Too Short To Ride

0 1 : Date me

"He'd totally be my type if he wasn't so short. I only want a guy if he's over six feet."

Karter had been furiously working on math homework she forgot to do the previous night, but when she heard what Jessica said, her ears pricked up. All lunch period she had been able to drown out the conversations but as soon as Jessica brought up the topic, all bets were off.

"I mean he's cute but like, he's barely an inch taller than me," Jessica continued to complain.

Karter set her pencil down and turned her head to face her friend, "so you really wouldn't date him. Just because he's not over six feet." The words came out as more of a statement as opposed to a question.

"Yeah," Jessica responded, "I like tall guys. What's so wrong about that?"

"It's incredibly shallow? You're saying that Caleb is basically the perfect guy but just because he's not taller, you won't even consider dating him."

Jessica pouted, "well, yeah."

"Oh my gosh," Karter muttered under her breath.

"Okay, you always freak out about this and I don't know why," Jessica began, "so what if I like tall guys?! It's the same thing as liking brown hair or blue eyes on a guy!"

"No it's not!" Karter raised her voice, "it's totally not the same thing!"

"Uhhh, Jessica," Bri interrupted in her small voice, "I'd stand down if I were you."

"No! It's a completely legit way of determining eligibility! Just because Karter is a million feet tall and can't find someone, doesn't mean I have to put aside my views! It's not like a short guy is ever gonna want to date an Amazon like you!"

An uncomfortable silence settled across the lunch table. Everyone was frozen, waiting for Karter to respond.

She slowly stood up from her seat and stared Jessica directly in the eyes.

"We'll see."

-

"Alright kids, good practice. See you tomorrow," Coach Martin said to the basketball team.

"Hey, nice job shark bait," Logan said as he ruffled Caleb's hair as they exited the locker room. Caleb swatted his hand away and the punched his arm.

"I said never to do that."

"What? This?" Logan grabbed Caleb around his neck and fluffed his crazy hair into an even bigger mess.

They joked around as they left the gym, but someone stopped them before they could get far. Caleb had seen her around school, but didn't know her name. She always kind of intimidated him due to her height.

"Hey, can I talk to Caleb?" She said.

"Uhhh, sure," Logan let go of his friend and made faces to Caleb when he passed behind the girl.

She pulled him off to the side so the other teammates could get through the door and finally spoke when no one was around to hear.

"Date me."

Her words knocked Caleb back a step and he blinked a couple times before realizing that no, he wasn't hallucinating. "Uhhhh, what?"

"Date me," she said again.

"Okay either this is some Twilight Zone shit or you're on drugs."

She let out a big sigh and then explained her situation, "I want to prove something to my friend. She said she'd never date a guy under six foot and I said... okay, basically I want to prove that height doesn't matter when in a relationship."

Caleb's eyebrows were furrowed in skepticism, "so I'm part of this bet just because I'm short?"

"Okay, first correction, this isn't a bet. Second correction, my friend was talking about how you'd be her type if you weren't short so I'm not just choosing a random guy."

"What a bitch..."

"So you up for it?" She asked eagerly. Caleb was a bit sensitive about his height, what guy wouldn't be? What that girl was saying was certainly a blow to the ego, but for whatever reason, maybe it was the endorphins after the workout or maybe it was because the girl was pretty, either way the words out of his mouth were a bit of a shock to both parties.

"Sure."

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1/31/18