Matthew "Matt" Bernard's Story

Matthew Pov

"Come on Max, you never just take a day off." I drawled, tugging my sister by her arm and grabbing a pair of skateboards from the garage. Max was always working. Always trying to be better at gymnastics. Not that I was mad at her for trying her best. She just needed to take it easy some time.

"Let's just pass by school and see if anything is going on," she said, sounding a bit unnerved, "What if we miss something important? Or mom and and dad find out? Or a teacher sees? Or-"

I shoved a skateboard in her arms, leaving her with a surprised look on her face.

"Just. Take. The skateboard." she made a face at me before grabbing it from my hands.

"Fine," she snapped, "But when we get grounded for a week you're going to regret this."

I grinned at her. We'd taken an early morning dip in the ocean water. I heard that the salty sea was actually pretty good for your skin. Of course, neither one of us really cared for that. The water was cold and refreshing, and I'm pretty sure me and Max were meant to be dolphins in real life. But she didn't like it as much as I did. I was a swimmer. She, a gymnast.

"Where are we going?" She was simply following me on her own skateboard, and I figured since she didn't really have a place in mind, I could decide on my own.

"The park," I said confidently, only looking back to make sure she was keeping up. She gave me a curt nod, and so I turned back to the road in front of me.

Maxine

My brother is a cutter. He's never liked school, and it doesn't seem like that's about to change.

And today, of all days, he'd gotten me to cut with him. We were both dressed similarly, and kind of looked out of place among all the people in normal clothes.

Okay, really looked out of place. I had a bikini on, with a sweater for my temperature protection, while Matt had gone bare back with a simple pair of Hawaiin looking swim trunks, his still developing abs looking sleek with the remaining drops of salt water from the beach.

"Wait, wait," he said, stopping by a girl with a guitar, and shoving his hand in his pocket. A few seconds later, he'd pulled out a couple dollar bills of various degrees of worth.

"What are you doing?"

"Wait for her to start playing," he said motioning in the direction of the girl by the fountain. "She's really good, trust me. This will be totally worth it."



I frowned, sitting a paper cup of hot chocolate milk in front of Mishka.

"I wanted coffee," she whined, pushing the cup back to me.

"Coffee isn't good for pregnant people," I said, shaking my head and trying to ignore the bambi eyes she threw in my direction.

"Fine," she grumbled, taking a delicate sip of the hot drink.

"What's that," I pulled out a large heavy piece of paper out from under her hand. It was a light sketch, looking some of a male lion and a two cubs.

"Cute,"

"Uh-huh. I'm going to paint later." she said, slipping it back towards herself.

"Traditionally or digitally?"

"This ones going to be traditional." I nodded.

"You know," I began suggesting, jerking my chin in the direction of the girl sitting by her lonesome, "I think I've seen her doing some sketches before."

Mishka nodded, barely looking up from her paper, "Me too,"

So she already knew who I was talking about, "But I've never talked to her," she continued, gently erasing a stray mark.

I nodded, rolling the soccer ball underneath the table with my feet.

"You should, one day."

"Uh-huh, I know." I sighed. Mishka had gone into the zone.

I opened my eyes and looked around. More people had accumulated into the show. I noticed a couple was looking at me. I had seen them before, but it wasn't anything that worried me. The girl was beautiful and I had meant to draw her but because of my forever waiting on him I didn't want to start a new drawing of someone from real life. She was pregnant and had a wonderful glowing look to her. Even the guy was pretty good looking.

I looked at my watch. '7:15 a.m. Would he ever show up? I sighed, taking a sip of my coffee. By now it had gotten a bit weird tasting and all the ingredients were just sitting at the bottom. I shook it around a bit. That's when she walked in.

She was about a year younger than me. She had blonde hair and blue eyes. American girl, no doubt. She was beautiful. I was straight, but that girl, she made me feel weird. I just needed to know her name. My way of explaining the weird feelings was that I just had to draw her. She had one of those faces that if you drew her and messed up one thing it would throw off everything.

I noticed her looking at me. I put my head down. 'I should probably get out of here. I guess he isn't coming.' I put my sketch book in my bag and got up from my seat. I guess the park was the next best place to go.

I made sure my headphones were still in and put my head down. I knew how to get to the park without even looking. I walked down the street and entered the park. I couldn't hear any of the street performers but I knew they were there. I probably should have looked up because the next thing I knew I was bumping into a guy... A gorgeous guy.

Max and Matt; Matthew POV

“Alright,” Max gave in, giving me an exasperated look, “We’ll wait, but I swear Matthew, the instant a teacher comes by here, we are ditching this place.”

I nodded complacently, smug with my victory over her. I could understand why she was so anxious. Max wasn’t a cutter, but I was. I was used to seeing teachers walk by me, rolling their eyes in my direction, or throwing a “where were you today Mr. Bernard” question in my face. Max wasn’t. What was worse was that the park was only a few blocks distance from our school. A lot of people adored walking through here in the early rays of the morning sunlight, before school started, and teachers were no exception.

“Hey,” I began, about to suggest a probably escape route, should any of our astute instructors pass by.

“Hm?” Just as the bland answer slipped from her mouth, something soft bumped into my back. I blinked for a moment, slow and deliberate, trying to process weather or not to turn around. For all I knew, it was just an accident. But, as human nature dictates, my head eventually turned to meet the eyes…no the top of the head of the person that’d bumped into me.

Looking down, I was greeted by a pair of shy looking eyes. Well, almost greeted. The person who’d bumped into me was a girl, with a cute kind of roundish face and a pair of headphones glued into her ears.

The set of headphones that she’d stuck in ears looked familiar, like one of the many pairs I owned (neatly hanged up in a special casing in my room at our Malibu house) and so I couldn’t help myself when I said, “I have pair of headphones exactly like those. Oh, and nice sweater.”

It was the first time I’d noticed her clothes. Her pants seemed to be sprayed with paint, which gave her an overall artistic look that struck me as familiar. Where had I seen this face before?

Ah. School. Of course.

I had a few classes with the girl, whose name I failed to remember, but had barely gotten to know her due to my constant cutting streak. From what I knew, the few times I’d seen her, she always had a sketch book with her, and was pretty artsy. I’d glimpsed some of her drawing and thought they were amazing, but had never thought to actually talk to her.

I guess it comes with the ranking. This girl was quite keep to herself type of girl, where as I was the outgoing hang with the bad-boys type of guy. Of course, due to social cliques that developed in school, I’d never talked to her much. In fact, I don’t remember having ever talked to her.

“I’m Matthew,” I said casually, trying to look friendly, “We go to the same school together. Same grade. Same classes too. At least some of em’. I’m not sure I caught your name though. If you haven’t notice,” I gave her a sheepish grin, “I don’t show up often.”

Behind me, I could almost feel Max’s eyes putting holes through my back. There was no doubt in mind that she had laser vision. Jeez.

Alex and Mishka; Mishka POV

“Al,” I said, causing my sweet husband to pry his eyes from the paper.

“Hm.”

“Sweetie you’re going to be late for practice,” I was eyeing the gold antique looking clock that this particular Starbucks had hung upon the bars of it entering doorway.

“Shoot,” he said, whistling at the end as he doubled checked with his own wrist watch. I was going to with Alex for his soccer practice today. He’d jokingly suggested that the coach took it a lot easier on the whole team when I was around, and I’d figured that he’d literally meant it.

“Want anything sweet before we leave?” He asked, slipping me the keys so I could go start up the car.

“Uh-huh. Get me some cookies,” I said, shuffling my heavy set of art papers together, and heading out to the car.

Alex POV

I nodded before Mish disappeared from my line of sight. My coach would typically have my head for being late. But Mishka totally softened him up. I guess it had to do with the fact that none of his grandkids were old enough to have kids yet, and since he treated the whole team like we were his sons, he had a soft spot for our families too. Besides, he’d been on a low note for the past couple of days, and I thought having Mishka around to talk with him would help him unwind a bit. The team and I were pretty sure his youngest daughter had dropped the bomb that she wanted to get married, but none of us mentioned it to his face. He’d tell us when he was ready.

I bit my bottom lip. By the time I’d gotten on line, I’d ended up with a blonde cashier. The blonde male cashier. I, like many of the men who walked in here, had at first thought he was a woman. Boy, was I wrong. Fortunately, I hadn’t made the mistake of going up and flirting with him, since I’d already been madly in love and married to my wife. It was a bit disconcerting to see just how feminine he was, but personally I had nothing against homosexuality, or bisexuality, or any other sexuality. The reason I’d found it so uncomfortable was because I’d literally thought he was a women, and hadn’t been sure if, to him, that was a compliment or an insult.

Usually, I tried to avoid getting him as my cashier due to the awkwardice of the situation, but this time, seeing as it was inevitable, I put on my most pleasant face.

“Good morning,” I said, eyes idly passing over the cookies as I tried to decide what to get for Mish. It never failed to surprise people at how deep my voice was, or how tall I was for a person of Hispanic descent, and I caught the women at the next register give me a passing glance, before reaching a delicate hand out to me.

I looked up at her, raising my eyebrows in the “what’s your question way.”

“You model. For Armani Exchange. You play soccer. Alexander Romero, was it?” she stated matter-of-factually. I nodded, flashing a brief dazzling model smile (like they’d taught us), and she looked thrilled about the fact that she’d met an Armani Exchange male model.

Turning back to the blonde cashier, I shook my head giving a sheepish smile before saying, “Sorry about that. Um, can I have three of those huge chocolate chip cookies.” They were about the size of my hand, and no doubt enough to curb Mishy’s sugar urge, “and a bottle of water.”

I placed the money on the counter and took my coffee from the barista, flashing her a quick smile, before twisting my head to look back at the brunette in the corner. She was pretty, although not in the conventional way. All pale skin and dark hair. From where I was standing I figured she was short too. I'd seen her a lot before, and something was telling me I'd seen her around school too. But I'd never thought 'hey, this girl is hot' (probably cause she totally wasn't) but she was cute. And she'd been staring at me. Well, at least she had been, until I'd met her gaze and she'd looked away. I felt my heart swell a little, a smirk forming on my lips as I realised my ego had just inflated about tenfold. Perhaps today wouldn't be so bad. Sure, the chances of her looking at me in that way were like...minuscule, but it couldn't hurt to be a little optimistic. It felt nice to think girls looked at me in the same way so many boys did.

But when I turned around again, coffee in hand and lips pursed, she was gone. I figured as much. I took a tentative sip of the steaming beverage, eyes watering slightly as the hot liquid ran down my throat. Whatever. She wasn't even that attractive anyway. What the hell was I doing getting so worked up about it? I should be more bothered about the guy giving me the eye from across the other-side of the room. But, whatever. The coffee tasted good. I downed another two mouthfuls as I quickly exited through the door, making my way eastwards towards the park. The sun was rolling even higher, and it was surprisingly bright despite the early hour. Holding my coffee with one hand, I reached into my bag with the other, searching blindly through the assortment of school books and broken pencils until my fingers curled around the familiar shape of my sunglasses. I slipped them onto the bridge of my nose as I walked, my eyes immediately grateful for the reservation from the glare.

It was a fairly quick walk to the park from Starbucks. The familiar smell of grass and sycamore was soon attacking my senses, the vast patch of green bustling with joggers and students who happened to have the same idea as myself, stretching out in spots of yellows and white where the occasional cluster of flowers had decided to bloom. My phone buzzed. I reached for it with my free hand. It was Kira.

Calling in sick today. Sorry babe x

I rolled my eyes. Typical. Didn't we have a World History presentation to do today? Trust my 'best friend' to bail. Stuffing my phone back into my pocket, I took a right in the direction of the fountain, contemplating the remainder of my day. And to think it'd barely started. My History teacher and I didn't get on with each other at the best of times, and now I'd have to deal with his rage solo. Deciding to worry about that later, I instead relished in the overwhelming warmth of the sun on my legs. It was a violent contrast to the shadow of the trees, which I realised I needed to avoid walking into at all costs, unless I wanted to break out in a case of some serious goose-pimples.

But, either way, nothing beat the park at this hour. It wasn't hectic like on the weekend, or too 'couply' like in the evenings (where you couldn't walk five minutes without seeing two teenagers sucking face). It was just right, and she appreciated it's calming tranquility. It was like a protective balm, giving you a little moment of solace to distract you from the fact that your day was most likely gonna get a lot worse.

Rounding a small patch of trees, the sound of the fountain hit me like a wave of cold water. But, in a good sense. Street performers were a common occurrence around here, but there were only one or two this early in the morning. There was one really pretty girl. I saw her almost every time I came down here. Sometimes I would toss her a couple of coins, but mostly I'd just sit a few feet away on the edge of the fountain and drink my coffee. It was my thinking time. And I would be a big messy mush without it.

Except, when I finally sat down in my spot, I caught sight of Starbucks girl a little while away with some blonde senior guy I recognised from school. And he was totally hot. And so was his sister...I mean what. I blinked, cursing quietly under my breath. Although I didn't see hot senior blonde boy around as often as I used to. He was probably one of those people that thought cutting school was cool. Douche bag much? So, Starbucks girl was definitely not available. I inwardly cringed for thinking such a thing was possible and looked down at my drink, holding the paper cup tightly between my two palms.

Boy did I need a pick-me up. Oh well. School started soon. I just needed to finish my coffee and then I could leave. And maybe that World History presentation wouldn't be so bad.

Today too, there were many familiar faces at the park. Most of them were around my age, like the blond guy with skateboard, he would usually give me a few bucks. And the girl who always holds a sketchbook; I would see her sometimes drawing in the park too. I saw a couple of her drawings once when she dropped them and I helped her pick them up, it was around the time when I first came here. And I have to say she have got an amazing talent. And there was that girl too, who always sat a bit further from me with a cup of coffee in her hands and always in thoughts…Sometimes when I couldn’t sleep I would wander how would it be like if I went to school with them. Would we be friends? I don’t think so. I was called a weirdo in my old school, so if I went here it would probably be the same.
I tuned the guitar and started playing the acoustic version of Guns N' Roses’ song Sweet Child O’ Mine. It was one of my favorite songs to perform in the mornings.



I didn’t like to sing too much, since I was a guitar player and not a singer, but I guess I don’t have that bad voice since nobody threw tomatoes at me, yet.
I played a few more songs then packed up; It was time for me go to work. I gave guitar lessons to the kids from the orphanage. The money I’ve earned that way was barely enough for me to pay the rent. In one of these days I’m gonna have to look for one more job.




When I arrived back to my apartment I took a quick shower. I got dressed into black skinny jeans, a white tee, put on my boots and grabbed a leather jacket along with the bag with my cameras. I was searching for my keys when my phone started ringing.
”Yo. ” I heard my friend voice.
”I’m on my way. ” I said while locking the door with one hand.
”You don’t have to hurry. The prof said that he’ll be late. ” I sat in my car and started the engine.
”Then I’m gonna stop by Starbucks for a coffee. Do you need anything? ” I could hear him talk to others.
” One Double Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino, two Peppermint Mocha Frappuccinos and one black coffee. ” I sighed.
” I've got it. See you in a few minutes.”
I drove to the Starbuck and parked across the street. There wasn’t a big line in front of a long haired blond guy so I went to him to place my order.
” One Double Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino, two Peppermint Mocha Frappuccinos and two black coffees. ”
As I waited for my order I wondered if the guy was working as a model too. He was very tall and had the model kind of a face.
He gave me the coffees and after paying him I got back to my car and drove to college.

“I have pair of headphones exactly like those. Oh, and nice sweater.” I just stood there. This guy was actually talking to me. “I’m Matthew. We go to the same school together. Same grade. Same classes too. At least some of em’. I’m not sure I caught your name though. If you haven’t notice I don’t show up often.”

I rolled his name off my mental tongue. I knew him. He was a cutter, big time. We had about four classes together when I was still going to school. Was I that invisible that nobody noticed that I had left to do home school? I tried smiling at him, wanting to seem friendly, even though my only real thought was to run away from that place as fast as possible.

"Sam," I mumbled. I looked at him. His green eyes were beautiful... and he was shirtless. It kind of caught me off guard but I remained calm. "I could draw you, if you want." My eyes flew open. What had I just done? Why was that always the first thing that came out of my mouth when I talked to someone. Of course, I did like drawing people. They sat there, you made them be quite, told them it would mess up the drawing and then you finish and then I would disappear back into my turtle shell, as my grandma used to say.

"Sam," I said again. "I'm Sam."

Matthew POV

I stared down at the girl for a while, scrutinizing her reaction. Well, scrutinizing whatever reaction there was to scrutinize. At first, she was real still, not much movement, just kind of….shocked, I guess.

Her eyes traveled up to mine, and for a while we had a bit of staring contest, eye-to-eye. My bright green eyes (so similar to my sister’s) were one of those outstanding features that just stood out on my face. I’d gotten a good deal of compliments about them, if I do say so myself, and I carried them proudly. She seemed to spare a passing glance for my chest, though if she thought anything about it, I wouldn’t have known. In fact, besides the silence, she didn’t really seem unnerved, nor really confident, and I had to assume she was only glorifying her eyes in the presence that was me. She gave me a shy smile, and the corner of my lips upturned.

Then came the words. Her voice was shy and quiet, and I found myself straining to hear her name. I figured I should have anticipated this much. From whatever I remembered of the girl, she’d always been quiet. Not much of a talker, and not one to speak up for herself.

I was still in the process of comprehending her name when she said, "I could draw you, if you want."

It was a prompt, almost premeditated thought, that made her intentions seem illusive and almost out of place.

Nah, I’m just joking. Actually, the offer seemed pretty innocent to me. I’d already had prior knowledge on her artistic ability, and in contrast to her bulged out, almost regretful looking eyes (which implied that she may have been having a few misgivings about asking me), I thought it was a totally cool idea.

Taken aback by her own words, she offered up her name again, as if trying to erase her previous comments from my memory.

“Sam. I’m Sam.”

“Oh,” I replied coolly, “Okay. Cool. So, Sam, maybe we could hang out some time and you could do that drawing of me? Usually, I’m down by the beach, but it gets kind of cold there, so if you have another place in mind…?”

I threw her a dazzling smile; one that I could only hope would be persuasive enough to get me a much desired drawing. Maybe, something of me in the water, or around the dolphins that claimed their home by the beach where I lived.

“And, we could hang out together. Like really hang out, not just for the drawing,” I attached to my offer tactically, waiting for her response.

Max POV

Oh god. Oh god, oh god, oh god.

There he was, in all his glorifying six feet of awkwardly sewn together limbs, and old, saggy, stained skin. The glazed look in his eyes was one of those ‘fear factor’ elements that gave this morbid man his tedious and strict reputation, and students were quick to duck out of his way before he grumbled morose lectures at them about “pants being too low” or “too short”.

He was my Pre-Cal Teacher. And he was heading this way.

I spared a glance at Matthew before realizing: He didn’t effing care!

“I’m going to hide!” I hissed in his ear, to which he briefly nodded concentrating on his conversation with the home schooled artsy girl. Not that he’d even remembered that she’d dropped out to be home schooled. That’s right lady killer. You just stand there and wait for a teacher to catch your sorry ass. Not that Matthew would care, but whatever.

Forgetting about my carefree, happy-go-lucky, unicorn brother, I did one of those “think fast” moments, where I practically ripped my sweater off my body, leaving me bare in my printed Victoria Secret bikini, and draped it over the top of my head like an overgrown hood.

I saw one cute guy throw me “the look”, but I didn’t have time to respond to his antics, and so I simply blew him over, acting as though I hadn’t seen him. There would be time to reprimand my brash, pass-up-the-hottie decision later. Right now, my only thoughts were to hide from old, mean, and saggy over there.

Scoping out the area, my eyes landed on the most unorthodox escape route/hiding place ever.

I would make a bee-line for the fountain.

Without a second thought, I put those gymnastic legs of mine to work, shooting out to the fountain, just in time for Mr. Doom-and-Gloom to past me straight.

The thing was, I would have totally celebrated my success at evading my teacher. Only problem was that I was heading straight on for the fountain at an almost uncontrollable speed.

Giving myself a good leap, I ended up splashing in the fountain (still standing upright, might I add; gymnastics is a useful thing), and spraying water all over the shirt of some blonde (ha ha, not that I wasn’t some blonde myself) girl with a cup of Starbucks coffee clutched tightly in her hands.

“Jeez,” I said, blinking slowly, and grazing my eyes over her soaking wet shirt, and now rip-able looking cup of coffee.

Think fast Max. What would someone, and by someone I mean myself, do in this situation. Oh, I know.

Peeling my sweater, which had remarkably remained unscathed by the water (once again, thank you gymnastics), off of the top of my head, I offered it up to her, trying to throw in the innocent looking Bambi type eyes that didn’t match with my scantily clad body, but usually worked with the guys. Maybe she’d have pity on me and for my sake, accept the Bambi eyes and forgive the sloppy mess that I’d caused her.

“Sorry, sorry,” I drawled on, thinking up a million excuses, “Take my sweater. You can keep it. It’s brand new, I think a Hollister? Mom bought it just yesterday? It smells pretty perfume-y. Yeah, I think it’s a Hollister,” I fumbled around with the sweater as I blabbered on, checking the label to confirm the brand. I was pretty sure my mother had only picked it up yesterday, so it hadn’t gotten much wear and tear. In fact, upon closer inspection, there was a hidden tag stuck somewhere in the sleeve, and I quickly tore it off, crumpling it, and doing a basketball shot to the nearest garbage can. Score one for Max. Score zero for park patrol.

“Anyway, you can have it. I don’t really need it.” Who was I kidding? I was going to be walking around almost buck naked through the park. I was probably going to end up in Juvi for illegal exposure of too much skin in a public non-beach place. Oh well. I looked at the girl, waiting for her answer, and firmly holding out the sweater to her.

Alexander

"That'll be four dollars and thirty cents. If you're willing to wait a minute or two, there will be a freshly baked batch of cookies fresh out of the oven quite soon. Of course, if you're in the rush, there are still some cookies from the last batch."

Surprise, surprise. I raised my eyebrows, glancing over what would have been the obvious, old, and probably now stiff, remainders of the previous batch, festering underneath the counter glass. If it had been Melissa (the female cashier working next my present cashier) she would have batted her eyelashes at me and tried to flirt it up a bit, but not give a damn about whether I wanted them fresh or straight from the display shelf.

I pursed my lips for a moment, wondering what Mish would’ve liked.

Fresh, definitely.

I dug out my wallet, grabbing a five dollar bill, and handing it over, “Don’t bother with change,” I muttered, stuffing the wallet back into my pocket.

Flashing a smile at the guy, and moving aside so he could tend to the next customer, I said, “I think I’ll have to take you up on those freshly baked cookies. Besides, I think I have time to wait…Oh, by the way, what’s your name?”

I knew very well Melissa’s name. She’d totally flaunted it out for me the first time we’d met till she learned that I had a wife. But, if you’ll notice, I’ve been referring to this guy as the cashier for the most part. And maybe, I felt a teensy bit bad, that, weather the guy noticed it or not, I’d avoided him on my many Starbucks mornings.

“Oh,” he replied “Okay. Cool. So, Sam, maybe we could hang out some time and you could do that drawing of me? Usually, I’m down by the beach, but it gets kind of cold there, so if you have another place in mind…?”

I stood there just kind of awed by the whole amazingness of this entire conversation. To be honest, I had noticed him at school and drawn a picture of him, once. It took me a while because I did it while we were in Chemistry and of course, he hardly showed up.

'He smiled at me!' I yelled in my head staring at his dazzling smile. “And, we could hang out together. Like really hang out, not just for the drawing.” I froze. 'Was he asking me on a date? No. Of course not. I mean, look at him. He's gorgeous, flawless and I'm... me,' I argued with myself.

"Beach," I said, a bit louder than my normal mouse voice. I had kind of noticed him straining to hear me. "Beach good." What was wrong with me? I sounded like a illiterate. "I mean," I said, clearing my throat softly, "The beach is fine. Here, let me give you my number so you can let me know when. My schedule is pretty flexible."

I pulled out one of my ever present pens that I used for signing my work. "554-0005." I smiled at him again. Gosh his eyes were gorgeous. "You have really nice eyes," I mumbled, looking at the ground, embarrassed. How would he react?

(I can’t include Max in this post since I have to wait for shrubvera to post. I don’t know where she (I’m assuming she’s a she) is though :/ )

Matthew

“Beach!” she replied quickly, a bit louder than the last time, taking me by surprise that for the first time since we’d met, I’d heard her talk loud and clear.

“Beach good. I mean,” she cleared her throat, a soft, barely audible noise, “the beach is fine. Here, let me give you my number so you can let me know when. My schedule is pretty flexible.”

I waited patiently as she grabbed a pen from her pack, scribbling her number on a piece of paper for me.

557-0005. It was an easy number to remember, and I doubted the idea that I would actually need the paper. But it was better to be safe than sorry.

”You have really nice eyes,” she said, out of the blue, pointedly looking away from me and at the ground. Cute.

Giving her a lopsided smile (which she wouldn’t see until she turned her head up) I said, “Thanks. I get that a lot.”

I know, I know. I didn’t go off giving her a special comment about herself. But, as far as I could tell, Sam was a pretty plain person, and I didn’t know her well enough to compliment her on something outstanding about herself. I mean, she had a cute face and everything, but I just didn’t feel comfortable going off and telling her something about her was straight out beautiful. I dunno what it is, but most guys are like that. It’s real easy for girls to get all romantic, and mushy, and complimentary, but us guys are more of pervs than anything else. We don’t comment on real beauty unless we really love someone. Usually, when it comes to flirting, we’re just big time goofballs that love to make funny, quirky, and disgusting comments that some girls seem to revel in.

Sam didn’t seem like one of ‘those’ girls, what with her being a lot more modest and reserved, and so I didn’t feel the urge to tell her anything “teenagerish”. It was a bit different with this girl. She wasn’t an all out flirt, and wasn’t seeking some kind of sexual attention, and so I myself had to change to suit her. Simple as that.

“Well, Sam,” I said carefully, judging my words and hoping that my unenthusiastic response to her comment didn’t hurt her too much, “I’ll be seeing you soon then. To be honest, just a heads up, Saturday would be an amazing day for us to hang out. We’d have all 24 hours to ourselves, and practically my entire house, since my parents are going off on a business trip. Only thing is you might have to interact with my sister. But don’t worry, she doesn’t bite. Mostly,” I said, chuckling and hoping Sam would get my sense of humor.

Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. We come from completely different worlds.

Alexander

I’d never heard the guy—or rather, Gabriel—speak much before, and it was a shocking surprise that he did speak with a certain amount eloquence, tinted with an unmistaken accent.

Something seemed to embarrass him (or maybe that’s just me reading the situation wrong), and he quickly excused himself to check up on my cookies.

“Three, yep,” I said, nodding my head as I waited for him to pack them up in a small flat Starbucks paper bag.

Contemplating for a moment, I decided to answer whatever questions I could remember him asking.

“My name is Alexander Romero,” I confirmed, chuckling as my tongue rolled off the name in a slight Spanish accent. My mother had always said it sounded better that way. To be honest, American english or Hispanic, the way it was pronounced didn’t really bother me.

“And it’s alright if you don’t know who I am. Actually, I’m relatively new to the modeling business I take part in presently, which would be Armani Express. I started up around fifteen, doing more child friendly, less explicit modeling for teen clothing, which eventually, as I got older and became…you know…bigger….and stronger, got me picked up for stuff like Armani. I get to do other shoots as well, but they’re not aimed for the general public. More for adult eyes. Actually I think my wife has a few of my magazines in the car.”

And all of a sudden there was a light, barely noticeable blush on my face (I’m kind of tan). I averted my eyes from Gabriel, attempting a go at nonchalance. I’d always suspected Gabriel of being homosexual, but in no way had ever gone out of my way to find out if he really was. His business, as far as I had been concerned, was his business and his business alone, and it was up to him whether he told people of his sexuality or not. Therefore, for the most part, I had ignored rumors of it, simply labeling them as possibilities but not conformations.

Now however, speaking of my nude-to-partially-nude shots with him was making me uncomfortable, not knowing how he’d react, or if I was offending him, and I snapped my mouth shut, basically reverting to just waiting for my cookies and avoiding his eyes. Jeez, way to go Alex.

“Well, Sam,” he said "I’ll be seeing you soon then. To be honest, just a heads up, Saturday would be an amazing day for us to hang out. We’d have all 24 hours to ourselves, and practically my entire house, since my parents are going off on a business trip. Only thing is you might have to interact with my sister. But don’t worry, she doesn’t bite. Mostly.” I nodded. Saturday was fine. I could just ask my boss, Carter, for the day off, not that she would care anyway. "Yeah. Sounds great." I walked away, smiling. We were from two completely different worlds, and here we are, interacting.