"Hey, John." I say as I hold the phone up to my ear. 

"Alex, you unblocked me. Um, hi, how have you been?" 

"I..I've been better. Look, Laf and I talked yesterday. And, anyway, long story short, I want to take you up on that date offer. Are you free tonight?" I ask. There was a shuffling of papers, but otherwise silence from the other line before,

"Yeah! Yeah I should be able to. Um, let's just grab dinner at the Jack and Jill restaurant near the school." 

"Um, okay.. What time?" 

"Does seven o'clock work for you?" 

"Sounds good... See you then."

"Bye Alex. And thank you." 

"Yeah yeah, goodbye." I hang up the phone and sigh.

I then switch to Theodosia's contact name and go to call her, but get interrupted by the door opening. 

"Where the hell have you been?" I ask, raising an eyebrow as I stood up.

Theodosia smiles awkwardly and closes the door behind her. "Um, I was at Aaron's house." She blushes.

"And you didn't think to ask first?"

"Chill, Alex, you're not my dad. You're barely even my brother." She rolls her eyes, setting her stuff down.

"True, but you're the closest thing to a little sister that I have. What happened after the date?" I interrogate.

"Well, if you must know, he took me to his house after and we lost track of time. We figured it was better I stayed there till morning, since it was almost two in the morning."

"Uh huh. And what did you two do? Did you...?"

"So what if I did?" She asks, annoyed. "Why is it any of your business?"

"On the first date? You two barely started dating-"

"And you and John did it when you two weren't even a thing." She crosses her arms.

I scoff. "That's different-"

"Is it? At least we had been talking a while and were actually dating before." She replies, furrowing her eyebrows.

"Will you two stop your bickering?! I'm on the phone with someone very important!" Grace yells from upstairs.

I sigh and Theodosia rolls her eyes. "We didn't even do anything. He let me sleep in his bed and he slept on the couch. I was just trying to show how hypocritical you were being if we had done something." She says before going up the stairs.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath before peeking outside to see Aaron still sitting in his car. He had to have been waiting for either Theo to tell him to go or to talk to me.

I walk outside and he gets out of the car, blushing gently. "Alex, hey, um-"

"Hi, Aaron."

"Are you mad? I can't tell..I promise nothing happened, we just lost track of time and-"

I sigh. "I know, I know. I'm not mad.."

He pauses a moment and stares at me. "You're not?" He asks.

I shake my head and he sighs a breath of relief. "No, I trust Theo in what she tells me. How was the date?"

He smiles bashfully. "It went really well."

I nod. "That's good, I'm happy for you two."

"Well, thank you."

There was an awkward moment of silence before Aaron nods at me. "Well, um, I suppose I'll see you tonight at debate practice." He says. 

I tilt my head. "Debate practice? We don't have practice tonight." I say. 

"Yeah we do, Thomas sent a text out to everyone." He says, confused, but not as confused as me. 

"Well, I never got a message." I cross my arms. He pulls out his phone and shows me the message saying emergency practice tonight because they needed to discuss some important cuts. "That little shit." I mumble. 

"I'm assuming..You're..The important cut he's talking about.." Aaron paused.

"Clearly. It's not happening, though. Washington will never allow it. He's just jealous he can't beat me."

Aaron lets out half a chuckle. "It must be nice to have Washington on your side. He hates me." 

I raise an eyebrow. "He doesn't hate you. Why do you think that?"

"Oh, you know. I'm always the alternate. Whenever anyone needs water, he makes me get it for them. Not only that, he doesn't tell me when some of the meets are. I have to find out from James Madison." He sighs. 

"Oh, I..I wasn't aware, sorry about that.." I mumble and he shrugs. 

"It's whatever. Colleges still see it as I'm on the team, so it doesn't matter all that much. I just wish I was more...Involved, ya know?"

"Well, in this case, you're more involved than I am. I didn't get an invite to this dumb shit Jefferson is trying to pull." I smile at him. "Hey, do me a favor, and put in a good word for me at that meeting?" 

"You don't want to come with me? I could give you a ride if you want." 

"Nah, I've got, um, plans tonight. You should probably get going now." I say. A light bulb then goes off and I smile at Aaron. "You know, I know a way we can get back at Thomas and get you actually competing at the last competition."

He tilts his head. "I'm listening." 

"Screenshot the text message, email it to Washington, I'll email him at the same time letting him know my suspicions about him trying to cut me from the team. We can get him suspended from the team, or at least he will become the alternate for this." I smirk gently and he nods. 

"And you're sure this will work?" He asks. 

"Oh yeah, for sure. Let me know when Washington responds. I'll let you go now." I wave and he waves back. I head inside, smiling widely. I pull out my phone and email Washington immediately, patiently waiting for time to pass. 

Timeskip brought to you by Christmas Music

I sigh as I walk into the restaurant, looking around. It was a nice restaurant, not going to lie. One I wouldn't think of coming to normally, but John suggested it so might as well. I go up to the hostess and smile politely. 

"Hello, I'm looking for John Laurens?" I ask. She points me to the table he was seated at and I thank her before walking over there. I look at him and blush, standing by the table awkwardly. "Um, hey." 

He jumps and looks up at me from staring at his phone. "Alex! Uh- hi." He stands, though I'm not sure why. I sit down and he awkwardly sits back down across from me. "I- Honestly I didn't think you were going to come."

"I said I would, didn't I?" 

"Well, yeah, but..I was sure you hated me." 

"Oh, I did." I say, raising an eyebrow at him. He looks down at the table and I sigh. "But, Laf and I talked a bit about what you two had talked about and..Well, I'm giving you a chance. Please, I'm begging you, don't make me regret it."

He looks up at me and nods. "I promise I won't. I really do care for you, Alex."

"When did that even start?" I ask, tilting my head. "I've been doing your homework for two years now, you've been bullying me for four, and you suddenly have a crush on me?"

He blushes madly. "Well, I wouldn't call it a crush necessarily-"

"John. No downplaying it. Do you have a crush on me or not?"

He hesitates and then sighs in defeat. "Yes. Yes I do." He pauses and looks at me with a nervous expression. "Are the feelings..Reciprocated?"

I smile gently. "They are. They weren't for a little bit, but I think they're coming back." I sigh. It was weird getting that off my chest. "Now, back to my original question." 

"Honestly, I think I've always found you..Intriguing. And then when you started doing my homework, we started talking more."

"I avoided any and every conversation with you, John." I say, raising an eyebrow. 

"I think.. I think that's what made me like you more. And then the kiss.. It.. It sparked something in me... I don't know what it was, but I liked it." He pauses. "But I think the moment I knew I liked you, was the moment I almost kissed you, but didn't." 

I nod slowly. "And why was that?"

"Well, after you left, I had that stupid butterflies in my stomach situation, I couldn't stop thinking about you, and all I did was wish I had kissed you.."

I blush madly now and stare at him. I don't know what I was expecting, but it sure as hell wasn't that. "Well-um-wow. Okay then.." I stammer. 

"Oh God, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable or anything." He hides his face in his hands. 

"No, no, I'm not uncomfortable, it was..That was really sweet. I just wasn't expecting it." I smile gently and he slowly takes his hands away from his face, smiling back at me. 

"So..Now you know when I started liking you, when did you start liking me?" 

I sigh. "I..I'm not sure. I think it was a while ago, probably that day the Schuylers were out of town and I got to see the real you at school, but I kept my walls up so I didn't even realize I liked you until.. Well, until I told Lafayette and Hercules what happened."

He nods slowly. "I see. Well, I think we can both agree it's been a pretty rough senior year, so with winter break starting next week, I want to ask if we can start over." 

I smile at him and nod. "I would like that."

He smiles brightly. "Awesome. Alex, will you be my boyfriend?"

I stare at him with wide eyes. I thought maybe we'd take it slow, but he seemed to be jumping the gun on this one. Not that I minded, though. 

"I..Well.. Yeah." I smile. "We're going to have to keep it on the down low for a little bit, though, you know that right?"

He nods. "I do. I figure we can start with telling like Peggy, Lafayette, and Hercules." He says and I agree with him.

He holds my hand and smiles at me. "God damn... I should've asked you out forever ago." 

"Well," I smile back at him. "Better late than never." 

1720 Words

This book is ending way sooner than I thought.. 6 more chapters left!

Also! I'm publishing the first chapter to my Reader's Choice story. The first chapter is where you vote on the ship, so make sure you check that out!

If this story is going to work, I'm going to need interaction with it, or else it'll flop. Voting ends in one week (12/15/2020) and then the next part (where you vote on plot) will be out shortly after that.

I hope to see you there!