If Only ✔

Chapter 3.

It's finally Friday and to be honest this week was ok. I didn't get to talk to Daniel much which sucks, but Andrew and I have been getting really close. It's nice to have another friend who doesn't treat me like the last option. 

I was walking back to my car when Daniel approached me with Julie in his arm. The sight broke my heart and I wanted to run away. If you didn't know by now, (which is highly unlikely) I love Daniel. It's not a small little crush; I love him and I've been in love with him for a year and a half now. But he never notices. Why? Because he's busy with other girls, because he's busy with soccer and because I'm supposed to be just his best friend.

"V! You're coming to the bowling game right?"He asks.

"Yup! I'll be there!" I say. He grins at me and I smile back. Then they walked back to his car, arm in arm.

As soon as they left my smile faded and I got in my car and drove home. I went to my room and made no rush to get ready. I took my time. Wrote in my journal, did some homework, and once I got bored, I decided to go change. I put on a grey jumper and kept my black  jeans. I put on minimal makeup and let my chocolate brown hair lose.

Once I looked presentable, I got into my car and drove to the bowling alley. As soon as I got there I spotted Daniel walking up to the building. I ran up to him and gave him a big hug.

"Hey V! Glad you could make it" He laughs and hugs me back

"Duh! I'm so ready to kick your butts!!" I grin. He laughs again and ruffles my hair, making me pout.

As we were getting our shoes, he spots his friends and rushes to them. We were all having fun until Julie and her friends came. We used to be playing for fun-messing around and purposely losing- but now the guys are playing to impress. Everyone was flirting with each other and I'm just there. I stopped playing a while back cause the game went from 10 to 0 in a snap. Daniel didn't even notice when I stood up to go buy a drink. He's too busy showing off to Julie. I went to buy myself some food and luckily saw a familiar face who I'm sure could redeem the fun in this night.

"Wow! The great Andrew is working at a bowling alley food court" I say smirking.

"I'm doing a favour for the owner since he's a good friend with my mom. Either way it seems more fun than your game over there" It was his turn to smirk.

"You saw?" I grimace. He nods his head and chuckles.

"Oh yeah. What would you like?" He asks

"Coke and some fries" I say. He nods and hands them to me. When I tried paying for it, he hands back the money to me.

"On the house. For my favorite girl" he says. I smile widely at him and go to take a seat. A few minutes later he sits with me.

"You're lucky I'm done for the day. I can keep you from dying of boredom." He says and I grin at him

"Oh my hero" I try to say in annoyance. Unfortunately, my smile betrays me and gives me away.

"I know. Now come on. Let's play" 

He grabs my hand and pulls me to the only other available alley, the one right next to Daniel and the others. I was so busy staring at Daniel as he throws the heavy ball. He wore a tight fitting V-neck tonight so just imagine how hot he looked. The way he flexed his arms, the way he grinned when he got a strike, it was all just mesmerising. While I was in my little trance, I didn't notice Andrew putting my name as "I Love Andrew". When I did notice, I gasped and hit his arm.

"You know that's not true!!! I could never love a liar!!!" I say. He just laughs at me. I push him away and enter his name as "I am a Buttface" . He sees this and bursts laughing again. His laugh was so contagious that I started laughing with him. We were laughing so hard, I  didn't notice that people were staring.

"Shhh! People are staring" He hugs me from behind and covers my mouths. I removes his hand from my mouth. We were both still giggly.

"You started it!!!!...Buttface." I say, throwing us into another fit of laughter. We were interrupted this time when someone coughed to get our attention. We looked up and I saw Daniel staring at us.

"Who's this?" He asks with a stern voice. I look at him straight in the eyes before answering:

"Daniel, this is Buttface."

Cue laughter

"Verdana, I'm being serious." His voice sounded annoyed, so I stopped laughing.

"This is Andrew. He's a friend of mine" as soon as I say this Andrew grins widely

"Not for long" He winks at me. My heart is loyal to Daniel, but who wouldn't turn into a bright red tomato when a hot and awesome guy like Andrew says something like that.

"Shut up or I'll actually turn you into a Buttface" I say once my face isn't super heated. He smiles sheepishly at me and pokes my cheeks.

"Look I don't know what the hell is going on ,but Verdana I thought you were hanging with us" He  looks at me with hurt in his eyes. I immediately feel guilty and was about to say something when Julie interrupted

"Oh Daniel, it's fine! They seem to be having fun so let them be. I mean she wasn't even talking with us anyways" She says and they all agreed. Daniel looks at me and sighs. He's disappointed. I should've at least told them that I was gonna hang out with my other friend for a while. I was just about to apologise when Daniel speaks.

"Fine. Whatever. Have fun." He says. I look down as they go back to doing what they're doing. I hide the feeling of being upset with a grin. I turn to face Andrew with the fake grin that I have on but he's not smiling at all.

"What??" I ask

"You're not okay..." He hugs me

"What are you talk about? I'm perfectly fine" I brush it off. He gives me a knowing look, and I know that there's no use in trying to hide it from him anymore.

"No you're not. You're not okay. I can see it." He says. I look down in defeat. 

"But...why are you even upset? You did nothing wrong."

"I ditched them."

"They ignored you, they were hanging out without you, they were the ones who weren't talking to you. They're being hypocrites.  " He points out

"I just wanna go home" I sigh and lay my head on his shoulder.

"I'll take you home." He says . I give him my keys and make our way to the exit. I really hoped Daniel  noticed I wasn't okay. I hoped he would stare at us and tell the others he has to go. I hoped he realised that he was in the wrong too. I hoped he was thinking of a way to make it up to me.

But when I turned back, he seems to have forgotten what just happened.He kept laughing and smiling with Julie in his arms. 

If only we realised then that our years of friendship was now on it's way to the end of it's journey.

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