So not fair! Why are you jealous? You don’t get to be jealous, you have Archer who is soooo romantic. Barf. What did Darleen ever do to you anyways, Jade! First, you hated her because she was hogging Archer’s attention, now you hate her because of what? I don’t get it? Why is this an issue for you?

“Hey sweetie,” Mom says when I barge in.

“Ugh!” I run up the stairs and slam the door to my room.

I quickly strip out of my clothes and look for something to wear. Darleen didn’t say what kind of Date this is, so I go for a very business casual kind of look. Slim fitting black jeans, a blue button up with a flowery tank top underneath. I brush out my hair and leave it down, letting the natural curls fall where they want.

“Is everything okay?” mom opens the door.

“Yep.”

“Skylar?”

“It’s Jade! She’s being so ugh! She’s mad because I’m going on a date with Darleen, but she won’t tell me why she’s mad!”

“You're gay?” mom fakes surprise.

“Oli told me you already know.” I roll my eyes.

“Darn.” She pouts.

“I don’t get her sometimes. She has Archer now, why does she care if I go out with Darleen?”

“Who’s Darleen?”

“She helped up with Dukun yesterday, she’s paying for the medical bills.”

“What? That was nice of her but she didn’t have to.” Mom says.

“Well she's rich, she wanted to.”

“Rich?”

“Darleen Grayson mom.”

“What!? You are going on a date with a Grayson?”

The Grayson’s are very well known around here, they are like royalty.

“Yes, she goes to my school, we are on the track team together.”

“Well, why didn’t you say so before!? I can’t believe you are going on a date with a Grayson. When’s the wedding?”

“You and Oli are the same, how am I a part of this family?”

“I’m just kidding, sort of. If you like this girl you should go for it. Jade will come around eventually.”

“But I don’t like her!”

Mom frowns at me.

“I like someone else.” I turn away.

“Jade has a boyfriend now,”

“They aren’t together yet, they are just dating.” I pout.

“Skylar, when are you going to give it up? Jade doesn’t like you like that, she is straight and taken now. If you keep waiting for her, you’ll end up alone forever.”

“Gee thanks.” I roll my eyes.

“Just try and have a good time, don’t think about Jade. Give Darleen a chance.”

“So you think I should date Darleen?”

“It couldn’t hurt, you’re still young, make mistakes while you still can.”

“Okay.”

Then the doorbell rings.

“Oh that’s probably my future daughter in law, how do I look?”

“Mom!”

“Just kidding, sort of.” She says in giddy excitement before going to answer the door.

So embarrassing. I quickly slip my shoes on and run after her before she can embarrass me anymore.

Darleen is dressed similarly to me, so I guess I picked right.

“Don’t let her fool you, she’s not as shy as she pretends to be.” Mom winked at Darleen.

“Mom!”

Darleen giggles.

“Let’s go, goodbye mom!” I shout as she tries to take our picture.

“Have a good time, remember what I said, and be back by 11, it’s a school night you know.”

“Don’t worry Ms. Clifton, I’ll have her back by curfew,” Darleen assures her.

“You can keep her forever if you want, we don’t mind,” Oli says coming down the stairs.

Why!? How am I a part of this family?

“Come on!” I drag Darleen out the door.

“What? I like your family.” She laughs.

“Stop it, they are embarrassing.”

She kisses me on the cheek, I feel my face go red. Then she opens the car door for me and helps me in. Just as we pull out of the driveway, I catch Jade looking at us through the window, she quickly closes the curtain. What is her deal!?

Darleen takes me out to eat at a decent restaurant. The whole time I am a nervous babbling fool, but she doesn’t seem bothered by it. By the time we are done, I have talked about, global warming, ferrets, shoe durability, and biology. Kill me now.

Then we go to the movies.

During the movie, she grabs and holds my hand. I don’t want to seem rude by retracting it, but I don’t want to give her the wrong idea. So, for half the movie I debate on whether or not I should remove my hand, by the time I decide an awkward amount of time has passed and it would be too late now. So, I hold her hand.

When we get out it’s around 9:30ish. She takes me to her house.

“Mom, Dad, this is Skylar.” She introduces me to her parents who are sitting at the bar chatting.

“I remember you.” Her mom smiles at me.

I feel my face go red.

“So are you two…?” her dad trails off.

“We aren’t dating yet, but I hope to change that by the end of the night,” Darleen smirks at me.

“Hehe.” I force a burst of nervous laughter.

“I see. Well, we won’t bother you then.” Her dad winks at her.

“We’ll be in my room.” Darleen drags me away.

No! not this again, abort, abort! Crud!

“Darleen maybe I should go home, it’s getting late and---”

“No way, your mom said 11, I still got a couple of hours that I intend to use.”

I sit on her bed, she sits next to me.

“I got your clothes for you, I’ll give them to you when you leave.”

“Okay.”

“So.”

“So, hehe.”

“What do you want to do?”

I want to go home! Abort!

“I dorish lieyhb” Babble! No! I need English.

She giggles.

I run my hands down my face.

“Look, I’m not going to go full animal again. I was only doing that because I was desperate to get you away from Jade, but now that Jade is busy. I can take my time and do this properly.”

I look at her through my fingers.

“Honestly, I’ll behave, unless you want us to mess around a bit. Then I’m all yours.” She holds up her hands in surrender.

“Really?” I ask.

She nods.

I slowly remove my hands from my face.

“So now that we have that cleared, maybe now would be a good time for me to ask you out on another date?”

I shrug.

“Say yes.” She pushes me down on the bed a devious smile on her face.

I look away from her.

“Say yes.” She starts to tickle me.

I try to hold my laughter in, but she ups her tactic.

“Say yes.” She laughs as I squirm around.

I can’t help but burst into laughter as I try to escape her fingers.

“Say it.” She laughs.

“Okay!” I give in.

She stops.

“No takey backy.” She kisses me on the cheek.

“No fair, you cheated.” I pout.

“All is fair in love and war.”

She hovers over me, her eyes locked on my lips. I can’t help but let my eyes drift to her lips.

“Can I kiss you?” she asks.

I nod.

So she does.

Maybe mom’s right. Maybe I should give Darleen a chance. She’s nice, she’s funny, she’s pretty. All the qualities a girlfriend should have, but she’s just not Jade. No! Don’t think about Jade when you are kissing Darleen! Bad!

She deepens the kiss.

Her hands explore my body, inch by inch. Slowly, her thumbs dig into my thighs as she trails her hands up to the crotch. The effect it has causes a ticklish sensation to form in my guts. I lean into her touch, my hips coming off the bed to lean into her. Her lips break from mine before they go to my neck then to my collar bone, my sensitive spot.

I take a shaky breath and let her work her magic, then she moves back to my lips and kisses me again. After a couple of kisses, I push her off.

“Now I really should get home,” I say.

“Mmk, just so long as you know we have a lunch date tomorrow.”

“But---”

“They won’t care if we ditch for lunch, so long as we are back in time for class. I’ll meet you in the cafeteria and then we will go from there.”

“Okay.”

After that she takes me home, giving me back my clothes now dry cleaned. She walks me to my door.

“So, um I don’t want to jump to conclusions, but does this mean we are like official or something?” She chews on her upper lip, avoiding my gaze.

Maybe Darleen isn’t so bad. She looks cute when she’s nervous. What could it hurt to give this a chance? Heck, maybe I’ll finally get over Jade and move on like a normal person. I can’t help but smile at her.

“Depends,” I say.

“On?”

“On how good the date is tomorrow.” I tease.

“Then you better be prepared to be blown away.” She smirks.

I giggle.

She leans down and kisses me, I quickly pull back, knowing my mom is probably spying on us.

“See you tomorrow.” She smiles.

“Yeah, see you rorow, I mean Tomorrow!”

She giggles at me and with a final peck on my cheek she walks back to her car.

I quickly retreat inside.

As I suspected both Oli and Mom were spying on me.

“Rorow!” Oli mocks me.

“Mom!” I complain.

“Aw, I’m so proud of you, your first date! How adorable. You know I remember my first date,” she pulls me into a bear hug.

“Mom!” I pull away.

“Rorow!” Oli chases me upstairs.

“How am I a part of this family!?” I shout before slamming my door shut in Oli’s face.

I look out my window and see Jade looking at me, she doesn’t look mad, just annoyed. Sigh. I need to get over Jade, yet even as I think that, I find myself wondering what I will have to do next to get her attention.