Chapter 5

A few hours later...

At the boys' house...

"Chicken omelette is served," says Liam after he finished cooking some dishes for dinner along with Nate.

"The smell is already alluring me," says Nate as he puts a plate of stir fried vegetables on the dining table.

Just then, the door bell rang and Nate decides to walk and open the door. Alex walks in with bags full of groeceries in his hands.

"Bro, you're back," Nate says.

"Yeah, these are the groceries," says Alex as he walks to the kitchen area to put down the groceries.

Alex puts down the groceries in the kitchen as he starts to sort them out. He had put aside a bag of vegetables since he knew Liam wanted to cook stir fry vegetables as well for tonight. After putting the groceries away, Alex wash his hands and walks back to the living room. He notice that Jack is not in sight, though it's almost dinner time.

"Where's Jack?" ask Alex with curiousity.

"Oh, he went out to pick up Rachel," says Liam as he starts preparing the plates.

"What? But she told me she's going home with her friend, Emma," says Alex as he still sound surprised.

"He told us he's gonna pick her up at her work place," says Nate as he sits down on the couch.

"I thought she already quit her job," says Alex as he sounds more and more confuse at the situation.

"Jack said that she told him that she got a new job at Q&A Bar with her friend," Nate says.

Alex sits down on the couch next to Xiaojun as he is still surprised at what Nate just told him. Rachel didn't say anything to him about her new job at Q&A Bar, and he was starting to wonder why didn't she tell him before knowing that it's his duty to protect her. Knowing that Jack was the first to know before him, made him feel like he missed out on something.

"Dinner's ready," says Liam as he walks out of the kitchen with a plate of stir fried vegetables.

Alex and Nate walks to the dining table as they have dinner together with Liam. Through out the whole dinner, for some reasons that even Alex couldn't understand, somehow he couldn't keep his mind off Rachel.

Meanwhile, at Q&A Bar...

"Enjoy your drink, Sir," says Rachel as she hands a glass of whisky to the tall man standing across the counter.

"Thank you, Baby Girl," says the guy before he walks away with a wink.

Rachel turns around and roll her eyes at the thought of the flirty guys at the bar. This was actually the third time a guy  tried to flirt her while ordering some drinks.

"Another flirty dude?" Emma ask as she and Rachel continue to make more drinks.

"Tell me about it. That's the third time tonight," says Rachel with an annoyed tone.

"Well that's annoying," says Emma.

"You bet," says Rachel.

"Hang in there, girl! Our shift will end soon," says Emma as she pats Rachel's shoulder.

Their shift soon comes to an end and Rachel and Emma starts to prepare to go home.

"I'll be going back. And you?" Emma ask as she hops on her bike.

"My friend actually called and said he'll pick me up," says Rachel.

"Ah ok. Does he happen to be a sweet guy who has your interest?" Emma teases.

"No. He's just a friend," Rachel says, though her cheeks are now blushing shyly as the thought of Jack comes a cross her mind.

"Ok then. Well, I gotta go home now. Bye, Rachel," says Emma.

"Bye, Emma. Stay safe," says Rachel as she watch as Emma rides through the streets.

Rachel waits outside the bar for Jack to pick her up. He had called her saying that he will arrive in a few minutes. Rachel starts to observe the streets, looking for any signs of her childhood friend in a car.

A few minutes later, a white car comes passing by and stops in front of the bar where Rachel is waiting. The car opens to reveal Jack coming out of the car.

He walks over to help her put her bike in the back of his car, before opening the car door for me. He enters the car and gives Rachel a smile.

"I hope I didn't make you wait too long, " says Jack as he starts to drive.

"About 10 minutes," says Rachel.

"Man, I'm the late one tonight and it's our first playdate after 12 years," says Jack as he lets out a small sigh. "I need to learn to be on time."

"Hey, stop worrying. If you forgot, I was also late for our last playdate 12 years ago," says Rachel in a chill tone.

Hearing Rachel's words makes Jack slowly smile at the memories they had 12 years ago. They were the best of friends and unseperable, and would often play and help each other in everything. For a few years of their childhood, it felt like they had everything in their hands with each other.

"So where are we going?" Rachel ask with curiousity.

"Let's have dinner and I'll show you a surprise at the end," says Jack with a bright smile.

Rachel turns her head to the blonde hair boy with a puzzled look. "What surprise?"

"For now, that is still a secret," says Jack with a small smile.

Rachel lets out a small laugh. "You always love giving surprises."

"And you always love getting surprises," Jack says, which makes Rachel slowly forms a small smile.

At West Side Plaza...

After about a 20 minutes drive, Jack and Rachel arrives at an urban-style Western restaurant. They walk inside the restaurant to see that it's almost a full house.

"Hello! How can I help you?" ask the waitress as she walks over to Jack and Rachel.

"Table for two please," says Jack.

"Right this way," says the waitress as she leads Jack and Rachel to the their table.

Jack and Rachel takes a seat and start reading the menu. Both of them decided to order various of dishes to share, including two tenderloin steaks (medium-well and well-done) along with french fries, chicken salad, and a lasagna, complete with two glasses of fresh orange juice. After writing their orders, the waitress walks back to the kitchen.

Rachel's POV...

I watch as the waitress walks back to the kitchen to prepare our orders. I turn my head to see Jack smiling as he stares at me.

"So how's college life?" ask Jack.

"Good," I say. "How about you and the guys?"

"We're pretty good," says Jack. "So how is Alex? Is he being a good guardian?"

"He's good, but can be too overprotective at times," I say.

The waitress then walks back with two glasses of orange juice, before walking back to the kitchen.

"Then he's doing a good job, cause that's exactly what I told him to do," Jack says before he takes a sip of his orange juice.

"I literally told him that he didn't need to be overprotective in the first place," I say before I take a sip of my orange juice. "I'm an adult."

"Well, you still need protection for your safety," says Jack.

"You got a point," I say as I roll my eyes.

The waitress then walks back to our table with our tenderloin steaks, as well as the other dishes. She puts everything on our table neatly before walking away.

"Ok, dinner time," says Jack.

"Yeah," I say as the two of us starts to try the various dishes on the table.

Through out dinner, Jack and I decided to share stories with each others. He told me that his dad is good friends with Alex's dad back in the days, in which he had already been friends with Alex since he was little. It was a bit surprising because I've never seen Jack having other friends besides me when we were both little.

"So you guys had been friends since you were kids?" I ask.

"Yes, but Alex's parents decided to move to Ottawa when he was 5 years old. Ever since that, our dads still kept in touch and would sometimes meet up everytime Alex's family came to visit Minnesota for the holidays," says Jack. "You could say they are like brothers."

"I see," I say before I take a sip of my orange juice. "I never knew about that. I almost thought that I was your only friend when we were little," I say as I feel a little embarrassed at my own thought.

"Well, you're my only female friend, cause I prefer to play with the boys," says Jack with a small smile, making me let out a small laugh at his sentence.

"And you're my only friend as I remember," I say.

"How can I forget that you used to be the little introvert in the neighborhood? I have to admit, when I first met you, I thought you were scared of me," Jack says.

"Haha, yeah right. I was never scared of you. But hell, I was a shy kid back there," I say as I continue to cut my steak.

Time pass and the two of us soon finish our dinner. Again Jack keeps talking about the surprise he's gonna show me after dinner. I wonder what it could be.

"So can you at least just give me a clue about this surprise?" I ask with curiousity.

"Fine, I'll give you a clue. It's a place where we can reborn as kids," says Jack as he continues to drive and keeps his vision on the road.

Reborn as kids? I thought in confusion.

I glance over at the childish blonde to see he has this secretive smile on his face. After all these years, this guy really didn't change at at all. I still see him as the childish boy who I can actually rely on in a weird way to be my all time best friend, or brother.

After a 30 minutes ride, we finally arrive at our destination and Jack parks the car.

"Where are we?" I ask as I remove my seatbelt.

"We're at the beach," says Jack as he hops out of the car and close his door.

Jack opens the car door for me and I walk out. The two of us starts walking to the beach, as we start to observe how quiet it is. There's no one around other than the two of us.

"It's so quiet," I say as I continue to observe the quiet beach while walking.

"Yeah," says Jack as he stops in his steps to hear the sound of the waves. "And peaceful."

I start walking back to Jack and join him in watching the waves. I see that there are a few stars in the sky tonight, which makes the atmosphere more beautiful.

"The view is so beautiful," I say to Jack.

Jack glance at me with a bright smile. "Hey! That's just a small part of the surprise," says Jack with excitement in his voice. "I haven't show you the big part yet!"

"Then what's the big part?" I ask as I stare at him while putting my hands on my hips.

"Close your eyes," says Jack with a shy smile as he turns his head down.

I close my eyes and wait for whatever to happen since Jack said that it's part of the surprise. I could feel the ocean breeze which makes me feel peaceful, but just then I could slowly sense that someone is getting closer and closer to me. His steps became closer and I could feel our faces only inches apart. In my mind, it's gotta be Jack. Maybe he has another crazy idea in his mind for the surprise.

"Tag! You're it!" Jack surprises me with his loud voice as he tag my hand and starts running off like a little boy.

I open my eyes in surprise as I see the boy running around while laughting.

"Catch me if you can, Spencer," says Jack.

"What the heck? Jack Pierce, I'll get you!" I almost scream at my sentence as I start running around to chase Jack.

The quiet beach suddenly feels lively as we run around chasing each other in a game of tag. For a moment, I feel like a little kid again as we run around carelessly while laughting at each other. From Jack's face, I could tell that he's also expressing his inner child with joy.

Tonight reminds me how much I haven't had this much fun in years. By that, tonight I wish I don't have to be an adult for a moment. We even got sands on our clothes at some points for the amount of times we had tripped each other and fall on the sand. Yet, that didn't matter. At least for now, I just want to behave like a kid again with Jack.

"Haha got you!" says Jack as he catches me from behind, making me laugh harder.

"Ahh, ok! You win," I say as he still have his arms wrapped around my waist. I slowly glance down to see his arms releasing me slowly. I turn back to face him as we stare into each others eyes.

"That was fun," says Jack as he stares deeply into my eyes.

"Yeah," I say as I stare back into his eyes.

I notice how Jack had grown to be a fine young man, yet his youthful aura remains within him. Since we were little, I always knew he would grow up to be a cool guy, yet I never imagine myself to actually be mesmerize by all of his charms when we grew up. Even under the night sky, his messy blonde hair and beautiful ocean blue eyes still looks breathtaking.

Slowly he walks closer to me, making us only a few inches a part. He slowly puts his hands on my waist, as his face gets closer and closer.

I was about to close my eyes and just let the moment flow, when I notice a man slolwy walking to our direction. The man had a black cap on and a black mask covering his mouth.

To be continue...