Heart Beat Song (A Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist Fanfiction)

Chapter Nine: Why Does It Matter?

Max and I went over to check on Zoey, only to find her cringing and eating dry cereal.

"Hey." Max greeted.

"Hey, Friendo." My eyes widened as I silently told Zoey to stop being so obvious.

"Great news, I won the lottery." I furrowed my eyebrows, looking at him.

"What?"

"Well, the restaurant lottery. I finally got us into that fancy farm-to-table place."

"You got us into Hand-Picked?" Zoey asked. I shook my head.

"The things you guys are into are just...so weird." I said.

"Yeah, Thursday night. Is it a date?" My eyes widened.

"Cool it, Romeo." I whispered.

"Is it a date?" Zoey asked worriedly.

"What? No. I just mean like, can you go? Why are you acting weird?" I looked between them, unsure of who was at fault here anymore.

"Am I acting weird-er than normal?"

"Hard to tell," Max said, "Anyway they're doing this uh, 10-course tasting meal and-"

"Sounds romantic." Zoey said.

"Or delicious. Do you know that they make their own butter? Apparently there's an actual cow on the premises and-"

"Hey, what's going on over here?" Simon said, coming over to us. I didn't think this situation could get more awkward. I was wrong.

"Nothing. Not a thing." Zoey told him. "Max, you remember Simon, and obviously Mary does since you kind of...work in his department now."

"Uh, well we haven't officially met yet," Max shook his hand, "But Zoey might have mentioned your name once or twice." Zoey shot him a look. "Or-well its a very common name You know, maybe it actually wasn't you, or maybe I heard it from Mary, she's my twin sister."

"Oh really?" Simon asked. "I saw heard the last name and just kind of assumed you two were married."

"Ok, that's really gross, and that is my cue to leave this conversation. See you around, Simon!" I said, turning to walk away, only to have Max grab my arm and keep me there.

"I'm sorry," Simon said, "It just, it seemed like you were all close, I feel like I see the three of you together all the time."

"Just close the way friends are close when they're friends with each other."

"Yeah...what she said." Max said, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Listen Zoey, I've got a project for your team I need to talk to you about, Mary, I'll need to talk to you too." I nodded.

"Great. Let's go talk about it. Max, let me just check my schedge and I'll get back to you about that dinner ASAP." They went to his office and I followed them, turning and walking backwards so I could look at Max.

"Did you tell her?" He mouthed.

"No."

"Does she know?"

"I don't know!" I shrugged dramatically, turning and following after them, felling kind of guilty about lying to my brother. I followed them into the office.

"The marketing team is gonna throw a party here to get the word out about the new Sprq Point Watch." Simon told us.

"And you want me to post about it 'cause my Insta's blowing up right now." Zoey said. "Pretty sure I've got at least twelve followers." Simon laughed.