Dating Him: The Series

by Michelle MacQueen

@MyFaceIsMyFace,@ChocolateIsLife is right #TheFutureIsFemale

  —@GirlsRock2019

  Peyton’s heart nearly burst at the user’s comment and positive replies. It still astounded her that so many people were using her app. No BS was exactly what so many young adults needed. She just prayed she could keep the cyberbullies away.

  —@MyFaceIsMyFace #GuysAreIdiots. Especially teenage boys who travel in packs. I guarantee if you showed an interest in any of them, they’d be thrilled. Keep your chin up and don’t let anyone’s words have that much power over you.#WeGotYou #NoBS

  —@CupcakesAreMyNemesis, @NoBSmod

  “Ashley, you’re so bad!” Peyton looked up at the familiar laugh. The hairs rose on the back of her neck at the sight of her former friend. “But you have the best stories.” Addison Parker slid into the seat next to Peyton without acknowledging her presence. Addison was too busy with her cheerleader friends to notice.

  “Peyton, honey, can you clock back in and wait on your friends?” her mom asked in a rush. “I have two waitresses late for their shifts, and we’re filling up.”

  “Sure.” Peyton slid off the bar stool where she’d sat, not bothering to remind her mother these girls were not her friends. Addie used to be one of her closest friends, but not since that night. Gone were the days when Addison Parker fussed over Peyton’s makeup and when Peyton’s slow burn romance with Cameron was the topic of almost every after-school conversation. After Cooper’s death, their friendship fell apart, and Addie moved on to new friends. Meaner friends.

  “Hi, guys,” Peyton said brightly, forcing a cheerful tone. “What can I get you?” She stood poised with her order pad on the counter, refusing to look at Addie. It hurt too much to see the cold insensitivity there.

  “I’m starving,” Ashley said. “I could eat a whole plate of chili cheese fries all by myself.”

  “Gross,” Addison said. “Can you imagine the calories?”

  Peyton coughed to cover her laughter. She’d seen Addie eat her weight in chili cheese fries more often than she could count.

  “You’re right. We should do salads,” Ashley agreed. “It would be so nice not to care about our weight like you, Peyton. Just look at that hamburger and mac and cheese she was chowing down on before we got here. It looks so divine. But willpower, ladies. I’ll have a half Cobb salad with ranch dressing on the side.”

  “Would you like steak, ham, or turkey?”

  “Obviously, turkey,” Ashley said as if that would make up for the mounds of cheese and bacon she’d neglected to substitute.

  “I’ll have the same,” the other girls echoed.

  “Anything else?” Peyton asked in a bored tone, not bothering to point out that her meal had a quarter of the calories of the diner salads they were about to inhale.

  “Let’s split some breadsticks. One for each of us,” Veronica added. “I haven’t had carbs in ages.”

  “Just this once,” Ashley agreed like she was allowing it against her better judgment. “We’ve hit the gym pretty hard this week.” She eyed Peyton’s phone. “I suppose we could have been bingeing Netflix like some people, but we are in peak physical condition. A little bread won’t kill us.”

  Peyton wanted to defend herself and point out she was the one eating the healthy food here and she was working on building something incredible—something they all used—not watching Netflix on her phone. But it wasn’t worth it. They wouldn’t believe her anyway. She turned toward the kitchen to put in their order when Ashley’s next words hit her like a truck.

  “We’ll have to watch it over the next few weeks before school starts, ladies. Rumor has it Cameron Tucker is returning from the Olympic Village in Emerson. After more than a year training for the Olympic track team he’ll be looking like a god and it’s our job to help him integrate back into the social world of Twin Rivers High.

  In a panic, Peyton gathered her dishes, tossing her half-eaten meal in the trash. Her hands trembled as she caught Addison’s eyes for just a moment. For one second, she thought she saw sympathy there, and then it was gone.

  Peyton raced into the bathroom at the back of the kitchen, her heart hammering in her chest. After eighteen months, Cameron was coming home. She looked at herself in the mirror, and disgust and self-loathing gazed back at her.

  “I can’t see him like this.” She eyed her fuller figure. After Cooper’s death and the destruction that came after, Peyton, always a curvy girl, had turned to food for comfort. In her grief, she hadn’t cared. By the time she started noticing the world carrying on around her again, the damage was done. She’d gained more than fifty pounds, and none of her clothes fit her anymore. Not even her fat jeans. After months of diet and exercise, she’d lost some weight, but she still had a long way to go.

  Peyton closed her eyes, refusing to look at herself any longer. She remembered how awful it felt the first time she had to buy a dress from the plus-sized department. She’d vowed she’d die before she’d ever shop on the fat side of the store. Now she had no other choice.

  She couldn’t bear the thought of seeing Cameron again. The last time they were together, their lifelong friendship was turning into much more. But there was no way Cameron Tucker—track god and Olympic hopeful—would ever look at her the same as he had that night after such a perfect first kiss. The girl he kissed that night didn’t exist anymore.

  Peyton jog-walked in the darkness around the school track. It was late, but she couldn’t face going home. Not until she worked off the calories from a dinner of too many carbs. She pushed herself to go faster. Thoughts of seeing Cameron again drove her like she had a demon hot on her tail.

  She’d thought she had come to terms with her lot as the fat girl. It had been that way her whole life, and for most of it, Peyton was strong enough to rise above the petty body shaming and find a level of confidence in herself that never wavered. But after gaining so much weight since she’d last seen Cam, how was she ever going to face him?

  Being the fat girl was nothing new. Peyton was in third grade when she first realized what made her different from everyone else. The thing that made her lesser somehow. She was only eight years old the first time the F word came to haunt her. Now, nearly a decade later, she could still remember the name of the classmate—a friend—who’d shattered her illusions about herself. Allison. It was ancient history, but her words cut deep into Peyton’s eight-year-old soul. Peyton and Allison were in the girls’ bathroom with a bunch of their classmates. Allison spoke to her from another stall.

  “How much do you weigh, Peyton?”

  “Um, I don’t know,” Peyton said.

  “You know you’re fat, right? Like twice the size of anyone else in our grade?”

  Young Peyton didn’t have a response to such harsh words. Of course, she knew she was bigger than most of her friends; she wasn’t blind. But she hadn’t realized her size gave others a license to ridicule her. Apparently, that made it okay … because Peyton was fat.

  Then in sixth grade, PE class with Coach Anderson was a living nightmare. Every day, filled with anxiety, Peyton headed to the gym with her classmates for her ritual hazing … from the teacher who had the best opportunity of anyone to help her overcome her weight problem before it became a lifelong struggle.

  Twelve years old and Peyton had to answer to the name “Big Mac” during roll call. She wasn’t the only one with weight issues. Peyton remembered a “Pat-the-fat” and an “Amanda-big-boned” in her class that year too—all names brought to life by the illustrious Coach Anderson. There were others who didn’t perform well athletically, but they got to respond to their actual names in class. But it was okay ... because Peyton was fat.

  Coach Anderson started every class with running laps. If you couldn’t make it three laps around the gym without stopping or walking, you got more laps. Some days, Peyton was forced to run-walk laps the entire period rather than play kickball or field hockey with her classmates. And then she went back to class sweaty and ashamed for being ostraciz
ed from her friends. But it was okay for a grown-ass man to shame a sixth grader because Peyton was fat and needed to learn that was not acceptable.

  Peyton hated PE with every fiber of her being. And now, here she was running laps in the middle of the night like her life depended on it.

  “I have four weeks left before school starts,” she reminded herself, taking the last turn in the track as she slowed to a stop. One more month to lose some of the weight she’d put on in Cameron’s absence. “I can drop twenty pounds in that time if I really push it.” Her calves burned, and she felt a little dizzy, but she had one more lap in her tonight. Peyton refused to be the fat girl anymore.

  Dating My Best Friend: Chapter Two

  Cameron

  ~ Cam

  I want you to know you can do anything.

  Peyton ~

  The stars used to hold every possibility. Cameron Tucker would lie in bed at night watching the cheap glowing stickers on his ceiling. They were childish, but he’d never been able to bring himself to take them down.

  I want you to know you can do anything.

  Those had been the words of his best friend, Peyton, when she was ten years old. She’d always been there when he doubted himself.

  But he’d left those stars behind, and they now felt farther away than ever. He couldn’t do anything. Not anymore.

  With a sigh, he rolled onto his side. Had his bed always been this uncomfortable? Was his room always depressing?

  Eighteen months ago, he’d left home and wasn’t sure he’d return. He never even had the chance to say goodbye to the people who were only sort of his friends. The only guy he’d been close with was dead. And he hadn’t called the girl his absence would hurt the most.

  Eighteen months. Enough time for the Cameron Tucker who’d lived in their small town to disappear. He closed his eyes, wanting the silence only sleep could bring. It was no use. The memories he’d fought so hard to forget were a constant presence now that he’d returned.

  Light crept around the edges of his curtains, but he didn’t know what time it was. School didn’t start for a few weeks yet, and he was perfectly content staying in his bed until then.

  A knock on his door ruined that possibility. Before he could answer, his mother poked her head in. The tentative smile on her face was just another reminder of how much things had changed. His parents hadn’t known what to say to him since he’d arrived home the day before.

  “Hi, sweetie.” Her sad eyes swept the bare walls of his room. The first thing he’d done when he got home was remove the posters belonging to the kid who’d lost everything in a single night. Her smile tightened. “I made you a smoothie. You didn’t eat dinner last night, so I expect you downstairs in five minutes.”

  She shut the door without waiting for a response. Five minutes? Was she kidding? Cam was no longer in the “roll out of bed and throw on some pants” stage of his life. It took him much longer than that to pull himself together enough to face the world. But she didn’t know. How could she? His parents had only visited him once during his time away.

  Twenty minutes later, he entered the kitchen. His father sat at the table with a newspaper hiding his face. He didn’t lower it or acknowledge Cam. Unlike Cam’s mother, his father wasn’t an actor. He couldn’t pretend things were as they’d always been.

  And Cam was grateful for that small mercy. He didn’t know how to speak to his father anymore either. For most of his life, their relationship was based on running. They were coach and athlete, both with a dream of making it to the Olympics.

  When the only dream you had died, part of you went with it.

  Cam’s mother handed him one of her healthy smoothies. He definitely hadn’t missed this. He’d spent so many years choking them down he just couldn’t do it anymore. This time, as he took a sip, he cringed at the chalky taste of too much protein powder. It was worse than he remembered.

  He attempted a smile. “Thanks, Mom.” He grabbed his keys off the hook on the wall.

  “Where are you going?” She wiped her hands on her apron. “I thought we could do some school shopping today.”

  Nope. He couldn’t do it. She tried so hard to treat him like he was still her normal son, and it made him feel like he was anything but.

  He only shook his head and left his parents behind. Outside, he dumped his smoothie into a bush and threw the empty cup into the back of his car before climbing in.

  He hadn’t planned where he was going, but there was a route he knew better than any other.

  Sun beat down on him through his windshield. It must have been ninety degrees. He wiped sweaty palms on his black sweatpants and gripped the steering wheel.

  Twin Rivers never changed. The whole town was stuck in some nightmare time warp. Two streets over from Cam’s house was Main Street where residents and tourists walked from crappy knickknack store to crappy antique store. The Anderson family had owned the hardware shop for three generations.

  Even the Main Street Diner… He averted his eyes as he passed the familiar building. Grandpa Callahan opened it four decades ago and passed it to his grandson when he died. Cam knew every inch of that restaurant.

  He wondered if Peyton Callahan was in there serving the early customers, her smile brightening their mornings. Cam had once told her she smiled too much. He hadn’t meant it. He’d just been teasing. She’d laughed and asked him why she shouldn’t smile. He hadn’t had an answer other than he’d secretly wanted her to reserve her goodness only for him. He’d been selfish that way. But he’d never told her how he felt, not until it was too late.

  He slowed and finally let his eyes rest on the diner. Through the window, he saw Mrs. Callahan standing at the counter probably poring over receipts.

  Being a part of their family was another thing he’d lost. Peyton would never forgive him for the way he’d left when she’d needed him the most. Even if she did, she deserved more than a best friend who was broken beyond repair. His breath clogged in his throat as Mrs. Callahan lifted her head and peered out the window as if she could sense him. Those eyes… That woman… She’d always had kind words and a warm home for him. She hadn’t deserved to lose her son.

  He tore his gaze away and continued down the road, turning out of the downtown area—if you could call it that. The road wound down toward the tumultuous convergence of the two rivers before inching up toward Defiance Falls. Cam suddenly couldn’t breathe.

  Drowning. He was drowning. He sucked in a breath as if it would expel the imagined water from his lungs and pressed the gas pedal to the floor. The car lurched forward, taking the narrow road at a speed he knew was too fast. But he had to get past it. He had to get away from the dark water and frothing falls. The droning of his car overcame the crash of water below.

  After a few minutes, he slammed on the brakes, coming to a screeching halt.

  He rested his forehead on the steering wheel, hearing their voices in his mind. We have to get out of here. Cam, get Avery to the shore. I’m not leaving without my brother.

  But he had. Cooper Callahan had still been in the car when it went over the falls while Julian Callahan made it out. Cam tried to help Cooper. After getting Avery to shore, he’d jumped back into the water, but the current was too strong, and he hadn’t made it back to the car before it tumbled over the edge.

  He slammed his head against the hard leather of his steering wheel, and his horn blared. Calming his breathing, he reached behind his seat for the box that was always there. The last time he’d been with Peyton, she’d given him a small wooden box containing notes she’d written in her girlish handwriting. She’d said they were encouragement for when he needed it. That was before the accident that changed their lives. He’d left the gift behind, but Peyton brought it to the hospital. Cam’s dad refused her entry but accepted the present.

  Cam hadn’t been able to make himself look at a single note, but he’d kept the box with him always. First, in his many hospital rooms and rehab facilities. Eventually, when he c
ould drive again, it lived on the back seat, almost as if she too was there.

  He ran his fingers over the carved wood, letting it soothe his nerves as he always did. Breathe, son. Breathe. The paramedic’s words that night never left him, and he did as he was told. Keep breathing. Don’t let yourself disappear. It will be okay.

  He set the box on the seat beside him and pulled his BMW back onto the road. The car had been a present from his parents. They thought it would make him feel better. Normal people sent flowers or maybe a balloon.

  What they didn’t understand was nothing could replace what he’d lost. Nothing could fix him.

  The school came into view. In a few short weeks, he’d be there for his senior year. If it was up to him, he’d have continued his online schooling. But nothing was up to him.

  He parked in the small lot next to the football stadium. A track wrapped around the field, and the familiar scene sent more pain through him than he thought he could feel anymore. But he couldn’t walk away.

  A few people lingered nearby, and some ran morning laps. Cam didn’t know if he was just paranoid or if their eyes really followed him. With any luck, they would barely notice his return. But he wasn’t the lucky sort, and the accident had changed their small town.

  On the field, the football team ran suicides. He hated football, yet he envied them. The black Tartan turf of the track held a familiar peace under Cam’s feet. He used to think it was where he was meant to be.

  Now, it represented a past he wanted to forget. Cam walked around the track to the bleachers and climbed up a few rows before sitting down. He recognized a few kids from the track team but didn’t approach them. He wasn’t one of them anymore.

  In truth, without running, he didn’t know where he fit anymore.

  He bowed his head and ran a hand through his shaggy brown hair. At the far end of the bleachers, a girl ran the steps. Cam lifted his eyes to watch her, a familiar yearning in his gut.