Chapter 38- Effort

 Paige's POV

I sit up wondering who would be knocking this early in the morning. Especially since almost everyone is gone, even the girls. The trip must've been open to the whole school. I throwing on a shirt, and decide my spandex will work for pants until I know who it is. I run my hand through my hair, and hope it looks okay. Swinging open the door, I see Jake all dressed and ready for the day. I turn looking at my clock, it's ten time for me to be getting up anyways.  But Jake? What's he doing? 

"Hi." I say opening the door again. 

"Hey." He smiles at me. 

"Didn't I say a couple days..?" I ask, still not sure what's going on. 

"Yeah... I thought about it to make sure I was sure. I know I'm sure." He replies leaning against the door frame.  He couldn't have thought about ti to much, it's only been a couple hours. I give him a look and he nods, walking past me. "Seriously... it took me like two minutes. I know I'm sure... so spend the day with. We can talk... get to know each other.."

"Jake." I say.

"Come on Paige. Give me a real chance." He begs, and I let out a huff of air. 

"What ever." I sigh, and I can see his face brighten. "Give me thirty minutes." I push him out of my room. I lean against the door breathless once he is gone. Oh my god, I'm going on a date like thing with Jake! I scurry off to my bathroom turning on the shower, and as the water heats up I pick out an outift. Ten I go through the shower with my hair up, it doesn't need washed, but I want to run ovre my legs again just in case.  Once I'm done I change into the short and shirt I choose, and I then go brush my teeth and fix up my hair. Then I open the door, and run downstairs where Jake is waiting. 

"You look amazing... like uasual." He greets me. 

"What exactly are we gonna do?" I ask, grabbing a banana off the counter. I set it back down thinking it's probably not the best food to have for breakfast with Jake around. I go to the fridge for an apple. 

"That is a surprise." He smirks at me, and I role my eyes. "You might want to grab your phone, a jacket, and like a blanket." He hints, and I don't know where he would be taking me that needs a blanket.

"I'll be back." I run back up to my room, I grab a blanket, but not a jacket... I'll have the blanket... and my phone. Pulling it from the charger I go through all the messages I have. Which Jake wasn't lying he sent me a couple messages. I feel bad, but my phone seriously died... I never really use my phone much anyways. To talk with family back at home... and my grandparents. We all have iphones for facetime.  "Okay! I'm ready." I hold my blanket and phone. 

"Are you sure? Do you want anything else, it's a long  drive." He informs me, and now I'm even more lost to where we're going. Long drive...what else could I bring? I get an idea, and I run back up to my room. Grabbing my history note cards, and my purse now I think I'm ready for sure this time. "Note cards?" He asks, and now it's my turn to smirk. He leads me out to his car, and I slide into the passenger seat as he gets in the drivers side. 

"So you gonna tell me where we're going?" I ask, it's a long shot but worth trying. He just shakes his head, and I sigh, watching as we leave campous. He checks out and the guard looks in the car at me and then to Jake and then back at me with confusion. I just look away back at the street. I'm guessing Jake doesn't take girls off campous often, and when he does it's not this early in the day. So.. how many times has he taken one of his 'dates' off campous? I really actually wonder how many other 'dates' there was. I shake away the thoughts, if Jake and I ever had the ex's cpversation it woud just be a minute long. I've never been in a relationship before, and I'm guessing Jake hasn't either... all the other girls were just one night flings... I think.

After about twenty minutes of silence in the car, I finally loose it. I sit up, turning and facing Jake. Clearing my throat, I begin, "So, where are we going? How much further is it?"

"Would you relax... It's not like I'm bringing you to some remote part in the forest to kill you." He laughs, and I sit back not happy. For all I know he is taking me to some remote forrest! "Okay... that's a little bit of a lie." He whispers.

"What?!" I sit up, ready to jump and grab the wheel if need to.

"We're going to my families private beach. No forrest with a bunch of trees, but still we'll be alone.." He sighs, glancing at me. 

"It's a bit cold for swimming." I say, wishing he would've told me this before we left the school. 

"We wont be swimming either... it's going through the time period for a lot of the jellyfish to be around." He says, "You'll see when we get there..." He exclaims glancing at me again, then back at the road. I lean back letting out a big breath of air, and he chuckles. "Do you not like being in cars?" He asks.

"I hate sitting for long periods of times." I explain, "I don't know, I guess I just hate being still. I try to keep myself busy." 

"I've noticed... dancing, musical, tutoring, straight A student, and you seem to still have free time for parties and friends." He smiles, I look away out the window. That's when I seet the drive way to his house. I glance at the clock we left the school forty minutes ago! Meaning we're almost there I think, well if we just passed his house I hope that means we're almost there.  "I wouldn't get to excited... we're only about half way there." He says next to me, and I can feel my spirit fall. 

"Flash card time then." I smile at his frown now. I begin going through the cards quizing him. 

****

"Paige... hey.. we are here." I hear Jake, I open my eyes blinking at the light. I must've fallen asleep. I look at Jake who is waiting with my door open for me to get out. He smiles at me offering his hand, I take it, and stand up stretching out. I look out at the beach, and I can't help but smile. It's beautiful. It's a small little sectioned off part of the ocean and sand bar. Looking closer though I see what he ment be not actually swimming.There are a couple jet skiers and they have something that they're doing to the water I look around spotting a cazeboo in which there is a table set up. Jake planned a romantic date? I glance at him, and he turns pink and looks away. 

"It's beautiful." I say, giving his hand a small squeeze. He leads me over to the shelter, and I see there is a basket and a blanket and flowers.  "So... how'd you get all this done in time? Who'd you have to call?"

"Jayla..." He sighs, "I told her not to go over board... sorry." He sighs, looking at the rose petals sprinkled around. I giggle, looking out at the beach. 

"It's okay." I say taking in the fresh air. We walk along the shore, bare foot for a while before we actually eat. We talk, more about interests and things getting to know each other. It's actually surprizing how much we already new about each other. He talks about his parents to me, and his families business. About how his dad wants him to take  it when he graduates, and that he doesn't want Jason to have it. He talks about how him and Jayla are close, and that she is getting to old. It makes me smile seeing how much he loves his family, even Jason. Jake respects him to a certain extent, I can tell, he wont admit it but he does. 

"How about you?" He asks, looking down at me. I knew it would all flip back to me, what should I say? My life and family aren't as intersting as his. No way close!

"Well... I guess us Easton's are just a normal family." I look away feeling kind of plain. I mean we aren't rich, and neither of my parents owns a company. My dad is a police officer, and my mom is a nurse. It was mostly just Patrick and me growing up. they both have important jobs that often keep them busy. It was patrick who always came to school concerts when I was young and in elementary, even he himself was still in high school. I guess when I was old enough to realize that my parents were gonna be busy, I became more independant. I learned how to cook, and I always made sure I did my homework, and studied. Of course our parents were in our livea s much as they could be, they always made it to my dance recitalsd. They also took one day out of a month off so the whole family could spend it together. All in all a normal family.

After a while we make our way back to the shelter, and we talk a little more. I get him to open up more about Jason, and what happened that changed their relationship. He doesn't go into much detail, but I get a little bit out.  I don't push it further, when he seems to not want to talk about it anymore. I feel bad, it just seems that when Jake started getting attention Jason didn't like it. It seems to me that Jason is scared that Jake will out record him in his reputation. I almost role my eyes at them both, I don't understand the whole reputation thing. But if it's important to him.. I'll live with it. 

Jake digs into the picnick basket pulling out a vine of grapes, and I grab the blanket. and I spread it out on the sand. We talk some more, while trying to toss grapes into each others mouths. We move on to sports, and I tell him about softball and volleyball. He talks about baseball and basketball.

The day was perfect, and we didn't even realize so much time had passed until the un started setting. We'd spent the whole day talking. Once we did notice the sun setting though, we decided we should probably get back to school. It's Saterday night, so we don't have school in the morning or anything, but still we thought it be best if we were back before it got to dark, it is like  a two hour drive anyway so by the time we get there it will probably be dark. He grabs my hand, once we're on the road and he holds on to it the whole ride home. I don't sleep this time, which surprises me, but the car also isn't quiet at all. We still talk, which is amazing because we shouldn't have anymore to talk about but there are millions of more things it seems. We talk about our favorites memories, and our least favorite. Favorite foods, and our most annoying family members like cousins or uncles. The only thing we never mention is the future. Which I am okay with. I mean this is technically the first date, so talking about a future together could jynx it all. The only thing that has anything to do with the future is the musical, which is also another thirty minute conversation we have on our trip back. 

Somehow from the musical we get baseball, and I decide to tell him Jason's offer for me to be the manager. Mentioning that Jason offered it, makes him quiet for a moment. I watch his face as he thinks it through,  but I don't get much. Jake is good at hiding emotions. Which I guess he must be used to doing around Jason... he becomes stiff like this when Jason is around, and when Jason is in the conversation. I wish that Jake really trusted me when I say nothing will happen between Jason and me. But I understand that I'm sure Jake asked all his other girl to not go to him yet they did. I also know that it's hard for Jake when it comes to Jason and me because Jason and I have a small 'history'. It's was just a dumb little kiss to me, but I get the feeling Jason told Jake it was more. I don't push the matter of me actually wanting to do it, I do add in that if I did do it though we would be together more often. That makes him smile slightly, but he also realizes that Jason and I would need to spend more time together. 

"Hey.. Jason told me to think about it." I say, finally not wanting Jake to think about it to much. "Why don't you think about it too? If you really don't want me to I wont." I offer. He squeezes my hand, and pulls it up to his lips giving the back of my hand a quick kiss. 

"If it's something you really want to do I don't want to be the one to stop you." He says looking over at me. I shrug my shoulders. I really hadn't thought about it to much until now. I actually kind of forget I even had the offer. 

"Well I wouldn't mind spending the extra time with you."  I look straight ahead at the road. We drive past a sign saying the school is a mile ahead. 

"Oh yeah huh? Well... I guess bus rides would be pretty fun. We could sit in the way back seat and do-" 

"Jake!" I laugh, and so does he. 

"I wasn't gonna go there but you know if you really wanted to." He chuckles. 

"God... focus on the road." I cover my eyes with my free hand. We pull back onto school grounds and Jake checks in at the gates. He pulls up to his dorm, and runs around letting me out. 

"I am going to walk you back to your dorm." He smiles at me, and I shake my head. He is definately trying to impress me. It's worked all day. He's been sweet and open all day, and he has been a gentle men. He is really trying.

"If only you tried this hard at your history homework." I look up at the stars, he unfolds my blanket and wraps it around my shoulders. I grab it with my left hand, and then he grabs my right hand walking next to me on my right side. 

"I can do that." he whispers. "If that would make you understand how much I want to be with you."  He looks down at me, with a serious look. 

"I had a good time with you today." I admit, "Great time actually."  He smiles, a little boy grin. "Did you have fun though?" I question.

"Most I've had in a long time." his smile broadens, it's contagious. 

"What about with all your guy friends?" I inquire, leaning back against his car. I pull the blanket in around me tighter, it's a chilly night. 

"Hmmmm nope." He says not even really thinking about it. "Now, let me walk you back to your dorm, and be a nice gentlemen."  I look up at him in suspicion. 

"Jake Lincoln ... a gentle man?" I ask jokingly, "Well, I never thought I'd live to see the day." 

"Ah you see new things everyday." He smiles down. "Of course, I don't have to be to gentle if you don't want me too." He smirks. I shake my head at him, and he chuckles. I grab the collar of his shirt, and pull him towards me. Our lips touch, and fireworks go off in my head. It's first time it's happened, out all the times we have kissed. For some reason my mind drifts to when he was talking about the elusive one, and soul mates. I let go of his shirt, but he doesn't move. It's not a rough and heat filled kiss, it's more of a... first shy kiss after a date. Which is what it is. 

"Get a room!" a voice says, and Jake steps away. We both look towards the way it came from. The bus. It came from the bus dropping off students. The ball game! They are just getting back! I look away completely embarassed. How many people saw?! Who is all on that bus?  Jake shakes his head, as the bus stops and a bunch of guys... his friends get off the bus. I take a deep breath, unsure how the rest of this night is gonna play out. Jake could completely revert into a jerk, and the whole would've been a waste!

"Ready to go?" He asks, without saying anything to his friends. I look over his shoulder seeing them watching us. 

"Jake-"

"Ah... gentle men remember?" He asks, and a smile comes to me. He offers his hand to me again, this is it. The moment of truth. Holding hands in front of his friends. It's little kiddish, but it's something that shows.  I grasp his hand, and he smiles at me teeth and all. "So.. if I really try on my homework, you'll go on another date with me right?" he asks as we walk away from his dorm. His friends behind us snickering. Which he ignores greatly. He is trying. 

"Hmm, I supose." I look up ahead, trying to seem reluctant. He still gets a giggle out of me though, and he holds my hand tighter. Once we're back at my dorm, he doesn't even go inside the dorm. "I had a wonderful day." I say again. 

"Me too." He says, "I should go.. before I loose this whole gentlemen like attitude." He chuckles. 

"Goodnight, Jake." I say, he steps closer to me kissing my cheek. Then he lets go of my hand and steps down the stairs. 

"Goodnight, Paige." He replies. I go inside, leaning against the door. Like you see in movies when the let out a breath and bite their lips. Accept I don't bite my lip. I let out a breath though. Holy shit, Jake and I spent the day together! I agreed to another date! We held hands, and talked. I get the feeling this is right. Those fireworks were a sure sign. 

Once I'm in my room, I go to my bed. I plop down and sleep comes fast. Today was long and amazing. Jake really put in an effort. If he is trying hard... then he really wants this.. I think. I really do wish he'd try this hard at his homework though!