I couldn't stop thinking about Jax.

        The evening we spent at Rowe Park was on replay in my mind, and I couldn't get it out. I'd never felt closer to him, and I saw him in a different light. He was so kind, considerate and a terrific listener.

        I didn't know Jax Velasco had it in him.

        I waited near the vending machine for him because I knew another day with him would get the awfulness of the day out of my head. Things were even worse between me and Mi Yun. We barely talked. We never met eye to eye, and it was even more awkward. I felt bad for poor Sadaf, who was in the middle of this. She had to juggle talking to the both of us without me and Mi Yun talking to each other.

        When I noticed the familiar brown eyes heading my way, I grinned with a sensation filling my stomach.

        Jax.

        "Hey." He stopped in front of me.

        "Hey." We stared at each other, smiling until Brice came into view.

        "Estella, what's up?" He pulled me into a hug, but my gaze remained on Jax.

        "Nothing much," I replied once he released me. "Jax, wanna go driving?"

        Brice frowned, and before Jax could open his mouth, Brice jumped in. "Actually, I have plans for us, Estella."

        This captured my attention. "Oh, yeah?"

        He nodded before turning to Jax. "Can you give us a moment, Velasco?"

        Jax appeared taken aback, and I was, too, but Jax nodded. "Sure thing, Abrams. I'm heading out, anyway. I'll see you later, Estella."

        He flashed me another smile before walking off, and I watched him.

        "Estella." Brice brought my attention back to him. "Come on. Follow me."

        He grabbed my hand in his and led me to the exit. I craned my neck ahead to see if Jax was still there, but he wasn't. He was a fast walker, and he was probably out the door to Verda by now. That old car was surprisingly homey.

        Brice squeezed my hand, and I glanced up at him. "You okay?"

        "Yeah," I said, finally noticing how huge and rough his hand was. "You have very manly hands."

        He chuckled. "Thank you?"

        I smiled. "It's not an insult."

        "I don't know if it's a compliment either."

        I shrugged. "Where're we going?" We were heading to the parking lot. "You brought your car today?"

        "Mm-hmm," he said. "Usually, Oliver drops me and Tyler off or sometimes Velasco does it, but I brought my car today."

        "Why?"

        He looked at me. "I have plans for us."

        I grinned. "Like what?"

        "So many questions." He tapped my nose. "Patience. You'll find out soon enough." We stopped in front of a black BMW, and Brice opened my side of the door. "Ladies first."

        "Thank you." I took a seat as Brice went around the car to get in. I put my things down and felt the leather seats. This was a nice, expensive car.

        So much different from Verda.

        "Okay, let's go," Brice said as I buckled myself in.

        On our way to God-knows-where, Brice played his favorite hip hop station, and we jammed out to it. It wasn't rock, but it was Brice. He blasted the AC, which was refreshing initially due to the heat from outside. However, after a while, I was freezing.

        Whenever I was in the car, Jax always let me control the AC the few times he had it on, because according to him, I was his guest, so I had to be comfortable. Usually though, he just rolled the windows down. The seats of Jax's car didn't stick to my skin like Brice's.

        Like I said, Verda was homey.

        After a couple more minutes of driving, Brice parked in front of a small little diner near the edge of Central Creek. Lisa's Dine N' Bright.

        As he killed the engine, he said, "The goal here is to eat and then leave with a bright smile."

        "That's cute," I said as we stepped out of the car. We met each other halfway in front of the BMW. He laced his fingers into mine again, and it was comforting as he led the way. "How do you know about this place?" I asked while he held the door open for me before stepping through himself.

        It was a small space with black booths and poker dotted walls. There was even a jukebox and a huge wall board with the heading "I was Here," so customers could write their names down.

        "This is where my parents met," Brice said. "When I was younger, they used to bring me here often. But as I got older, I've been coming by myself."

        I wondered why.

        "Brice!" A brunette, middle-aged woman with curly hair came from behind the counter. "Good to see you, boy."

        "Hey, Lisa." Brice let go of my hand to give the woman a hug. "Long time no see. This is Estella." He brought me forward. "She's one of my friends from school."

        Lisa smiled. "Nice to meet you, Estella." She gave me a hug before pulling back to eye Brice. "Friends who hold hands?"

        Brice laughed while palming the back of his neck. "You could say that." He grabbed my hand in his again, and I smiled.

        "Okay, you kids." Lisa grabbed two menus and tapped Brice's arm with them. "Let's get you settled in. Follow me."

        We followed her to the farthest booth to the right, and we sat down. We sat across from each other at first, but I thought about it. I read somewhere that face to face was awkward. Side to side was intimate. So I got up and sat beside Brice instead, and he watched me for a second while Lisa laughed.

        "Can I start you kids with a drink?"

        "Gonna personally serve us today, Lisa?" Brice said while scanning through the menu.

        "Why not?" Lisa said. "I always look forward to your visits, Brice."

        "Sprite for me, Lisa," Brice answered.

        "Can I have a Fanta, please?" I said. "Actually, do you only have classic Fanta?"

        Lisa shook her head. "We also have pineapple, strawberry and even apple Fanta."

        "I'll take apple, please."

        "You got it." She wrote it down. "Do you know what you want to order, or do you need some more time?"

        "I know what I want to order," Brice said, "but she probably needs some time, so I'll order when she orders."

        "Okay." Lisa smiled at us. "Take your time. I'll be back with your drinks."

        Lisa walked away, and I looked at Brice. "She's sweet. I like her."

        "Me, too," he said. "She was always so nice to me when I was a kid."

        "Why'd you stop coming with your parents?"

        Brice didn't talk about his parents much. Then again, he barely talked about anything that wasn't hip hop company, music or school related.

        He shrugged. "They stopped coming. My dad is an attorney, and he's always busy. My mom..." He chewed on his bottom lip. "She does her thing. That's all there is to it. They're too busy now, but I'm not. I love this place."

        "It's a nice place," I agreed. "Very homey."

        Brice nodded before studying me. "Why're you sitting right next to me? If you don't mind me asking."

        My face heated up. "I read it somewhere that this is more intimate and less intimidating."

        Brice smiled, flashing me those dimples. "You're cute." He grabbed my cheek right as Lisa returned with our drinks.

        I loved Fanta, especially the variations of it. Not a lot of people had apple Fanta, so I was more than happy to drink it. Brice and I ordered. I got a BLT sandwich while he got a burger, and we got large fries to share.

        We had small talk about what we usually talked about until our food arrived. I didn't have marching band practice anymore, but I was still starved after school. As we ate, I couldn't help but wonder.

        "Why do you suddenly want to do this?" I asked. "Not that I'm complaining, but it's out of the blue."

        "Someone brought me to my senses." Brice took a fry and brought it to my lips, and I opened up. "They reminded me that I need to take advantage of my chance to get to know an amazing girl. Like, actually know her."

        I munched on the fry. "Who's this wise person?"

        "Doesn't matter." He took another bite from his burger.

        I put my sandwich down and rested one elbow on the table as my eyes stayed on Brice. "What do you wanna know?"

        "Anything," he said. "How's your home life?"

        "Good," I answered. "I have no siblings. It's just me and Daddy. My mom isn't really in the picture, but Daddy is a real estate agent."

        He slowly nodded his head. "My mom is kind of in the picture, but most of the time, it feels like she isn't. It's not her fault. It's just life."

        I wanted to know more, but he didn't elaborate. I wasn't going to pry. Not yet.

        "It's not my mom's fault either," I said, and he nodded. "And as you know, I'm a band geek. More band than geek." He chuckled. "Wind ensemble. Marching band. District Honor Band. You name it. But I still like to look cute and be cute. I like to get my nails done. My hair done. My eyebrows done. But I don't want to get my nose or boobs or anything like that done. No, no, no." He laughed even harder. "I like the way I am, even if I am on the bigger side."

        "You're not overweight, Estella," Brice said. "You don't look it either. You look curvy."

        "Thank you," I said with a smile. "What about you?"

        "Well," he started while dipping a fry into his honey mustard, "I'm not curvy like you." He flashed me a smile that I returned. "But you know me, hip hop company. Music. I like talking to people, and I like being around them. I feed off of that energy."

        "I'm more of a social introvert," I said. "Maybe we can balance each other out."

        I preferred to be alone, but I could thrive around people. I was still nowhere near Brice's social, and I was nowhere near Jax's anti-social. At the same time, I didn't mind being alone with just me and Jax. We were just fine that way.

        "Maybe," Brice said. "When people see me, they assume I can only hang out with certain people or get along with a select group of people, but that's not true. I can talk to anyone, and I can befriend anyone. People don't have to meet a quota for me to be associated with them. I just love people."

        I never thought about that. Brice was a pretty popular guy, and he had a lot of friends. But his closest friendship circle included guys like Tyler and Jax. Two people, most people wouldn't affiliate him with at all.

        "What about dating?" I was curious. "Will you date anyone? Regardless of race or social status?"

        "Of course," he said. "If she's sexy, if she has a tolerable personality, why not? I don't care if she's black, white, Latina, or Asian. I don't care if she's popular or a band geek." He winked at me. "I don't care. Girls are girls."

        "You sound too perfect right now."

        He shook his head. "I'm not perfect. Actually, I have a geeky side to me." My eyes widened. "Remember Yu-Gi-Oh!?"

        I groaned. "The show? Or the game a lot of the boys in band play?"

        "The latter," he said, and I nodded. "I used to love Yu-Gi-Oh! in middle school."

        My eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "What?"

        "Oliver and I used to play it all the time. Tyler wasn't interested, but we were. It was so fun. I haven't played Yu-Gi-Oh! in a while, but I'll love to play it again."

        "Oh no," I said with a crying smile. "Yu-Gi-Oh!?" He nodded. "Goodness, Brice. That's a shocker."

        "Even all those facts Tyler is always throwing at us about stars and his molecules, some of it is pretty interesting," he said. "Now, you know Tyler. Once he starts talking, he goes on and on and on. It may be interesting at first, but after an hour of talking about the same thing, it sorta gets old."

        That sounded like Tyler. The weird part was, he loved molecules, but he hated chemistry. He loved stars, but he didn't care for astronomy.

        "I'm not dumb," Brice said. "I'm not the smartest. Velasco is the smart one, but I get decent grades, and I have street smarts."

        "I need to work on that," I said, "street smarts. I can't survive in these streets."

        "Good thing you wouldn't have to."

        We laughed as we finished up our meal. When the check came, Brice took it, and he left a mighty tip for Lisa. It was sweet.

        As we walked to leave, Brice grabbed my arm. "Come here for a second." He led me to the wall board, and he handed me a marker. "You were here. Leave your mark." I wrote my name in my nicest penmanship as Brice did the same. When we were done, we stepped back with Brice's arm around me. "Now, everyone knows."

        "Yeah," I said as I took in our names beside each other.

    Estella Gillon and Brice Abrams.

        I liked it.

        "Now, come on." Brice locked his hands in mine again. "Let's go."

        We walked to the exit of the small diner. I was glad I was here. Not necessarily because of the diner itself.

        I was glad I was here with Brice.

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* What do you guys think about Estella's new attitude towards Jax? Brice making more of an effort? The diner scene and the information shared? What do you think about Estella's relationship with Brice vs. her relationship with Jax?