Page 84 of Nanny for the Athletes

Charlie

I couldn’t helpit. I needed to find her every day now. Even though I couldn’t actually talk to her with other people around, just seeing her helped.

After the aquarium, things changed. We no longer were mere acquaintances walking the halls of Fairy Tale High anymore. There was now something between us that no one could take away. A shared experience that was purely ours. Something no one else knew about or could weigh in on.

I held it tightly to my chest, knowing that even if things didn’t work out between us like I hoped they would, we would still have that night.

But, surprisingly, things were going rather well. Though I hadn’t seen her in person in a few days now, we had been texting a lot. She didn’t seem to be annoyed when I blew up her phone all the time. She said she was used to it from all the other messages about her deals.

She even went as far to say she enjoyed my texts and they broke up the monotony of the people looking for updates, or bad news from Flow and Jett.

It made my whole day when she sent that this morning. I had told her to have a great Monday, to which she replied with a grumpy gif, one of the Snow White dwarves marching around with a frown on his face.

I had apologized, but she returned with the happy message back, so I then sent a few more memes about Monday mornings her way.

By the time I got to lunch, I was on full alert. I just needed to see her and the pain in my chest would go away. Thinking about her made my heart constrict and the only way to get rid of it was to lay eyes on her.

But that didn’t happen. Eric and Phillip surrounded me and dragged me over to our usual lunch table, which was across the cafeteria from where Una normally sat.

“Yo, did you hear what Eric did?” Phillip asked as soon as we sat down.

I shook my head, taking one last glance over my shoulder to see if Una was at her table. She wasn’t. I frowned and slipped my phone out of my pocket.

As I did, her scrunchie fell out, tumbling onto the bench and sliding onto the floor.

Phillip looked at me, then followed my gaze to the floor. Before I grabbed the scrunchie, he swooped down and napped it.

Thankfully, he was a smart guy and didn’t hold it up for everyone to see. He kept it low, handing it back to me with a questioning stare.

“Don’t worry about it,” I whispered out of the corner of my mouth. I shoved the scrunchie into my pocket and sat up, looking at Eric. “What did you do?”

Phillip covered a chuckle by clearing his throat. “Yeah, Eric, what did you do this weekend?”

Eric’s glare was enough to tell me that it wasn’t something good. “I broke it off with Indira,” he admitted, a little flush filling his otherwise pale cheeks.

“Finally,” I said, wanting to roll my eyes, but held back. “If a girl cheats on one guy, she’s bound to cheat on you too, man. I can’t believe you even tried to make it work. She was gorgeous, and seemed nice, but honestly, cheating is a big no for me.”

“Me too,” Phillip chimed in just as my phone buzzed.

I looked down at it in my hand, seeing only the sender’s name on the lock screen, thankfully. Once I saw who it was, I glanced up, searching the cafeteria for her.

There. Leaving the food line and heading back to her table was Una. Her braids were bound back in one large braid down her back, held together by a scrunchie matching that in my pocket. As soon as I looked her way, though, she ducked her head, avoiding my gaze.

My shoulders sagged, but not from sadness. It felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of them, the vice around my chest loosening. She was there. She was beautiful.

A smile crept across my face as I watched her make her way across the cafeteria. She glared at someone next to her and rolled her eyes at another person before approaching her table.

As soon as she did, she snuck one last look at me, catching my eye this time. She pursed her lips, as if suppressing a smile. But I knew.

I knew.

“Who’s Dahlia?” Phillip asked, louder than I would have liked.

“Huh? I thought we were talking about Indira?” Eric said before leaning over to grab a French fry off of Phillip’s tray.

“What?” I doubled down, not realizing what he meant.

Phillip pointed to my phone. “Someone named Dahlia has sent you like three messages in the past minute. Who is she? I don’t know any Dahlia’s at Fairy Tale High.”