Hope

I tried to fix my hair and my clothes before going inside the diner. I followed Chloe and Mark to the booth by the window where I can see the counter. The two sat side by side while I am on the opposite chair.

I roam my eye until I saw him. There he is. Andrew Croft. The tall blue-eyed, brown hair hunk worked for Danny.

I’ve been crushing on him for the last 2 years and I am just happy to see him at the diner everytime we eat here.

I live in Richmond. A small town that is only 30 minutes drive to Boston.

When my sister Lisa got pregnant in college, my parents supported her and decided to move to Massachusetts to help her with her pregnancy while she is in college. They even supported her boyfriend, now husband, so that none of them had to stop studying. My sister only took a break when she gave birth but then she went back to school after giving birth to the twins.

Lisa and I have a big age gap because my father was in the military. After mom gave birth to her, my father was deployed and was not able to return for two years. After that, he decided that he does not want to miss another kid growing up so after they had my sister, they decided not to have another kid. But that ends after 13 years when my Dad retired from the military.

My sister is a rebel. She grows up without Dad most of her life so she does not always follow the rules. That’s why now I have an 8-year-old niece and nephew. We are still living in Massachusetts as my parents like the environment in Richmond. My sister and her husband also live in the same town as well. They need my parents to take care of the twins.

I love this town and everything around it. But I most especially love this diner now and that’s because of Andrew. I had known him for 2 years. He is staying in town with his friends from college.

I am not sure why he is friends with them though because Jayson and Derek are rich and playboys while Andrew is smart and reserved. I always see his friends in the diner as well but everytime I see them, they have different girls hanging on their arms like a man purse trying their best to be the best flavor of the month.

“We really need to think of a topic now so that we can already work on this project.” Mark complaints. I am listening to them while also paying attention to Andrew that is cleaning the counter and fixing the condiments on another vacant table.

We are currently stuck on which topic to pick for our physics project. We need to work on a case study and got three weeks to do the research and then 3 months to go before summer then senior year.

Yep, I’m a bit of a nerd. I am planning to go to an Ivy League so I am pushing harder in gaining as much credit as I can to be accepted and it’s not getting easier. Chloe and Mark are in the same boat as I am.

“I told you we should move forward with circular motion and gravitation.” I heard Chloe answer while my eyes is following Andrew as he goes inside the kitchen. I waited for him to come out again but I only see Danny go out of the kitchen and approach our table.

“Hope! Are you listening?” Mark snaps in front of my face to call my attention.

“I’m sorry, what is that?” I blushed when I realized I no longer followed their conversation.

“We need to find the 4th member to do this project Hope.” Mark answered.

Mark and Chloe are my bestfriends. I’ve known Mark since my family moved to Richmond. We went to the same school since grade school and we hope to get accepted in the same university.

Chloe move into town when we are 12. She is the emotionless robot in our group. We become friends because she pitied me when the kids at school put my books on top of the basketball ring when I went to the restroom to pee and left my book on the bench at the end of our gym class.

Mark and Chloe fought the other kids to my defense and after they made everyone run away, she directly climb to get my books from the ring.

Kids like to make fun of me because I read a lot. While other likes to play, I like to read.

“How are you guys?” Danny ask while pouring water to our cups and then pulling out his pen and pad to get ready to to take our order.

“Hi, Danny.” I greeted. “We are currently stuck on deciding which subject got the most significant scientific contribution in Physics. Care to weigh in?” I smiled at him when I ask him.

Danny laughs at me. He is like Santa Claus with his big belly and white hair. He is just missing the beard. Because of his looks, he always plays Santa every Christmas program in town. Danny was a friend of my late grandpa. He is close to my family and we usually have him for dinner when we have something to celebrate.

“If I can weigh in Hope, I don’t think I will stay running my old man’s diner.” And we all laugh at his words.

“Aw don’t say that Danny. Who will make us our favorite burger? We love you Danny and the diner will not survive without you.” I answered smiling.

“Yeah and also us. So can I have your delicious burger with ranch dressing and fries for sharing please?” Chloe smiled.

“Mine is with barbeque sauce.” Mark requested as well.

“Okay. And you Hope?” Danny asked.

“I will take with cheese and tomato and ketchup only, please. Oh, and a chocolate milkshake.” Danny wrote everything down.

“I will have Andrew bring your order.” Danny say as he walks away. I palpitate at his words.

“You look like a lovesick puppy Hope.” Chloe remarks as she knocks on the table to get my attention.

I pout at her words. I know I am not any guys ideal girl. I am the literal description of plane Jane. With brunette hair and hazel eyes hidden under my black spectacles. I am not very stylish as well. But being stylish is the least of my concern right now as we are chasing our tails to get as much credit as we can to add to our college application form.

And Andrew is a 10. More than 10 actually. I can never have a guy like him and I’m sure he can have any girl he wants. But I am already happy enough with getting a smile from Andrew everytime he delivers our food and sometimes he joins in for a chat when there are not many people at the diner.

“It’s not a crime to admire him, Chloe.” I roll my eyes at her and I pull out my notebook to show them the list of names of people we can pull to be part of our group. We need a fourth member as per Mr. Torres because of the number of people in the class. We cannot leave a man down. That’s his words.

“It’s not a crime but you’ve been dreaming about the guy for 2 years now. I think you either do something about it or just find someone else to admire.” Chloe retorted while pulling my notebook to check the names.

As if I can do something about it, I thought to myself. Andrew is older than me. I am 17 and he is already 23. I am in high school and he is in grad school while doing part time for Danny.

Mark checks the names on my list. “You wrote Halley’s name here.” Mark commented.

“Yeah. She is the most eligible person on that list to be part of this research.” I answered while my eyes roam in the diner as I saw Andrew come out of the kitchen again. He is bringing plates two tables away from us.

“Like we ever gonna get her. You know she hates nerds” Mark fling my notebook to my direction and I pull it back and I look at the list again.

“She hates everyone, don’t take it personally.” Chloe added as she lean back and cross her arm.

Halley’s a bit of a troublemaker. She is always mad at the world and does not really care about anything but she is the granddaughter of my Nana’s friend. I like her grandmother. She is sweet and acted like a grandmother to me when my Nana died.

She thought that Halley and I are friends, being the same age and attending the same school. But we are not. We are very different and my parents know that we are not friends. As a matter of fact, I think she hates me. Her boyfriend is in a band and he finish high school two years ago.

I look at the options that we have and I know that others will just be a dead weight to us and they will be worst than Halley. She may be a troublemaker but she is smart. Maybe even smarter than me. I’m pretty sure she does not study as much as I do but she gets good grades no matter what. Either way, we have to choose someone. I sigh while looking at my list.

“That’s a heavy one. Penny for your thoughts?” I still as I heard Andrew’s voice while putting down our orders on the table. His voice always sends a shiver to my spine. He smiled at me while waiting for my answer. I always get butterflies in my stomach every time he talks to me.

“Typical high school dilemma. Nothing to be concerned about.” I hold my breath while smiling at him. Just a few words from him every time we ate at Danny’s is enough for me to last through the week.

Andrew got a body like superman. Tall, broad shoulders, ripped arms. I saw him running one time when we visit the university and I am not the only one gawking at his muscles. Girls are about ready to throw themselves at him.

“A typical high school drama but you sigh so heavy? I hope your burger will help. And I know this is your milkshake.” He said as he puts down the last of my order. He decided to sit down beside me. As I said, he does that from time to time and that’s my favorite part of eating at Danny’s.

I scoot to the side closer to the window and reach out for my notebook on the table with the list of names that we are deciding to invite to join our group. He read through the list and lean back on the booth.

“Working on a project or looking for someone to kill and hide the body?” He raises his eyebrow and creases his forehead before handing me back my notebook. I laugh as I take back but really did not let go of the notebook so we are holding it on both ends.

“I assume you sigh because you need someone to join your group?” I nod.

He still doesn’t let of my pad. Instead, he moves closer and put his arm around the back of my chair before he sets down my notebook and point to one name.

The closeness excites me and I did my best to hide my happiness. He does not wear any perfume but he smells like musk. I look at the side of his face and I can see stubble starting to come out our his squared jaw. I wanted to reach out to feel his face to kiss his jaw. I look back at my notes to stop myself before I start drooling.

“You gotta be kidding me.” Chloe is the first one to react. She looks at Andrew and crosses her arm on the table. “You cannot pick the same name. What makes you think that she is the best choice?”

I tried to focus on the name he points out. Even he knows that’s the best choice. Whenever we ate at Danny’s, we chat about the things and people in school. He also knows Halley’s boyfriend Howard as he plays in Spicy Town, the bar just outside Richmond. Andrew’s friends always go there.

Andrew looks at me and smile. “You also think she is the best option?” He asked and I can only nod again. I am not the one to lose words for Pete’s sake. I am part of the debate team, but in front of Andrew, it’s so difficult for me to come up with words. Especially not with the close proximity we have now.

“If Hope thinks she is the best option, there is no argument anymore. Hope is smart and a good judge of character.” He then lets go of my notebook. I hug it as my heart swells at his comment. I just want to kiss him right here right now. It’s getting difficult to pretend that his presence does not have any effect on me.

He pats my head with his other hand before settling it back down on the table and drums his finger. He waits for Mark and Chloe to dispute. Chloe leans back while doing a stare-down with Andrew while Mark shakes his head and looks outside the window.

After a minute pass, Mark breaks the silence. “There is no way she will join our group even if we beg her. First, she hates us, and second, she does not even care about anything.”

“That is true.”Chloe looks at me as if she is waiting for me to come up with a plan for how to convince Halley. We all know that is the dilemma. She does not like anyone. The last time there is a group project, she just went on doing it herself despite having a group. They end up having two projects and all of them got a D despite her paper being the best one as per Mrs. Cane. But her lack of cooperation brought their team down.

After that, no one wants her in their group anymore. But we need her now.

I fiddle on my notebook and stare at the name that we are having a dilemma with until I felt Andrew’s hand on my head again. He turns my head to face him. He smiles and lean down to whisper.

My eyes widened at his words. I move my head backward and he nods his head toward another booth at the end of the diner.

I put my two hands on my mouth when I saw what he wanted me to see. Chloe and Mark followed my sight. I look at Andrew again as he put his arm around me this time to whisper again. “I think you can solve your typical high school dilemma now.” He smile, squeeze my shoulder then stood up.

My knight in shining armor. I smile wide as I look back at Chloe and Mark. We finish our lunch and discuss how we will convince Halley.