckin’ right. I got to kiss this hot-ass girl that I thought I’d never even see again, and I was being fucking nervous?!

Slowly, she retracted her lips, and I opened my eyes in time to see hers flutter open. I stared at her for a bit, and felt a smile break across my face. “Nah, fuck it,” I eventually said, and grabbed her shoulders, pulling her in for a second kiss. Sammy eagerly accepted it, and soon we were kissing each other over and over, shedding our shyness bit by bit. 

Sammy was the first to lightly moan into the kiss, though when I heard her, I immediately followed after. It felt a bit weird – wasn’t it gay for guys to moan while kissing? But Sammy pulled back the kiss and bit her lip. “I like the sounds you make,” she purred, and went right back to kissing me.

As our shyness was shedded, our inhibitions soon followed. It was crazy – I already knew I had a weird introduction to this shit, but I never expected to be in the car with one of the hottest girls I’d ever seen, who went to a different school, and we were kissing and moaning into each other’s mouths. It felt embarrassing, it felt primal… but it felt fuckin’ good.

Sammy started to get really into it, moving across her seat and on top of me. She was juuust small enough that it worked, and with the way we were getting into it, it would have been hard to stop anyway. From her stories, it was obvious Sammy was a girl who both knew what she was doing and wasn’t shy going from zero to a hundred, and I was determined to follow suit. As soon as Sammy got on top of me, my hands floated downwards to her ass. I grabbed a cheek in each hand and started to grind into her, with my now-painful hard-on definitely evident to her. Sammy ground back against me, and our bodies desperately moved against each other as we resumed open-mouth kissing in her Honda Civic. 

Sammy’s confidence was contagious. Soon enough, our tongues were exploring each other’s mouths, and our hands were desperately roaming up and down each other’s bodies, needily grabbing at each other’s hair, necks, and backs. We could feel it, it was obvious, we just clicked. 

Eventually, Sammy came up for air, but still ground up against my cock even as she gasped and practically moaned, “Haa, haa, haa~” while looking down at me. Mid-grind, she moved her tongue around her mouth. “I think my gum moved to your mouth,” she chuckled breathlessly.

“I was wondering if it felt bigger,” I replied, then smirked. “It tastes better when it’s from you.”

Sammy grinned. “Freak,” she playfully accused, then moved her head down and resumed kissing me. For the next few minutes, it was like we were in our own little paradise in her dad’s shitty car. She ground against me, our tongues wrestled, and my thoughts prickled with need for her. Yup, I fucking wanted this girl. Sammy was hot as fuck, and I loved kissing her.

Once again, she came up for air, once again doing her little moan-pant. “Holy shit,” she moaned, then looked off into the distance. “We can’t go back to yours, can we?”

“Not a chance,” I admitted, and used the time away from her wonderful mouth to search my feelings. “And… in the name of honesty… holy shit do I love kissing you, but I don’t know if I’d want my first time to be… on the first date. Sorry if that’s-”

“No, oh my god Jason, that’s totally reasonab- in fact, I think that’s probably smart, and if anything, I respect you more for that,” she replied quickly. “But…” She panted a few times, smiling hungrily at me. “Tell me right now that this isn’t just a one-and-done situation. Like, if I’m willing to drive over again-”

“Fuck yes. Fuck, fuck, fuck yes,” I replied emphatically. 

“Good, because, uh… I think I really want to go on a second date with you,” Sammy giggled, moving in to kiss my neck. Her lips felt amazing against mine, but they felt like magic on my neck, and my vision began to blur and my cock began to throb as Sammy kissed my neck in a way that wasn’t just going to leave hickies… they were going to leave obvious hickies. 

“Ohhh fuck…” I moaned, knowing I would never have had the confidence to moan like this with another girl. But moaning for Sammy felt good. Fucking good.

Rose was going to be pleased. If it was a contest between texting Sarah again or going on a second date with Sammy, I knew exactly what I was going to fucking choose. Sammy released her lips from my neck, leaving a stinging sensation and the pride of knowing she marked me. “My turn?” I teased, and Sammy laughed, biting her lip. I latched on to Sammy’s neck, knowing we weren’t going to get out of this position for a while, and knowing that whatever the fuck was going on, this was the start of something fucking amazing.

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