"This is so embarrassing!" I groaned.

"Let us see it!" Vivian yells from outside of the dressing room.

"How this?" I hear Ally ask as her dressing door clicks open.

"It's cute!" Olivia approves.

"Yeah, the flower print suits you," Evelyn agrees.

"You think?" Ally replies.

"Come on, Wendy! Everyone's already done!"

It's true. Vivian of course got a red one, since red has always been the best color on her. Olivia picked mint green, and Evelyn a dark, deep purple. All of them two-piece suits. Because of this, they forced me to try one on myself.

"I'm sure its cute," Olivia insists.

Nervously, I turn the lock and peek my head out, hiding the red of my body behind the door. Seeing how great Ally's slim yet toned body from gymnastics and cheer-leading makes me even more scared to show how I look. Despite this, I step forward.

"Its so cute!" Vivian squeals, spinning me around.

"I don't think we ever saw your butt before," Evelyn adds.

"This is really embarrassing, guys. I think its too flashy for my taste. Maybe I should pick something simpler." I indicate the slits on the sides of the bottoms and the off-the-shoulder ruffled top.

"We picked the most-toned down two-piece. Plus, you look really good in baby blue," Vivian insists.

I wanted to keep trying on two piece suits, but my body is like a chopstick; It doesn't fill out the suit, and those I do fill are too short and I end up with a major wedgie. I thought jean shopping was the worst, but not anymore. Plus, the ruffled top did compensate for my small chest. The high-waisted bottoms were too bad either.

"Okay, fine."

"Yay!" Olivia claps.

"I'm jealous. How do you stay so slim when you constantly eat?" Ally pouts as I gawk at her abs.

"She's blessed with a fast metabolism," Evelyn explains.

The next day we all arrive at the water park, along with Vincent, Carson, Luke, and Logan.

I've never been much of a swimmer. Dad put Wren and I into swimming classes when we were young, and of course Wren excelled at it. Every class was embarrassing to know that as a fifth grader, your second-grader sister was already at the top level while you were stuck with kindergartners. Now, I can stay afloat for at most one minute before I drown to death.

Because of this, I never swim. So, I began to get very confused once everyone started to peel off their clothes, their swimsuits already on underneath, in front of the lockers. Maybe if I wasn't frantically trying to think, I could've enjoyed the view of Vincent's back muscles flexing as he took off his shirt.

"I'm going to go to the changing room real fast," I say to Vincent, who nods and leaves the locker open so I can put my stuff in later.

Even after I finished changing, I had to pace back and forth before emerging. Outside, I rounded around so that I avoided the direction Vincent was facing as he spoke to Luke and Logan. I slide myself closely against the other lockers, behind Olivia who is too busy making out with Evelyn to notice my presence, and extend my arm to toss my backpack into the compartment. My fingertip barely touch the door, so as I kept increasing how rigorously I was waving my fingers, the door accidentally shut too hard and everyone turns their attention to me. I force an awkward smile as I balanced on one foot and hugged onto the lockers with one arm, like a spider falling off the walls.

Vincent must've been embarrassed for me, because his face went cherry red and he made a deep gulp before avoiding my eyes.

"Woah, Wendy. I was starting to think you were secretly a dude," Luke laughs, but stops once Logan slaps his palm onto his bare back and left a red hand-print.

"Still looks a bit like a dude to me," Carson teases and Ally kicks him in the shin.

"Seeing Wendy without jeans and a sweater is kinda like seeing a wet koala; it's weird and scary to look at," Luke continues.

"Trust me, this is just as uncomfortable for me as it is for you," I sigh.

Maybe that's why Vincent's not looking at me. Maybe I look like a wet koala to him too. Everyone else must've noticed the same thing since Vincent didn't interject his opinion for a while now, so Logan nudged him.

"Hmm?" Vincent looks at Logan but his eyes stay locked away from me.

"My brother's over here insulting your girlfriend and you're not going to do anything about it?" Logan sighs.

"S-s-stop it, Luke," is all Vincent manages, but his eyes keep avoiding me.

"Wendy looks super cute today and you're not even looking," Ally huffs.

"I'm sure he's seen more of Wendy before," Luke snickers. Vincent's eyes widen and someone might as well smear his face with his red paint, because it wouldn't have compared to how flushed his face became.

"Let's go already," I divert the conversation to another topic.

Everyone agrees and we let Luke lead us off somewhere. As we walked everyone's head seemed to turn towards us. Well, not really us, but my friends. The boys with their chiseled body and the girls with their toned body. I was pretty much the ugly duckling, except that they didn't reject me as their friend. They never gave me reason to feel excluded and always treated me just like one of them, but there was no denying I was an odd one out to third parties.

Vincent grabs my hand suddenly as we walk, which surprises me. He was avoiding me earlier.

"What's wrong?" I ask about his sudden gesture.

"Just wanted to hold your hand," he replies, then letting go and putting his arm over my shoulder and pulling me close by his side. Vincent's eyes darted to every guy who glanced our way and caused each of them to tense up and look away.

"I didn't know you were so protective of your friends," I giggle.

"What do you mean?"

"You've been glaring at every dude we walked past. But I'm pretty sure more girls are checking them out." I wave my friend in the direction of a group of girls batting their eyes at Luke and Logan.

"No, I was doing that because they were looking at you," Vincent explains.

"Me?" I burst out in a howl of laughter, Vincent looking at me in confusion. "If anything they're looking at my friends."

"I'm pretty sure you look the best out of everyone here."

"Says the guy who didn't even bother to look at me."

"Well, it was because...you looked...really..."

"Spare me the sugar coating. I know I look wierd."

"I-I-I-" Vincent stutters. He leans down and quietly whispers into my ear, "I was shy..."

Vincent Miller being shy? Is that even possible? Why would he be?

I whisper back, "You don't have to be shy. I've seen you shirtless a bunch of times already," I smile.

Vincent looks at me, dumbfounded. "You're always so dense," Vincent sighs.

I was already tired by the time we got to the line for the first water slide. Since Luke and Logan insisted on going on the most popular rides, we had to wait in lines for the majority of the day. But it was worth it to sit next to Vincent, who really seemed to enjoy this kind of stuff. It was also amazing to see how he left each ride with perfect hair while I truly looked like a wet koala.

We finally got to a take break at the wave pool. The girls got on chairs and laid to tan. The boys started wrestling around and slightly drowned each other. Meanwhile, I just needed to pee.

"I'm going to the bathroom. Be right back," I tell Vincent, who nods before he is tackled by Carson into the water.

The bathroom area is so crowded, I try to push through people, but they don't budge. They all seem to be looking in a single area, towards a lazy river. It doesn't seem that exciting, but I guess it's really popular.

Rounding around the crowd, I find an opening and slip past some rope set up, so that I don't accidentally cut the line. From that point, it was so empty. They should've set up the line here so that traffic wouldn't be blocked.

"CUT! CUT! CUT!" I hear a shriek from some speakers. "WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU?"

Huh?

I look around and see that the whole crowd was staring at me behind a row of ropes. I suddenly became a deer in headlights and froze. A mustached man ran up to me with his speakers and placed it in front of my face, yelling into it, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? CAN'T YOU SEE WE ARE SHOOTING SOMETHING?"

"Um, sorry?" Is all I can manage.

"Are you some FRICKIN IDIOT? SECURITY!"

"I'm sorry. I'm just looking for the bathroom."

"That's what they all say. I understand you're a fan, but you have no right running onto our movie set."

"Movie set? I'm sorry I didn't realize that you guys were filming here."

"SURE YOU DIDN'T," the man scoffed saracastically.

"It's fine. I know her," a guy taps on the man's shoulder. The man looks at him hesitantly, but then tells everyone to take a five minute break.

"Thanks for that. If you hadn't lied, I don't know how long my ears could last before I became deaf," I smiled, turning and continuing my path towards the bathroom.

He grabs and wrists to stop me and stands in my way. "You don't remember me, Wendy?"

"Huh? How do you know my name?"

"We went to elementary and middle school together. Remember?"

I examined his face carefully, but nothing. Copper hair? Nothing. Brown eyes? Too many people. He has a chiseled face, but a crooked nose, with a slight bump, as if it has been broken. A BROKEN NOSE!

"Gregory!"

"Yep!"

"Your nose is still crooked from that time my sister broke it while playing hop scotch!"

"Yeah, they say it's going to be permanent."

"Wow, you got really tall...and buff!"

He only laughs in agreement. After all, Gregory used to be the scrawniest kid in our grade. He had thick curly hair, wore dark rimmed glasses, and braces. We were all awkward looking, but Gregory just happened to be unfortunately awkward, like me. Maybe that's why we were friends. Of course I had Vivian, Evelyn, and Olivia, but Gregory and I clicked in a different way.

He was also a theatre kid. But, he got bullied so much after getting the lead in the school play, he left after the eighth grade to an arts school. We never saw each other again until now.

"Are you part of the movie staff?" I turn my head towards the sound and lighting people.

"I guess you can say that," he chuckles.

"Wow, it nice you're still into acting after all these years. Don't worry, you'll get a movie role soon enough if you climb the ladder. Everyone has to start somewhere."

"Yeah, thanks." Gregory laughs, "Nice to know you're the same, Wendy."

"I am?"

"Yeah, still an airhead."

"Right..." I say, realizing I casually interrupted a movie shooting. "Well, it was nice seeing you again. I have to go to the bathroom."

"Sure. See you soon, hopefully."

"Bye," I wave, scurrying off before I peed my bikini bottoms off.

After taking care of my business, I made sure not to walk onto the shoot again. Instead, I had to round the entire park by going the other way.

"Wendy, what took you so long?" Vivian asks.

"Oh, there was a movie shoot near the bathroom. I accidentally walk into it and so I had to go all around the other way," I huff, trying to catch my breath.

"Oh really? Did you get to meet any of the actors? Were they cute?" Ally perks up, interested.

"No, I just saw a childhood friend of mine. By the way, where's Vincent?"

"Oh, he got worried, so he went looking for you."

"Really? I'm going to go look for him then."

Immediately, I head for the place I know Vincent would think I wandered off to- the food court. Vincent is so predictable when it comes to him predicting me.

"Vincent," I call out.

"Wendy, what took you so long? I was getting worried."

"Sorry. I got..lost." I am too worn out to explain the whole story to Vincent at this point.

"Hungry?"

"Always."

Taking my hand, Vincent walks me towards a stand and buys a vanilla soft serve for himself and two churros for me (knowing one is not enough). We find an empty bench, away from the food court and attractions, and eat there.

Vincent is nice enough to let me dip my churro into his ice cream. As a reward, I give him a bite as well.

"You were too cute," Vincent says out of no where.

"What?"

"This morning. You looked so cute in your swimsuit. I kinda got flustered." Vincent blushes and ruffles before sweeping back his wet hair.

"Oh," my face reddened as well, "Since we're confessing embarrassing thing... I was peeking at your back and chest all day while pretending to look around."

Vincent laughs, before taking his ice cream and smearing it on my lips.

"Hey," I pout.

"You've got something on your face."

"Thanks, Captain obvious." I try to lick it off, but I miss a few spots.

Vincent slides close to me, pull me face close with his free hand.

"Let me help."

He smashes his lips onto mine and I freeze, not knowing what to do with both hands occupied with churros. Closing my eyes, I let Vincent lead until he finally pulls away.

"You...missed a spot..." I sheepishly say.

Vincent smiles, placing his hand on my cheek this time and our lips met again. That ice cream must've been really stubborn, because it took us forever to get off.

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