What I Never Told You

Chapter 15

  "Thanks for dropping me off." I hugged my grandparents one last time.
  "We'll miss you," Grandma Rose said.
  "Remember communication!" Grandpa Jack yelled as I reached the airport entrance.

  "Got it!" I gave him a thumbs up. 

  I checked in, made it through security, and boarded all in twenty minutes.
So now I had ten hours to plan out what I was going to say to Everly.

                            ~~

  I walked out of the airport with my luggage and scanned the sea of cars for my mom's.
I stopped when my eyes landed on Asher. I rubbed my eyes. There was no way he was here. I was just tired from the flight even though I had slept for most of the flight.

  "Hey," he said.

  So I guess it wasn't my imagination.
  "Hey, what are you doing here?"

  "Your mom told me you were coming back today and I asked her if I could pick you up." His voice was shaky. 

  "Aww, that was nice of you."

  "My car is just right over here. Let me take your bag." He grabbed my bag from me and led me to his car. "I missed you while you were gone."

  "I missed you too." And I wasn't lying. I missed my sweet friend.

  He placed my bag in the trunk, walked over to the passenger side, and grabbed something off the seat.
He came back to where I was standing and held out a bouquet of peach carnations (my favorite flowers). "Will you go to winter formal with me?"

  A crowd had gathered around us and were staring at me, waiting for my answer. I still didn't know how I felt about him.

  How could I say no? I didn't want to embarrass him so I didn't really have any other options. I  smiled and took the flowers. "Yes."

 His face lit up and he relaxed. He hugged me and kissed my hand. 

  He opened the passenger door for me, walked over to the driver's side, and got in the car. He started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. "I've been wanting to ask you out since forever but I didn't know if you liked me. So I was surprised when you asked me to go to the carnival with you." 

  I had asked him as more of a friend though. The other girls and I had decided together that each of us would ask out one of our guy friends.

  I changed the subject. "What have you been up to for the past week?"

  "Not much. I went tux shopping with my mom because the last time I actually wore one was at my cousin's wedding when I was thirteen. I also hung out with Ryder. " 

  I grimaced. 

  "We met up at the courts and played some one-on-one. We were talking about winter formal plans and stuff. I saw your Instagram posts. How was Switzerland? It looked like you had fun."

  "I did. It was great for the most part. It's so pretty there. I met some new people and we did so many fun things. But it wasn't all glamorous." I told him about Dylan, the rafting incident, and spending the night in a hole.

  "Woah. It still sounds like one of your better nights."

  I hit his arm. "How do you figure that?"

  "Don't you remember what happened on our class trip to Arizona?"

  "We don't talk about that anymore. And how was I supposed to know not to lay there?"

  "There were signs posted everywhere!"

  "Yeah ok. Hey, do you think you can drop me off at Everly's instead?" I asked as he turned into my neighborhood.