So I haven't updated this in almost four years. But I just reread it...and I really do like it. It might be tough going getting back into the swing of things at first. I really like the way I wrote this, but my writing style has changed since then, so I'm not sure how this will go. But I'll definitely give it my best shot!

Romeo and Julian

I was on cloud nine the next day. I kept sighing wistfully and reaching up to touch my lips like some lovesick schoolgirl. But I couldn't help it! My first time spending time with Greg Hatley, and he kisses me! I know it was only in the context of the play, but I can't let that little detail get me down. I've been kissed not once, but twice by my secret crush. I can die happy now.

"Lucas!" Mom started knocking on the bathroom door. "Geoff is here!"

I was pulled out of my daydreaming. "Um, tell him I'll be just a minute!" I called back. I couldn't stop thinking about what had happened yesterday, and it was taking me longer than normal to get ready for school. I think I had been brushing my hair for ten minutes now.

"All right," she replied slowly. "But hurry up! Don't make him late because of you dawdling." I could hear her move away from the door.

Sighing nervously, I looked at myself in the mirror again. I was wearing my best pair of jeans, the ones Geoff teasingly told me showed off my ass. I'd changed shirts five times. It had taken three tries to get my hair pulled back without there being any bumps in it. I always cared about my appearance, but I'd never put this much effort into it before. I was considering changing my shirt for a sixth time when my mom came back.

"Lucas!" she said sternly, banging on the door. "Get out here right now! You're going to be late!"

"All right!" I shouted back. I cast one more nervous glance at the mirror before finally opening the bathroom door. Mom was glaring at me on the other side.

"You look very nice, now get going," she said, jaw tight.

I smiled weakly. "Thanks, mom. I just have to grab my bag..."

Mom didn't say anything to that. She just followed me to my room and watched as I put on my shoes and grabbed my backpack. I gave the room a once over, decided I hadn't left anything, then made a beeline for the door. I hadn't eaten breakfast, but there was no time for that now. I opened the door and saw Geoff's car idling in the driveway. He honked as soon as he saw me.

"Come on!" he shouted, rolling down the window.

"Coming!" I shouted back. I ran out the door.

"Have a good day!" Mom called after me. She waited until I was in the car before shutting the door.

"Jesus Christ," Geoff groaned once I had the door shut. He put the car in reverse before I even had my seatbelt buckled. "What took you so long? Did you have to wait for your nails to dry?"

"No..." I mumbled, fumbling with the seatbelt. Geoff sped off toward the school. "I just...wanted to look nice."

Geoff would have stared at me long and hard if his eyes hadn't been glued to the road. "For what?" he asked. "It's just school, man. You don't even have class with Greg until fourth period."

I could feel my face get hot. "I know..." I tugged at a loose thread hanging from the hem of my shirt.

The car came to a stop at a red light, and Geoff looked over at me. He was quiet for a minute, then started laughing.

"W-what!?" I exclaimed, staring back at him.

"You're almost adorable, you know that?" My face got hot again. "Just one little kiss, and you're freaking out trying to impress him." He didn't mean anything bad by it, though. He was grinning at me, but looked away when the light changed.

"It wasn't one kiss," I insisted. "It was two kisses."

"Oh, yeah. Big difference there, Don Juan," Geoff said sarcastically.

I frowned. "I know..." I said quietly.

Geoff glanced in my direction then sighed. "Look, I didn't mean anything. Cheer up."

I nodded a little but didn't say anything. Geoff sighed, and we started to turn into the school parking lot.

"Well..." he began slowly as he pulled into his parking spot. I glanced over at him as he put the car in park and turned the key. He looked back over at me and grinned. "Did you at least have some nice dreams?"

My face got red and I punched his arm. "That's none of your business!" I squeaked.

Geoff laughed, rubbing his arm as he opened his door. "I'll take that as a yes," he teased.

I kept my head down as I got out of the car. Greg had, indeed, starred in a dream or two last night... But I wasn't going to tell Geoff about it!

"I see you're wearing your ass jeans," Geoff observed as we walked toward the school. "Trying to turn a certain someone's head?"

I could feel my ears getting hot. "Why are you looking anyway!?" I demanded, whirling around to look at him.

Geoff was just laughing at me. "Make sure you drop something and have to...bend over to pick it up," he continued, leering. "I'll bet Greg would like that."

A little bit of my anger evaporated then. "I hadn't thought of that..." Oh god, did I say that out loud?

Geoff laughed even harder, doubling over in the parking lot now. "Oh god, I'm sorry," he choked out. "You're just too funny right now!"

My face got red again. "Shut up!" I screeched, kicking him in the shin.

"Ow! Damn!" Geoff winced. I started walking on without him. "Hey, get back here!" He started jogging to catch up with me.

"Ack! No!" I started jogging to keep away. I knew what was coming if he caught me.

"Thanks a lot," I mumbled, pouting.

"Oh, what?" Geoff asked, feigning ignorance. We were walking together to fourth period, drama class.

"You messed up my hair!" I whined. "I spend forever on it this morning!"

Geoff rolled his eyes, draping his arm around my shoulders. "Lucas," he said seriously. "You had it pulled into a ponytail. It's not that hard."

I scowled, but couldn't say anything. He had a point, after all... It was just a ponytail. It had taken maybe five minutes to fix it in the bathroom. Anyway, I couldn't stay irritated for long, because as soon as we walked into the classroom, there he was. Greg.

"Oh, hey Lucas!" he called when he saw me, waving.

I waved back, grinning stupidly. "Hi, Greg."

Geoff snorted and poked me in the back. "Go on and talk to him. I know you want to."

"Thanks," I mouthed to him, then headed over to Greg, smiling in a way that I hoped was calm and not at like I was constipated.

"Hey," Greg said to me again when I got closer. "Thanks for practicing with me yesterday."

"Oh, no problem," I said, trying to sound casual. How was it that I could act in just about any part, no problem, but couldn't even act calm around Greg? "Oh!" It was then that I remembered. Greg watched me curiously as I set my backpack down on a desk, unzipped it, and started to dig for something inside. "Here's your script," I said, pulling it out of my bag. I turned so quickly to hand it to him that I hadn't noticed he'd moved closer, and I ended up smacking him in the chest with it.

"Oh, thanks!" he said brightly, taking the script from me. "So you found yours then?"

It took me a minute to respond. I had to get my brain to stop obsessing over how nice his chest was. His t-shirt was kind of tight, so I could almost make out the outline of—

"Lucas?" he asked, sounding a little worried. "Are you all right?"

"Oh!" I was still staring at his chest. I had to fight to tear my eyes away. "Um, yeah. I'm fine. Just...spacing out. No need to worry." I smiled, trying to look reassuring. I probably just looked guilty. Geoff was probably watching all of this from a distance and laughing.

"All right," Greg replied, smiling down at me. He seemed to buy it, at least.

"Hey, Lucas?"

"Yeah?" I didn't want to stop staring at Greg's perfect eyes, but I had to at least acknowledge whoever was talking to me. I turned around and saw one of the girls in the class, Hannah Peterson. She was overseeing the costumes and makeup.

"Hey, Hannah," Greg said behind me. He was smiling at her. I couldn't help but feel a little bit jealous.

"Hi, Greg." Hannah smiled flirtatiously at him, then looked back down at me. "Lucas, could you come here for a second?" she asked, looking a little impatient.

"Um..." I glanced back at Greg. "Sure," I replied, finally looking away from him.

"Good," Hannah said, and with that, she grabbed my wrist and dragged me away from Greg, over to a group of girls standing over in one corner. Since only the guys were acting, the girls were going to be going all out with costumes, makeup, and set design. "Here he is," she announced, pushing me into the middle of the group. I was immediately attacked.

"What are your measurements?" Alecia asked me. As if I would know!

"Um...I wear small shirts?" I offered meekly. "And...28 inch waist pants?"

"No, no, no," she said, shaking her head. "Your measurements." She held up a tape measure that I hadn't noticed before. "Here, hold your arms straight out."

Then, against my will, they took my measurements. Apparently, thanks to my non-existent hips, I was between a size 2 and a size 4.

"God, you're so skinny," one of them groaned.

"Um, thanks?" I wasn't sure if I should take it as a compliment or not; I was a little sensitive about being so small.

"Come here," Jennifer said, tugging on my arm. "We want to see what we can do about your hair."

"My hair?" I asked, panicking slightly. After I'd gone through that much trouble to fix it for Greg? No!

"Yeah," Katie replied, reaching up to pull out my hair tie. "You can't just wear it like this on stage."

It was too late to protest. I just had to stay there and let them have their way with me. This time, I was sure I could hear Geoff laughing.

In the end, the girls had pulled back the top layer of my hair with a pink ribbon. They had even put some lip gloss and mascara on me before I finally broke away. The end result? Now I was standing in front of James, the guy who was stuck playing the nurse, trying to rehearse the second scene of act three. It was a serious scene, where Nurse tells Juliet about Tybalt's death, but James just kept staring at my makeup and the bow in my hair, and he couldn't deliver any of his lines without laughing.

"Can heaven be so envious?" I asked, gritting my teeth.

"Romeo can," he started, sounding like he was choking, "though heaven cannot." He was struggling not to laugh as he read the next few words. "O Romeo, Romeo!" He gave up and started laughing out loud. "Who ever would have thought it?" he asked, completely slipping out of character.

"Oh, this is ridiculous!" I fumed, turning to Mr. Louis. Even he had a hand over his mouth as he chuckled quietly. "Can I please take this stuff off?"

"Now Lucas," Mr. Louis reasoned, smiling, "you're going to have to have your hair done and wear makeup on stage. It's best to let everyone get it out of their systems now."

"Besides," someone in the class added, "it looks cute on you!"

I turned, expecting Geoff to have said it, but the voice hadn't come from his direction. Instead, it seemed like... Greg? I stared at him, blushing, and he just smiled back at me. I swallowed nervously and turned back to James. "All right," I said quietly, trying to regain my resolve.

"What devil art thou that dost torment me thus?" I began, throwing myself back into the role. James was still trying not to laugh, but he seemed to have calmed down at least a little bit. "This torture should be roared in dismal hell. / Hath Romeo slain himself? Say thou but ay, / And that bare vowel I shall poison more / Than the death-darting eye of cockatrice..."

As soon as we were done practicing, I took the ribbon out of my hair. I didn't know what the girls had done with my hair tie, and I didn't have any spares on me. But I wasn't going to keep wearing a pink ribbon in my hair the rest of the day. I hated having to keep tucking my hair behind my ears, but it was better than the alternative.

I was stuffing my script back in my bag and getting ready to head to the cafeteria for lunch when someone put their hand on my shoulder.

"Hck!" I sucked air in quickly through my teeth and whirled around, startled. I expected to see Geoff there, trying to scare me, but instead it was Greg, and he looked mildly apologetic.

"Sorry," he said, sticking his hands in his pockets casually, "I didn't scare you, did I?"

"No, no," I assured him, though it was a lie. "It's okay." I hesitated, not sure what to say now. "So...um... What's up?" I was mentally kicking myself now. Real smooth.

"Oh! Uh..." He seemed nervous again. "Do you want to get together to practice again? Maybe this afternoon?"

I immediately thought of yesterday's practice and my face started getting hot. "Um, sure. That sounds good," I said, nodding as I started shuffling my feet.

Greg grinned. "Okay. Want me to just give you a ride from school?"

"Sure." I smiled a little. "That'd be great."

"Great. I'll meet you after school by your locker."

"All right. I'll see you then."

I knew I was grinning like an idiot as I waved at him when he left the room. I was definitely obvious enough for Geoff to notice.

"Got another date with Greg?" he teased, ruffling my hair as he walked up.

"Shut up," I said, blushing. "I'll tell you at lunch."

I'm looking forward to continuing this story. Lucas is a lot more light-hearted personality wise compared to Travis (My Summer at Camp Hell), so it's going to be interesting for me while I try to write both stories.

Please review if you liked it! Getting reviews makes me happier than you can imagine, and it's great motivation to keep writing!