Josie can be pretty overbearing sometimes. And that’s putting it nicely. As I’ve said before the girl loves attention. She loves being the center of the spotlight. So when you are not paying attention to her and she wants you to pay attention to her, the girl will do anything to make you notice her.

I knew I was going to have to set some ground rules before I went back to school or else our secret wouldn’t be a secret for much longer. Every day of my suspension she’d text me, call me, and come over when she could. When I was with Carson, she’d get all Godzilla on me.

But she swears she’s not jealous.

Yeah right.

And I’m the next president of the united states.

Even though I told her to lay off, nothing changed. So, if I didn’t want everyone to know that I’m playing tongue hockey with my best friend regularly I needed a way to get her to back off. So when she came over Monday after school, I laid it on her.

“No kissing, texting flirty stuff, or being touchy-feely with me at school.”

“Yeah, I get it.” she tried to lean in and kiss me.

“I don’t think you do,” I put my hand on her forehead and stopped her from leaning in.

She glared at me.

“Josie, this past week I’ve seen a side of you I’ve never seen before. Trying to adapt to this new side is… challenging, to say the least. I’m just saying, if you act like this at school it will be really obvious that something is up between us.”

“Something is up between us,” she grabbed my hands and pulled me closer to her.

“But I don’t want people to know that!” I say incredulously.

She frowns.

“Please Josie, just don’t do anything crazy.”

 “Since when do I do crazy things?” she gently pushed me down on the bed.

“You’re not listening,” I pout.

“I am.”

“If you try anything at school or make it obvious, I’ll stop this whole thing. I mean it.”

“Look at you, being bossy.” She pins my arms down.

“Shut up,” I feel my cheeks heat up.

“You’re so cute when you get flustered.” She leans down and kisses my neck.

“If you’re really listening to me, then why don’t you practice some restraint right now.” I challenge.

She pulls back to look me in the eyes.

“All you do is make out with me,” I point out.

“I thought that’s what you wanted, you said you wanted to mess around.”

“Yeah… I mean I do. I just… I’m just saying we could do other stuff.” I feel the heat in my cheeks spread to my neck.

“Other stuff? Whatever do you mean?”  she teases.

“Shut up, you know what I mean.”

“Do I? We can do other stuff if you want.” she smiles deviously at me.

“Ugh! You’re the worst!” I push her away.

She laughs and lays next to me.

“I’m just saying, practicing some restraint wouldn’t hurt—”

She cuts me off by pulling me into her arms and cuddling me.

She’s so warm.

She smells good.

I nuzzle my head into her chest and close my eyes, letting her hold me.

“Better?” she asks.

“Emm,” I wrap my arms around her.

She giggles.

Being in her arms feels so comfortable. I feel like a cat when you grab it by the back of the neck. Gone is all my frustration and anger, I’m paralyzed against her. Unable to form thoughts or words.

“I think I found your weakness,” she hums as she nuzzles her face into my hair.

“Just… don’t make it obvious at school okay,” I say against her.

“I’ll try my best.”

Normally that would tell me she’s planning something but I’m in such a comforting trance I can’t react to it. Why haven’t we been cuddling like this all these years? She makes me feel like a part of something. A piece of a whole.

Our legs are intertwined, her arms wrapped tightly around me. She’s curled ever so slightly, letting me fit into her like two matching puzzle pieces. She breathes me in and I breathe her in. Just having her hold me like this makes me sleepy.

Her sock-covered foot grazes against my sock-covered foot. I rub my foot against hers and soon I’m half asleep.

It’s not until the doorbell rings that I snap out of it.

I move to get up but Josie holds me in place.

“No,” she says.

“It’s probably Carson,” I try to get up.

“It’s my time, he can wait.”

“Josie.”

“No.”

My phone starts ringing. I reach for it by she takes it out of my hands and ignores the call.

“Hey!”

“We were having a moment.” She pouts.

“Moments over,” I sit up and snatch my phone away just as it starts ringing again.

I answer it.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey, I’m at your door,” Carson says.

“Yeah—” Josie wraps herself around me from behind and I elbow her.

“You okay?”

“Sorry, just Josie being annoying,” I complain.

“Oh, I didn’t know she was over. I can come back later.”

“Please do,” Josie says.

“No! It’s okay, I’ll be done in a sec.” I say.

“Okay,” he chuckles.

I hang up and pry myself from Josie’s arms.

She glares at me.

“Restraint, start practicing.” I pat her on the head.

She grabs me by the wrist and flips me back down on the bed. I glare up at her. She smirks at me.

“Maybe you should practice becoming a better actor.” She says.

Before I can argue she leans down and kisses me.

“Emm!” I protest.

She bites me on the lip, hard enough to make marks.

“Ow!” I push her away.

She stares down at me with an unreadable expression.

“What the fuck!?” I push her off and get off the bed.

She grabs her bag and leaves the room without another word.

Ugh!

Why!?

Why does she have to be like this?

Not jealous my ass.

I roll my eyes and slip my shoes on before going downstairs to meet Carson.

“Hey, she okay?” He indicated to Josie who just stormed past him.

“Leave her be, she’s just being a bitch!” I shout loud enough for her to hear me.

She flips me off as she gets in her car.

“I could have come back later,” he shuffles around awkwardly.

“It’s fine. She’ll get over herself.” I grab his hand and interlock our fingers.

“Okay,” he says.

As Josie leaves, she blasts music from her car and then peels out of the driveway.

What a big baby.

Ugh!

“So how was your day?” Carson ignores the incident.

“Okay, you?” we start walking down the sidewalk.

“Can’t complain. Can’t wait for you to come back to school tomorrow.”

“That makes two of us,” I lie.

He leans in to kiss me and I kiss him back but he pulls back abruptly.

“What?” I ask.

“What happened to your lip? Are you okay?”

“Oh,” I laugh nervously and cover my mouth. “I just tripped and bit my lip earlier. That’s embarrassing.”

“You should be more careful.”

“Once a clutz always a clutz.”

“Some things never change,” he playfully bumps shoulders with me.

I smile and bump him back. I suck my lip into my mouth so he won’t be able to get a closer look at it.

This arrangement might be a bad idea after all.