Nathaniel Jean's Senior Year

13: Nathaniel Jean's New Dream

I came up with the title for this after watching Tangled lmao

Lucas tucked his hand into mine as we entered his house, sighing in relief at the rush of warm air that greeted us.

I'd told him in the car that school had pretty much sucked for me today. The guys were acting all weird around me for some reason, I'd failed a calculus test, and I'd earned myself detention on Saturday for falling asleep in class for the third day in a row. Club practice had drilled me into the ground on Monday and Wednesday, and with my parents home to add unneeded stress to my life, I hadn't been getting enough sleep. In short, I was exhausted. Of course, Lucas said it wasn't my fault, but my teacher thought otherwise.

He'd said he was going to make my day a whole lot better. I didn't know exactly what he meant by that, but I figured he was implying that he always made my day better—which, in fairness, he did.

"I've got something for you," he mused, trying and failing miserably to conceal a smile. I eyed him suspiciously as I hung up my coat—he was up to something.

"Yeah?" I asked, curiosity painted in watercolor across my expression.

"Yeah," he affirmed, re-grabbing my hand. "You wanna see?"

What kind of dumbass question . . .

"Well of course I wanna see!"

He led me upstairs to his room and sat me down on the bed. Then he disappeared into the closet, and I had nothing but the sounds of shuffling to use to guess what he was doing.

Then his form reappeared, holding so much stuff that he looked like he was about to fall over, and I choked on air.

A bouquet of roses. A pink teddy bear. A heart-shaped box of chocolates. Another box of red-sprinkled cookies. And, balanced meticulously on the box of chocolates, a long black box.

I thought back to my seventh period and asked myself what date I'd put on my paper. It couldn't be . . . There was no way . . . I would've remembered.

I recalled my messy handwriting absentmindedly scrawling out 02/14. Today was Valentine's Day.

I looked up at Lucas, who was staring down at me expectantly with his classic smile. "Oh my god," I breathed. "I forgot."

Lucas snorted. "Well I didn't. So?"

His prompting tone hit me like a slap in the face, and I finally realized that he'd bought all of this lovey-dovey shit for me. Me. Flowers, chocolates, a teddy bear . . . For me.

"Fuck," I cursed as I felt myself starting to get emotional. But I couldn't help it—I was a guy that had gone all of his life without getting gifts for events like Christmas or my birthday; unless money counted. No one had ever thought of me that way—as someone to put time and effort and thought into picking things out for. It had become normal for me by now. I didn't expect gifts from anyone; why set expectations for something that you know will just let you down in the end?

And yet here was Lucas, standing before me with a fucking boatload of gifts meant for me, and god I felt like a fucking girl because I was pretty sure I would either scream or burst into tears.