First Comes Like #Wattys2020

18

EIGHTEEN

Promptly after dinner, when I'm done with the dishes, I get a new message from my match. I grin and head upstairs to the privacy of my room, away from little sisters who peer over your shoulder, dads that like you to hand them the remote even when it's right next to them, and moms that like to say, Is that Macey? Tell her I said hi!

Once in my room, I flop down on my bed and open the message.

So. What do you think of pickup lines?

Pickup lines? I type, smiling. They should be avoided at all costs. Most of them are really cheesy.

Lol. There are some good ones.

Like what?

Are your legs tired? Cuz you've been running through my head all day. (I mean that ;)

Aw. But I think that's the one pick up line that should be banned.

Everyone else seems to like it.

Wow. Our generation is messed up.

I'm going to get one that you'll like. :)

Try.

He starts sending me a bunch of cringe-worthy pick up lines that are so bad they're funny. I feel like taking a shower and changing into my pajamas, then curling up in bed with my match. Well, not with him, but just talking to him until I fall asleep laughing. Is that possible?

I roll off my bed, carelessly, messing the covers, then take my phone with me to the bathroom. I get undressed then wrap a towel around me, then I grab my phone and hop onto the counter.I know I should probably get into shower, but I don't, I just sit there, perched on the bathroom counter smiling as the pick up lines get worse and worse.

Give up. I type.

Never!

Neither my match or me says anything after that so I put my phone down and look out the little window just above the sink. The sky is the shade of a rich grape flavored cotton candy-- It's dark purple complete with fluffy clouds. I can't see much because the Pinkette house is right there-- smack!-- blocking hat would have been our view of the little bay and all the little boats.

At eye level is another little window just like ours. Through it is a bathroom (just like ours), the lights on and Dean there in a towel one hand drying his hair, the other on his phone.

It's takes me a second for me to register what I'm looking at: Dean in a towel, but when I do, I don't look away. He's clearly just out of the shower, his hair wet and not perfectly finger-combed like I'm used to seeing it, the towel around his waist, exposing his unbelievably beautiful chest that looks like it's been chiseled by gods.

I feel my eyes lose focus like they do when I stare at one thing for too long a time. I blink and shake my head and my eyes focus on Dean again.

Woah. What was that coursing through me just then?

I rub my arms where goosebumps have appeared. You could have imagined that was what was under Dean's shirt, all along--I mean, arms and abs like his weren't sold separately-- but nothing your imagination could conjure could ever beat what it was like in real life. He was drool-worthy.

I swear I'm just looking away when, unexpectedly, like everything bad happens, Dean looks away from his phone and out his window, and catches me staring. His eyes go wide first. But then he pretends to shriek and cover himself like a girl and I don't wait to see what else. Quick, I pull the curtain closed and hop off the counter.

My heart is beating fast as I look at my fear stricken face in the mirror.

God, Dean's going to think I'm some sort of pervert! He'll never stop talking about it!

My phone buzzes and I pick it up, welcoming the distraction. One new message from my match.

Can girls be peeping toms?

Confused, I type: Uh, yeah?Peeping janes, I think.

I finally drop my towel and hop into the shower. I let the water run over my skin and convince myself that since Dean was joking about it, by pretending to cover himself, he probably won't mention a thing.

But who am I kidding?

He was going to throw it in my face tomorrow and every other day after that. I sigh and run my hand down my face. I had enough to worry about already, with Valentines Week around the corner and the way my skin prickles when I'm in Math class with Cole, and Macey and her Gatwick problems and now this.

The shower doesn't help. Because then I think, I thought we were doing pick up lines, how did he get on peeping toms? And then I realize I was basically a peeping jane, a few moments earlier when I stared at Dean. Coincidence?

Some people believe that the best ideas come when you're in the shower. A solution to a problem. An epiphany, maybe. And it's only when I'm washing my hair with my coconut scented shampoo that it occurs to me that the peeping tom/jane thing wasn't a coincidence.

Dean.Me.Bathroom.

Oh no!

I get out of the shower and my phone vibrates on the counter again. With wet and shaking hands I pick it up and open the message.

Lol. Then, Just caught my neighbor staring at me in the bathroom.

My stomach lurches and my heart drops right down to my toes.

Unless the guys at my school were all being stared at by their neighbor next door, and unless they all lived in identical houses to their neighbors, then this meant only one thing.

I was talking to Dean.

Dean was my match.