"Now I remember why I prefer breaks over school," I sighed as I relaxed into the deck chair that was standing a few feet away from the pool.

It was finally summer break. The long long awaited summer break.

I can't even remember being able to just enjoy myself and not having to worry about some school assignment or some presentation.

This was the life. Just lounging around, tanning in the sun and drinking pina coladas.

I could get used to this.

"You look like you're already in full vacation mode. It's barely the second week of summer break," a voice said.

I opened my eyes and pushed my sunglasses up to see who was talking.

"I'm just trying to enjoy every singe second of it before it ends all too soon," I replied and took the drink that Ryder was holding out to me, before he lay down onto the deck chair next to me.

Luckily, the pool wasn't too crowded and it was relaxing just laying here. Usually it was full of screaming kids but since almost everyone was currently on vacation it was peaceful.

I took a sip of my smoothie before pushing my sunglasses back down and relaxing into the chair, soaking up the hot sun.

Ryder chuckled. "You planning on doing anything else this summer or just laying around in the sun?"

"Nope, this is pretty much it," I replied.

"Well, I'm going to go swimming, since, you know, we're a the pool. Care to join me?"

Ryder stood up and held out a hand towards me, waiting to see if I would go with him.

"Go swim, child," I said to him and waved my hand dismissively. "Stay on the shallow end though," I joked.

I saw Ryder roll his eyes before jumping into the pool and swimming a few times around it.

I settled back into the chair once again and closed my eyes, not wanting to miss any second of the warm and relaxing day.

A while later, I was still laying on the deck pool with my eyes closed when all of a sudden something wet was on top of me.

I gasped and my eyes shot open as I looked at what was laying on me.

"Ryder!" I exclaimed as he hugged me to his dripping wet body. "You're all wet," I complained and tried to wiggle out of his grip.

"I can make you wet too," he said and smirked up at me.

I rolled my eyes and pushed his face to the side.

Thankfully, he got up but then he picked me up bridal-style and walked over to the edge of the pool.

"Ryder, no!" I laughed and clung to him tightly.

However, it didn't help much because he dropped me into the pool and I slipped out of his grip.

"Ryder!" I yelled when I came back up to the surface and spat out the water that had gotten in my mouth.

"Watch out!" he called before cannonballing into the poll next to where I was swimming.

His jump sent another big splash over me and I spit out the water that was in my mouth again. I swam to the edge of the pool and threw my sunglasses onto the deck chair before swimming back to where Ryder was.

I was about to say something when he ducked under the water and appeared under me.

He went up again and then I was sitting on top of his shoulder.

I laughed and tried to stable myself but I kept on falling to the side.

"Give me your hands!" I shouted while laughing and trying not to fall over.

He put up his hands and I grabbed them with mine so that I could stabilise myself.

"See, this is much more fun," Ryder said to me.

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever."

"Without me, you would just be laying around and tanning. So you should thank me," he spoke.

He ducked under water, taking me with him before coming back up.

I leaned my head down to his and pecked his lips. "Thank you," I told him while smiling.

He smiled back at me and I thought he was going to kiss me again but then he threw me off of his shoulders and I landed in the water with a big splash.

"You keep doing this," I complained and swam back over to him.

"I know," he replied and smiled sweetly at me.

I rolled my eyes before ducking under water. Ryder followed suit and also ducked under. He grabbed my hands and pulled me closer to him.

He pressed his lips firmly against mine. His hands on my lower back so that I wouldn't swim away. My hand cupped his cheek while he tugged softly at my bottom lip.

We both pulled back and swam up to the surface to get air.

"That's not cliche at all," I teased while swimming to the edge of the pool to get out.

After pulling myself out and drying myself as best as possible with a towel, I was about to lay back down on the deck chair when I saw the devil's daughter herself walking into the pool area with two of her minions.

"What are you doing here?" Ashlin sneered as she and her two friends walked up to me. "Shouldn't you be out spray painting some building?"

The two girls behind her snickered.

"And you? Shouldn't you be blowing some guy right now? I mean, that's what you usually do," I fired back while smiling smugly.

Ashlin gasped and the jaws of the two girls dropped to the floor.

"Oh, she did not," one of the girls whispered to the other.

Oh yes I did.

"You would know all about that, wouldn't you?" Ashlin replied, looking more pissed off than ever. If she were a cartoon character I'm pretty sure there would be steem coming out of her ears.

"No, I don't practice the arts of sucking. Unlike you," I told her as I pushed past her, bumping her shoulder with mine in the process.

I know I was being mean but she just annoyed the hell out of me and I did not feel like acting nice to her today.

"Whatever, bitch!" she called after me.

"Good come back! But maybe spend a little more time thinking of better ones instead of handing out yourself for free!" I called back.

"How dare you!" Ashlin screamed and dropped her purse and towel.

She stomped towards me in her six inch wedges. A furious look on her face. Her hair was whipping wildly around her head and her neck grew like two sizes. If I'm not mistaken, she looked like she was going to attack me.

Not knowing what else to do, I hastily stepped to the side when she reached me in her fast strides. Unfortunately for her though, she didn't realise soon enough that I had moved out of the way and fell over the edge of the pool, into the water.

I gasped and covered my mouth with my hands to hide my laughter.

Ashlin came back up to the surface, her curls from before now gone and her mascara slowly dripping down her cheeks.

"I am so going to get you for this!" she threatened and swam to the edge of the pool as best as she could in her bikini cover-up and heels.

"What's going on?" Ryder asked as he jogged over to where I was standing while Ashlin struggled to get out of the pool.

"Oh, nothing. Everything is as it should be," I replied and smiled at him.

He stared at me questionably with a raised eyebrow but didn't say anything.

After Ashlin pulled herself out of the pool on her stomach and then stood up, her eyes met mine with a glare. Without saying anything else, she walked past us with her head held high.

"Girls!" I heard her yell and turned around to see what was going on.

The two girls sprung up. One of them reached into a bag and pulled out another cover-up. The other one got out what looked like a make-up wipe and wiped away the mascara that was running down Ashlin's cheeks.

After they finished, Ashlin turned back around to us and slowly walked over to us.

"Hey, Ryder," she said, smiled, and batted her eyelashes.

I rolled my eyes and started to walk away, back to my deck chair but Ryder grabbed my hand and pulled me back to him.

"Hey, Ashlin," he replied and gave her a tight smile while putting his arm around my shoulders.

Her gaze flickered quickly to his arm around me, her smile wavering but she looked back up and smiled brightly.

"Are you here a lot?" she asked him, totally ignoring my presence, which I wasn't too upset about.

"Sometimes," he replied, not wanting to make conversation but also not wanting to be rude.

"Well maybe we could swim a few laps," she suggested and flipped her hair over her shoulder.

I gaped at her.

Did she not see his arm around me?

"Actually, we were just leaving," he told her.

"We were?" I asked him.

He gave me a look and I understood what was going on.

"Yes! We were," I said and went to gather our stuff.

While walking away, I looked over my shoulder to where Ashlin and the other two girls were still standing.

"It's been fun!" I called to her. "Let's do it again sometime!"

________________________

"Chocolate or strawberry?" I asked Ryder as I looked into the freezer.

We were at my house after having enough of the sun. And Ashlin.

Dylan was at a friend's house and Nathan was running around here somewhere. My mom and dad were on some early business dinner. Even tough it was only late afternoon, turning to evening.

"Um, chocolate," Ryder replied and put away his phone since he had been texting Blake.

"Okay," I grabbed a chocolate ice cream cone and unwrapped it before handing it to Ryder. "Here you go."

"Thanks, baby."

I turned back to the freezer and got myself an ice cream too. I unwrapped it and threw the paper away before hopping onto the kitchen island. Ryder got up from where he had been sitting and went to stand in front of me.

"You have ice cream on your nose," he said and nodded at my nose.

"Can you get it?" I asked while crossing my eyes to look down at my nose.

Before I knew what was happening, Ryder licked my nose with his tongue.

"Ryder!" I laughed and wiped my nose with my free hand.

"Hey! Wait a minute!" he exclaimed and took my ice cream out of my hand.

I smiled cheekily at him because knew what was going on.

He tasted my ice cream and a look of disbelief washed over his face. "You had cookie dough and didn't tell me?!"

I smiled and pecked his nose before grabbing my ice cream back and hopping off the kitchen island.

"Let's eat outside," I suggested and made my way to the backyard where the hammock that we had put up was hanging.

Ryder followed me and we both got in it.

Even though the sun was slowly setting, it was still quite warm. I liked it though. I prefer warmth way over cold.

A short while after we had gotten in the hammock, Nathan came running out of the house with an ice cream of his own in his hand.

"There you guys are!" he called and ran over to us.

He climbed into the hammock with us while I just hoped that the ropes tying it to the trees were strong enough.

"Hey, buddy," Ryder said and did some handshake thing that him and Nathan had made up. "What do you have there?" he asked and nodded at the ice cream that Nathan was holding.

"Cookie dough ice cream."

I laughed to myself while a look of disbelief washed over Ryder's face once again.

"Unbelievable!" he exclaimed and threw up his hands.

Nathan and I laughed at Ryder and high-fived.

Together, all three of us stayed outside and watched the sunset as the sky turned form light blue to orange to a dark blue.

Thankfully the warm air stayed, even though the sun was already gone.

"You guys wanna head inside?" I asked them.

After I got no reply, I looked at Nathan and Ryder to see that both of them had fallen asleep.

I chuckled to myself and got up as best as I could without waking either of them. I picked up Nathan and carried him up to his room.

"You're getting way to big for this," I whispered as I set him on his bed.

I kissed the top of his head and said goodnight before walking back outside where Ryder was still sleeping in the hammock.

I smiled at the adorable sight and climbed back in to lay down with him.

To wake him up, I started peppering small kisses all over his face.

Eventually, he woke up and rubbed his eyes while yawning.

"Hey," he said, his voice still groggy.

"Hey," I chuckled and placed my lips on his. "You wanna go inside?" I asked him.

"No, let's just stay here for a few more minutes," he said and wrapped his arms around me.