"Excuse me mom!”

“What are you in such a hurry for? You might break something, relax.”

“Today is the day!” I scream out with excitement.

I look out my window and see the sun shining bright without a cloud in sight.

“Nothing can ruin today, nothing!”

“Oh that’s right, today is your date with Tzuyu right?” she says with a smirk.

“Mom!” my face get’s red with embarrassment, “We…we never said it was a date, we’re just hanging out, ok?”

“Do you look at all your friends the way you look at Tzuyu?” My brother sneers.

“You shush, no one is talking to you, ok?” I glare back.

“Ha whatever.” He gives up and goes back to playing whatever video game he had in his hands.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to drop you off Chaeng? There might be heavy traffic around this time.” My mom says looking worried.

“No, getting dropped off by my mom is so embarrassing, I’ll just take the bus I’ll be fine I promise. Oh! I’m going to put some stuff in my bag before I go!”

I stuff a couple sodas in my backpack along with some chips and candy. Movie snacks are super expensive so hopefully I can sneak this in so Tzuyu and I won’t have to spend too much.

“Ok then, be safe out there Chaengie!”

“Yes mom!”

I head out to the bus stop not too far from my house. I check my phone and the bus should be here in five minutes. Five minutes pass by and there is no bus. Five more minutes pass and still no bus, now I start to get worried. Maybe I should've let my mom drop me off. What’s going on? Finally, I see the bus heading towards me as it turns the corner. The driver opens up the doors.

“Hey sorry kid, you wait long?” He says worried.

“Yeah, like ten minutes, did something happen?”

“Yeah man, crazy accident a couple blocks back, no one was hurt thankfully, but it caused some heavy traffic. Where you headed?”

“I need to meet my friend at the movie theater, I’m running late.” I start gritting my teeth and keep staring at the time on my phone.

“I’ll try and get you and the rest of the passengers to their stops on time, can’t have everybody late right?”

“Thank you so much.”

This driver is nice, I hope he gets me to see Tzuyu sooner than later, I don’t want her to be waiting by herself. Time passes by and I can see the movie theater as we get closer and closer. I stand near the back door of the bus and get ready to run fast to the theater. As soon as the doors open I yell thank you to the driver and sprint to where Tzuyu is. I can feel the wind blow at me as I run and I make some stupid face that I can’t control because I’m focused on getting to Tzuyu on time. My backpack is bouncing and I can hear the snacks jumping around in there, I hope they don’t make a mess. I see Tzuyu and I realize that I must look terrible with my hair messed up from the running and my backpack bouncing around and me looking all sweaty.

“Sorry I’m late! Were you waiting here for a long time?” I say trying to catch my breath.

“Oh no it’s fine, I’ve probably only been waiting for five minutes.”

“Oh that’s good, the bus was late and there was a lot of traffic. I thought I was gonna be super late and I didn’t want you to be waiting for me for too long.”

I notice Tzuyu has this slight smile on her face. It made me lose my breath again, seeing her smile. Wait she isn’t laughing at me is she?

“Hey? What are you smiling about?”

“Nothing, the way you were running up here was just really cute. You’re really cute.”

What she said was so unexpected I couldn’t help but turn bright red. I didn’t want to look even more stupid in front of her so I turn away in an attempt to hide my face. I thought she was laughing at the way I looked, but instead she said I was cute. Tzuyu sure knew how to make me blush.

“Shut up, no I’m not. You’re the cute one here.” I try to fix my hair and straighten myself out to look presentable. I didn’t notice at first because I was exhausted from running, but Tzuyu really does look a lot cuter than usual. She even had a bow in her hair. Does she maybe consider this a date?

“Ahem, well let’s go buy our tickets now?”

My mind comes back to earth.

“Yeah of course, I’ve caught my breath now, we can go in.”

I reach to my pocket for my wallet to pay for my ticket, but Tzuyu stops me.

“Don’t worry about your ticket, I got it.”

“What? No way! I’ll pay for my own ticket its fine, really!”

She looked adamant about paying for me, so I let her do it. Maybe she really did think this was a date, the thought of that put butterflies in my stomach. After getting the tickets we looked at the concession stand and saw the snacks. Just as I thought, the food was way too expensive. I turned to Tzuyu and her face looked a little worried. She probably wanted to pay for our snacks too, but didn’t expect it to be so much money.

“Pssst Tzuyu.” I whisper.

I point inside my backpack and show all my snacks I packed for us. I couldn’t help but smile, since she paid for my ticket, it felt good to relie