The Story of us

Chapter 18: High school boys are too needy for their own good

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania - 414 miles

"I feel like I'm eighty right now."

I glanced up at Travis, who was looking around the room in astonishment, and I couldn't help but nod my head in agreement. We had only been present at Nyla's friend's party for around ten minutes, yet people were already treating us like we were in our thirties. Well, they weren't doing it as much with me, since I pretty much still looked like a teenager myself–much to my dismay, and Harry's amusement–but Travis seemed to have it the worst out of all of us. A couple of minutes prior to his proclamation, a kid had come up to him and tipsily asked him if he knew what the Internet was. Which certainly seemed to be pushing it, since Travis didn't even look that old, but when I had brought this point up to him, he had refused to listen to me.

"I'm twenty-two!" he cried in exasperation. "Twenty fucking two–that's probably only, like, five years older than these guys. I just graduated from college. I don't even have a proper job yet. I work at Burger King and I still live in my parents' basement. I clearly am not an adult!" He sounded almost hysterical when he delivered his final words, and I had to press a hand over my mouth to keep me from laughing out loud. Travis was a sensitive guy, I knew that much, and I was pretty sure that he wouldn't appreciate me making fun of him. And, besides, so what if he didn't have his life together? He was still twenty-two. I was pretty sure that the only good thing about being that age was that you could drink legally.

"Why don't you work at McDonald's?" Niall asked him curiously. He currently had an arm slung around my shoulder, and Harry was staring at the two of us with a funny expression on his face. Part of me knew that it was fine for him to be holding me like this because we were friends, but the other half couldn't help but try to subtly inch myself away from him, and closer to Harry.

Travis shot him an angry glare. "I'm not a failure," he scowled. "God."

Niall and I exchanged a confused look, but then before he could say anything else, I beat him to it. "What's wrong with McDonald's?" I asked him in the brightest voice that I could possibly muster up without putting myself at risk of vomiting. "I used to work there."

That was actually a lie; the only jobs I had ever had were either at my dad's office or in retail, but I was trying to make him feel better. Be a nice person and all that bullshit.

Unfortunately, Travis clearly wasn't used to my change in behavior–that, or he just didn't care about it. "Exactly," he told me, cracking a slight grin as Harry leaned over and slapped him a high five. In turn, I glared at both of them.

"You guys are such douchebags," I huffed in annoyance, rolling my eyes. On second thought, maybe I should have followed Nyla when she asked me if I wanted to accompany her (although she had seemed extremely satisfied when I had declined her request). I wasn't sure if I would be able to stay sane surrounded by the three of them tonight.

"You love me," Harry grinned at me. I wasn't sure why he had taken to saying things like that lately. It was beginning to become too hard to pretend like I didn't find him irritating anymore. (Actually, that wasn't true. Majority of the time, I still found him annoying as fuck. Except now, the only difference was that I also wanted to kiss him.)

"Ha!" I laughed a bit too loudly. "That's hilarious!" When all three of them turned to stare at me with confused expressions on their face, my cheeks flamed red and I gave them a tight smile. I wasn't sure if I had ever wanted to die more than I did right now at this moment. Of course, I didn't love Harry, but the way I had reacted clearly could have made him think otherwise.

"I need a drink," I mumbled to no one in particular, slinking away into the kitchen before any of them had the chance to follow me. Code for: I want to be alone right now. (But also, I really did want a drink.)