First Love, Fragile Heart by Susan Bloom

Episode : 3

Monday morning, Sandy found herself not wanting to go to school and see Andrew after that super awkward football game. She would rather just hide from him in her room for the rest of her high school career. That didn't fly with her parents though. When she got to school she was immediately approached by her friend Tracy. "Sandy! Sandy! you'll never guess who wants to go to homecoming with you!" Tracy shouted, even though she was inches away from her. Sandy's heart instantly began to flutter, hoping that it was who she thought it was. "Who??" Sandy asked with an excited tone. "Chase Duffy," Tracy replied, still all hyper and loud. Her heart sank, but she decided to fake excitement for Tracy's sake. Chase was a runner, with really long legs, blonde curly hair and a face that resembled a little boy. "Oh, awesome!" She said with a fake smile. "I know right, he's going to ask you after school today in the picnic area, but you didn't hear that from me,"

Sure enough, she was right, after school, Chase stood with a bouquet of Lilies, waiting for Sandy to come out so he could ask her the dreadful question. "Hey Sandy, um I was wondering um if you would go to Homecoming with me," Chase asked, turning super red in the face. Sandy couldn't possibly say no, and it wasn't like Chase was a bad looking guy, and it certainly wasn't like Andrew had asked her, so she panicked and told him that she'd love to go with him. "That's awesome, send me a picture of your dress so we can coordinate," Chase replied with excitement. Trying to be excited, Sandy couldn't get the sinking feeling out of the pit of her stomach. Chase was so sweet, but he wasn't Andrew.

A couple of weeks went by and then came the night of the homecoming dance. Sandy and Jazz both got ready at Sandy's house, before the boys came over to pick them up for pictures. "What are you going to do if Chase goes in for a kiss tonight?" Jazz asked while putting on mascara. "Duck and cover," Sandy replied with a little giggle. She had never kissed a boy before and she certainly didn't want her first kiss to be with a guy she hardly knew, and didn't really like that much. "I bet you wouldn't do that if it was Andrew trying to kiss you," Jazz mocked. Although she wasn't wrong, Sandy didn't want to even bother day- dreaming about that. Girls, the boys are here," they heard Sandy's mom yell from the bottom of the stairs.

After pictures, Jazz, Sandy, Chase and Jazz's date Henry all headed to meet their other friends at some fancy restaurant called Brio. The second they walked in, Sandy spotted the one person that was capable of making her dinner miserable, and wonderful all at the same time. "Fancy seeing you here," Andrew said giving Sandy that smile she day- dreamt over. "I guess great minds think alike," she replied, hoping that he hadn't noticed her shaking. He wasn't with another girl, but with a guy friend that she didn't know, and his date whose name she thought was Rebecca. Sandy was relieved to see that he didn't have a date but had a super guilty feeling in her stomach that she indeed did. "You guys enjoy your dinner," Chase said to the table, before guiding Sandy to where the rest of the group was sitting. "You okay?" Kate whispered in Sandy's ear. "Just make sure I don't look back," Sandy replied, feeling anxious and still a little guilty.

"This place is super expensive, do you want to share something?" Chase asked after looking over the menu. "Share something?" Sandy thought to herself, "What kind of cheap ass is this guy?" She didn't feel like arguing though, so she agreed to share the mushroom ravioli with him. She wasn't terribly hungry anyways. The meal came and went and dessert seemed to fly by too. While cheapo Chase was paying for the meal, Sandy finally turned around for the first time since they had gotten there, only to see that Andrew had already left. Relieved and bummed, she got up, put her arm around Chase's and headed for the car that his mom was picking them back up in. The dance was only about five minutes away from the restaurant, so it didn't take very long to get there. Chase's mom snapped a few pictures of them sitting in the back seat and then they went went in.

The theme of the dance was "70's" so the gym was covered in peace signs and tye die. There was a giant disco ball put up in the middle of the dance floor, and Sandy felt like she was in some sort of time warp. "I didn't know that they had photo booths back in the 70's," her friend Tracy joked while making the peace symbol with her fingers. Regardless if it went with the theme, Sandy loved a good photo booth, so she forced her friends to get in line with her. Little did she know that the man she had her eyes on loved the photo booth almost as much as she did. "Looks like great minds are thinking alike again," Andrew said from behind her. "You following me Solomon?" Sandy joked, trying to hide her inner spinning feelings. "I just can't seem to get enough," He replied quickly, making her completely melt.

Sandy, Chase, Andrew and Tracy all square into the photo booth together. "Sit on my lap Sandy," Andrew insisted, before the count- down started. Sandy looked at Tracy who already knew that she was about to be forced to sit on Chase's lap. "3-2-1," the camera counted down and they posed four different times. Naturally, the girls did the duck face in one, peace signs in another, and then the very last one, the boys pretended to try and kiss them. Sandy wished they she had turned and just kissed him then and there but it would have been really awk- ward with her actual date in the photo booth next to them. She already felt like a horrible person for sitting on Andrew's lap, instead of Chase's. She hoped he wasn't mad.

"That was fun," Chase said, "let's go dance, Sandy." He took her out to the dance floor and they danced to the song "Everytime We Touch," by Cascada. Sandy had a good time letting loose and dancing, not focusing on the boy she seemed to be so distracted by. Then a slow song came on, and she remembered that her date was someone she really had zero feelings for. She danced with him anyways, feeling super small, because Chase was over six feet tall, and Sandy hardly broke five feet. They didn't look at each other once while they were dancing, Sandy spent the entire time looking around trying to find Andrew. "This is the longest song ever," Sandy thought to herself, ready for it to end already.

The second the song ended, she asked Chase to go get her some punch. He did as she asked and Sandy automatically took off to look for her friends...and Andrew. She found Andrew first, "I'm dipping out," he said to her, before she could even ask him to dance. "Oh okay," she said, not being able to hide her pouting face. "I'll see you on Mon- day and we can talk more about why you are here with him and not with me," Andrew said, before kissing her cheek and walking away. "Holy crap did that just happen?" Sandy thought to herself, flabbergasted. With him leaving the dance like that, she was ready to go home too and write "Mrs. Sandy Solomon" in her notebook or something.

Unfortunately, she had to stick it out for one more hour, so she figured she'd do that with her friends and put all of her nervous energy out on the dance floor. None of her friends had seen or heard what had happened with Andrew, but she couldn't wait to tell them when they could actually hear themselves talk. The night soon came to an end and Sandy's dad waited to pick her up in the front of the gym. She said bye to all of her friends and gave Chase a big hug before hopping in the front seat of her dad's BMW. "How was it?" He asked, the second she got into the car. "It was great!" She replied, with enthusiasm, thinking back to Andrews words. "Oh? Did you and Chase really hit it off?" Her dad asked, wondering if that's where the happiness was coming from.

"No he's just a friend, I've got my eye on somebody else." She muttered to herself.

Sandy was so excited to get to school on Monday, though she didn't

know what to expect. All she knew was that she couldn't wait to see Andrew and maybe even tell him about her feelings. She needed to tell her friends about what he said to her first, though. "No freaking way!" was the first thing to come out of Kate's mouth. "Dude so are y'all like together now?" Jazz asked. "No, but I think we are definitely a step closer to being together," Sandy said while doing a little happy dance.

Her friends joined in on the happy dance and continued to do so until Andrew and Sam walked up to them. "Who put extra caffeine in y'all's coffee?" Sam asked, giggling at the girl's silly dance moves. Feeling slightly embarrassed, Sandy looked over at Andrew who had an adorable grin on his face and proceeded to wink at her. She blushed and he reached his hand out to guide her somewhere so they could talk in private.

"How was the rest of the dance?" Andrew asked with a slight bit of jealousy on his face. "Not nearly as good since you left." Sandy replied, looking him straight in the eyes. "I've got to tell you something," she said feeling all brave. "What's that?" he replied with a questioning look on his face. "I wanted to go to the dance with you, not Chase," she spat out really quickly, "he asked me and I felt bad saying no." Andrew started to smile, "I should have asked you before him, I just didn't have enough time." He grabbed one of her hands, "all I know is that it made me so jealous seeing you slow dance with him at Homecoming."

Butterflies started to swarm all in Sandy's stomach. She looked up at Andrew and right into his big brown eyes. They both smiled at each other and slowly he started to lean in. Sandy shut her eyes real tight, hoping that she wouldn't completely mess up her first kiss. As he wrapped his hand around the side of her face, she felt his soft lips on hers. When their lips parted, she couldn't help but smile and feel every muscle in her body begin to melt. She was smitten.