A Life Like Mine (18 page)

              “Yes. Now I know you’ve got a mission. You have other reasons. What are they?”

              “I don’t have any!” He stood up. “You
are
high maintenance.”

              “What?” I froze. “Who said that I was high maintenance?”

              “Nobody. I was just kidding.” Hank was uneasy.

              “Who said that? Did Adam tell you that?”

              “No…I…”

              “If he did, tell me. I knew he didn’t think of me as a potential girlfriend. He sent you to get me to like you didn’t he? Once I did I’d be out of his hair.” That gorgeous hair…“And you just are supposed to seduce me. As soon as I lean in to kiss you, he’ll catch us and never forgive me. That’s his way of getting out of having to date me without it being his fault!” I totally freaked out.

              “Whoa! It was just a comment. Sit down and start swinging now.” Hank’s voice bellowed over mine, and I did as he said. “I never meant to make you that mad. Adam did say that, but he only said that because he was mad at you at the time. You probably say the same kind of stuff about him all the time don’t you?”

              “No.”

              “Oh, come on. Not even once?” He nudged me as he sat back down on his swing.

              “Okay, maybe once. But, just once,” I admitted.

              “I knew it.” Hank chuckled.

              “Don’t rub it in.” I frowned.

              “Oh, I’m not. You’re just funny that’s all.”             

              “How so?” I asked.

              “Adam’s the best guy you’ll ever meet, and you don’t even realize it.”

              “I do too. He’s the best. I couldn’t imagine myself with a better guy,” I disagreed.

              “Then why aren’t you dating him?”

              “Because I don’t want us to end up hating each other,” I answered, twirling a strand of my hair.

              “Won’t you just end up hating each other if you don’t? You’ll both hurt each other by dating other people and stop being friends. Why don’t you just try it?” He asked.

              “I see.”

              “You see what?” Hank raised his eyebrows.

              “I see why Adam sent you now. He wanted you to convince me to go out with him.”

              “You’re so stuck on the thought that I was sent by him, aren’t you?”

              “Yes.” I said.

              “Why?”

              “Because there’s no other reason for why you’re hanging out with me.”

              “Could it just be because I like hanging out with you?” he asked

              “No. That’s not it.”

              “Okay. You obviously don’t believe me. You’re not going to anytime soon, are you?” Hank shook his head.

              “No, I don’t believe you, and I won’t believe you.” I smiled. “Why else would you be practically begging me to do out with Adam?”

              “Because I don’t want to see him heartbroken,” He answered.

              “Please! He doesn’t like me that much.” I snorted.

              “Yes he does. He likes you so much he can’t think of anything else. Whenever I hang out with him, all he can talk about is you. To tell you the truth I really didn’t like you until I met you.”

              “How honest of you,” I retorted.

              “Well, I thought I’d be honest from the beginning. You really should let Adam know where you stand,” Hank said.

              “He does know where we stand.”

              “No, he doesn’t.” Hank stood up.

              “Yes, he does.” I shook my head again.

              “No, he doesn’t. You just keep leading him on. You really don’t get it, do you? He’s falling in love with you.”

              “What?” My mouth went dry. There’s no way he liked me that much. I knew that I had fallen for him, but that’s why I hadn’t talked to him for a while. I was scared that I might tell him that I liked him that much. Then where would we be if he didn’t feel the same? Where would we be if he did?

              “Did you hear me?” Hank asked.

              “Yes.” I whispered. “You’re lying. Why hasn’t he done a ton of romantic gestures if he felt that strongly? He can’t be in love with me. He just can’t!”

              “Why not?”

              “Because if he is…It’s not true love. We haven’t even gone out. We’re not even out of high school. That’s way too serious. I barely even know him. He barely even knows me. It’s too fast!” I answered.

              “Calm down. He never actually told me he’s in love with you, and it’ll be a long time before he does. Chill out.”

              “Why did you say that then?” I asked.

              “I know he does,” He replied.

              “How?”

              “The look in his eyes when he talks about you,” He admitted.

              “He really likes me?” Butterflies flew all around in my stomach.

              “Yes, he really does.” He grabbed my arm and lifted me off my swing. “Come on, it’s time.”

              “Time for what?” I asked practically being dragged my Hank.             

              “The reason that I hung out with you for so long.”

              “I knew that you were talking to me for a reason!”

              “This was only part of it. I actually did want to hang out with you though.” Hank stopped. “Don’t look yet. Now when you do, I’m going to be gone. Open the front door once you get there, okay?” He asked.

              “What are you talking about?” I asked. Hank walked off to reveal…my car? What was it doing here? It was all fixed! I ran up to it in utter shock. Who could have fixed my car? I opened the front door to see an envelope on the dashboard. It had my name written on it in Adam’s handwriting. How could he have known about my car? There’s no way! I opened it up to read what he had written.

            
 
Ashley,

You said that you needed to refuel; you must have meant your car! I went over to your house to see if I could put some gas in your car, but it was totaled. I asked your parents if you were going to do anything about it, and they said that you weren’t…I thought that it would be the perfect gift for the perfect girl! I really miss you, and I’m sorry that I couldn’t give it to you in person, but I’m not really supposed to leave the house right now. Hank will give it to you though. Isn’t he great? I hope you like him as much as I do. It would be great if you guys got along. I know that that you don’t want to enter into a relationship right now, and I respect that. I just really like you, and I thought that you could accept this gift as one from a really close friend. We don’t have to go out with each other right now. We can just be friends. I miss you. I hope you miss me too. You said that you wanted to know that I like you
that
way. Does this prove it? If it doesn’t, than I’m out of ideas! You probably like that romantic stuff, so I wrote a list of all of the things that I like about you. It took me forever. I hope you like it, because I got a cramp in my hand for writing so much! I must’ve made ten drafts.

What I like about you:

Your smile

The way you walk

The smell of your hair

Your soft skin

Your laugh, especially when you snort and aren’t ashamed of it

Your eyes

Your eyebrows when you’re thinking really hard

The way your forehead crinkles when you’re upset

                                                                      I miss you,

                                                                                                  Adam

Chapter 10

The Beach

              Before I start going off on the kind of stuff that goes on at the beach, I’m going to address what you just read before. You know, the thing that Adam gave me. I know, I know, you’re thinking that he’s the greatest guy that ever lived. Well, I won’t argue that. I really like him now…ok, I admit it, the car fixing did help my view of him. Anyway, I haven’t heard from him since then. He hasn’t even been at school. A whole week has gone by, and I haven’t gotten one word from him. I keep calling him, but he’s never answered me back. All I ever get is his voicemail. I just wanted to fill you in. Annie hasn’t talked to me either. She won’t even let me speak to her. All I see her doing is making out with that…that…I’m really low on insults right now. I’m talking about Tom. Okay, now is the time that I go on and on about whatever is going on in my life. I’m supposed to be talking about the kind of stuff that my friends and I do at the beach, but to tell you the truth, I really don’t feel like talking about that right now. Instead, I’ll just jump right into what happened that day at the beach. It all started in the morning.

              “Ash! How are you? I didn’t know that you were going to be here today.” Tina waved to me.

              “Well, I’m here,” I answered half-heartedly.

              “Why are you so glum?” Hank was with Tina.

              “I don’t know. I miss Adam. He hasn’t talked to me in a long time.” I was a little too frank with them.

              “Oh. Well, do you guys want to go for a walk along the shore, or do you want to go over to the park again,” Hank asked.

              “Shore,” Tina said for her and me. Okay…wait a second. Did Hank just totally avoid my question? I think he did!

              “But…” I started to speak.

              “Are you coming or not?” Hank interrupted me.

              “I’m not going until you tell me what’s going on with Adam. I haven’t heard from him, and I’m starting to think that you know something,” I told him.

              “Well, I know lots of things. First of all, Tina has a thong on. Second, I like baseball. Lastly, and my favorite, I know that somewhere there is a girl in a bathing suit just waiting for me to come and whisk her away in a car that she buys for me.” Hank smiled as if he was in heaven.

              “Hey! I don’t have a thong on…oh…wait…never mind.” Tina said.

              “Very funny. I’m serious, what’s going on.” I ignored Tina.

              “Going on? I don’t know what you mean, I’ve been doing lots of things lately,” Hank answered.

              “What’s going on?” I repeated.

              “I’m going to start off towards the shore. I’ll see you guys in a bit.” Tina ran away while she still could.

              “The last time I talked to you, Adam had this huge gift for me, and it was really sweet. I’ve tried calling him, but all I get is his voicemail and…”

              “He is busy. He’s living with me. Remember?”

              “Not really.” I shrugged. “I do remember one thing though.”

              “What’s that?” Hank started to walk down towards the waves.

              “You tried to kiss me that day,” I said flatly.

              “I did not!” Hank started to blush.

              “Oh, you so did! You were going to ‘tie your shoe’ or at least that’s what you say.” I confronted him.

              “I never wanted to kiss you.”

              “You didn’t?”

              “Come on, Ashley. I’m older than you. Besides, even if I wanted to, which I don’t, I’d never betray Adam.”

              “Adam? The guy hasn’t even called me back, or at the very least, have you tell me what’s going on with his court case. Are we in limbo or what? John never called me back.”

              “John?” Hank scratched his forehead.

              “He’s the officer that I was working with to try and get Adam off of the hook, but I don’t think that it worked very well,” I replied.

              “He didn’t call back because he was fired,” Hank said.

              “Fired?” I stopped in shock.

              “Yeah, that’s what Adam told me. He got fired because he tried to turn in fake evidence that some girl tried to sabotage Adam. The girl that supposedly tried to sabotage Adam denied the claims, and brought up a lawsuit of her own. I guess she won,” Hank explained.

              “Lena! She’s the one that did all of this in the first place! What a first class wenchwad!” I fumed.

              “Wenchwad? Is that even a real word?” Hank laughed.

              “It is now. I invented that word. There are lots of words that I’ve invented, but that’s not what I want to talk about. What happened to Adam?”

              “What kind of words?” Hank smiled.

              “Words that are really…that’s not what I’m here to talk about! Stop trying to get me off the subject you horrible…” I scrunched up my nose trying to show my anger. It didn’t work.