Jill starts to speak, "Hi, my name is Jill and this is my boyfriend, Daniel." She points to Daniel behind her who waves to the crowd, "We've performed here a few times, and as Kevin said, the crowd liked us. Tonight, we will be singing LOVE by Nat King Cole. If you don't know that song, it's from the Parent Trap. Relax, eat and drink while listening to us sing."
The song starts with a melody, then Daniel plays the piano and Jill sings. I never talked to Jill, she's more Elizabeth's friend than mine, but God can she fucking sing. It's soft and strong, and her face show's me she's passionate about the words coming out of her mouth.
Occasionally, she turns around to Daniel and sings to him. He blushes and looks down at the piano. Then, something surprising happens, and he joins in with her. They both sound like Disney characters, I look over at Elizabeth, whose eyes are glued to them.
After a few minutes, the performance is over and we all clap. They bow to the audience, saying thank you. Elizabeth and I both stand up, clapping the loudest so they can see us.
Oh, and they do.
They both freeze when they spot us across the room, they look at each other and scurry off the stage.
"Not on my watch." Elizabeth grabs my hand, running us to the back of the stage. Surprisingly, no one is watching the back so we just walk through. We catch them before they get far. "Jillian Del Campo, stop!" She screams, Jill turns around to us, slowly, following her movement was Daniel.
"Hey, Elizabeth. What are you doing here?" She smiles awkwardly.
"I'm on a date, you told me you were busy tonight with work, I assumed it was homework, but I guess we got our words mixed up. You two are lounge singers! How- wha- how is this even possible? Is this what you've been doing this whole time? Blowing me off, saying you were hanging with Daniel all the time, and it was this. Why wouldn't you tell me?"
"Look, it was Daniel's secret, he didn't want me to say anything. At first, I wasn't performing with him, it was another girl singing. She was too busy to perform and left, I filled in for him until he found someone, but never did so I took the position permanently." She explained it like it was all so simple.
Daniel speaks, "Don't be mad at her, I told her to keep quiet." She squeezes his hand.
"I don't understand Jill, you were mad at Daniel yesterday for maybe giving you an STD, now you guys are good?" I stifle a giggle, oh hell, Jill thinks he actually has an STD? Maybe I should have made up something else instead of that.
Jill looks at me, "Turns out he doesn't have an STD, Andreas made it up so he could spend time with you. Next time you want to say someone has an STD, make sure you say that it's fake."
I hold my hands up, "Sorry Jill, don't kill me." I believe that she will, she's been hanging with Elizabeth too much.
"Why didn't you just tell me you wanted to hang, why lie about Daniel having an STD. That's serious." Elizabeth smacks my arm, hard.
I rub it, "I'm sorry! I couldn't think of anything else."
She rolls her eyes, "Dumb jock." She jokes, smiling at her feet.
Jill grins, "You too." She shakes her head. "I left Eliza to go and curse out Daniel, he was scared I thought he was going to cry." She rubs her hand down his back, kissing his shoulder.
Daniel scoffs, "She's making that up, you know how girls are. Anyway, the cats out of the bag, I'm a singer. I didn't tell anyone because I thought you guys would laugh."
I feel hurt in my chest, "Man, we would never judge you. You're like a brother to me, and I would support you like one. Also, your voice is amazing and why did I never know you played the piano?"
"There's a whole piano in my room."
Right.
"I forgot." I shrug.
He laughs, "You sat in my room numerous times playing it." Guess I don't remember. "Please tell me you guys won't tell the others, I want to tell them on my own time."
Elizabeth says, "I can't do that, you don't under-"
I yank her arm. "We'll keep quiet, right E?"
Her eyes cut at me, "Fine."
We leave Jill and Daniel and walk to our seats, eating our pizza. We discuss Daniel and Jill being lounge singers and how good they sounded as we eat it.
I can't believe Daniel can sing, I just thought he was good at school and track, he just had to be good at another thing. I finish up my slices of pizza, and I sit back and watch Elizabeth finish hers, she finds it weird that I'm watching her eat, so we pack up our food and leave the restaurant.
Elizabeth wanted to go see Jill and Daniel, but we were stopped by security. They must have been on their break a few minutes ago.
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Driving down the road, Elizabeth stares out the window, her hand clasped in mine as I drive. I hear a loud shriek leave her lips.
"What the hell! I almost ran off the road." I hold onto the wheel, directing us back on the road, this girl is going to be the death of me, I swear.
"Look, it's a botanical garden, we have to stop." She points.
"No." My voice was stern.
"Please, I want to." She gives me pouty lips; I can't say no to that.
I find myself parking the car and walking through bushes of pretty flowers with the best girl on my arm.
How did I get so lucky?
This botanical garden is beautiful. It's currently nighttime, but the yellow and white lights are on, brightening up the place. On our sides are two, long rectangular bushes with various colors of flowers sticking out. Elizabeth's fingers trail over them, smiling when they tickle her wrists. Coming into view is a huge water fountain, and right in front of that is a wooden bridge that goes over a lake. Little coy fish jump all through the water.
I guide Elizabeth away from the pretty flowers to the bridge, we stop on it, leaning our forearms on the bridge's arms. "I've never been to a botanical garden before." She confesses.
"I could tell, you were touching those flowers as you've never seen any before. What do rich people do for fun in Boston?" I asked her.
She rolls her eyes, shoving my shoulder, "I told you, my parents are rich not me. And I was in club sports if I wasn't doing that I was with friends. Although, now that I think about it, I and my family were a part of a country club."
"See, you're so fucking rich, no regular person is in a country club." I pull her head to my chest, kissing the top of her head. It's nice to have her so close to me, if I could, I'd like to embed her in my skin. "Was it like High School Musical? With Sharpay and Ryan."
She laughs, and it rumbles my chest, creating a flurry of butterflies in my stomach. "No, it wasn't like High school musical. It was made up of people of our town in Boston, doctors, lawyers, and various government officials. I only went there to play tennis with Bridget or go to the sauna, and they did have good food."
"Like what?"
"Oh, I don't remember. I believe burgers and sandwiches, like a regular restaurant only rich."
"Take me there someday?" I ask.
She looks up at me, teeth on display as her lips stretch around it, "I would love to take you there, most of the guys there are old football players, they would love to meet you." We stay silent for a moment, then she asks me a question. "Andreas?"
"Yes, E?"
"I know this might sound crazy, but what are you in college for?" Her voice was small.
"I never told you, huh."
"No."
"Biology."
Her arms let go of me, and a feeling of sudden emptiness comes over me, "Biology? Do you want to be a biologist or what?"
"God no! That's too much knowledge for a dumb jock like me." I joke, rubbing her back with my hand. "I was leaning towards teaching maybe."
"Teaching?" She questions. "I could see you as a teacher, Mr. Chen. What grade?"
"Maybe intermediate. I don't want to work with elementary, they cry too much. 11- and 12-year old's is something I can deal with. It's something that I've been thinking about for a minute, you think I could be a good teacher?" Sometimes I have doubts, but the fact that Elizabeth believes in me pushes all that anxiety out the window.
She pushes a strand of hair out of my eyes, then kisses my cheeks, chin, forehead, and lastly my nose. "I think that you could do anything, even a dumb jock could be a good teacher."
A boisterous laugh leaves my mouth, "You are so lucky I love your ass." I smack her ass.
She yelps, "Do you have to be so rough?"
"I thought you liked me being rough with you. Remember in my bedroom, when I smacked-"
"We don't have to recap!" She puts her hands over her ears, trying not to listen to me.
She's so childish.
"You ready for me to take you home."
"Yes!" She screams, keeping her hands over her ears as we walk back to the car.
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