Free Butterfly Weeds by Laura Miller

his.
     
                  “What?” he asked. “I was listening in History the other day.”
     
                  I stared into his baby blues for a second longer before speaking.
     
                  “You’re ridiculou s,” I said, smiling up at him.
     
                  Then I turned and started making my way to the small school building at the bottom of the hill. Will followed after me.
     
                 
     
                  “Lady’s first, My Love,” Will said as he suddenly reached in front of me and grabbed hold of the metal door with its two, tiny, glass windows. “I know you’ll come to your senses eventually.”
     
                  I faked a laugh and then walked through the tall doors.
     
                  It took me two tries to manipulate the latch that freed my sticky locker door from its base, but on the second try , the slender door popped open.
     
                  “You walking me to class today?” I asked Will as I slid a couple of textbooks onto the locker shelf above me and grabbed two others.
     
                  “Is today any different than any other day, Jules?” he asked rhetorically and in a voice that made him sound as if he was being put out.
     
                  “Of course,” I said, chiming in on the opportunity. “Today is the day you realize that you can’t possibly live without me,” I said, grinning in his directio n.
     
                  “I thought that was yesterday,” he said, smiling back, pleased that he had beat me at my own game.
     
                  My grin grew as I shut the stubborn locker door and stepped toward Will three lockers down.
     
                  “Okay, let’s get goin’. I’ve gotta stop by Coach's office before class too,” Will said, taking the couple textbooks from my hands.
     
                  “Okay,” I replied. “Why do you so urgently need to talk to him this morning?”
     
                  “I don’t. He’s got a cookie jar,” he said, sounding as if I should have known. “You have so much to learn about life, My Dear.”
     
                  I rolled my eyes again as we set out down one of the two hallways that made up the small high school building. We reached the tiny classroom seconds later, and Will followed me in and set my books down onto a small lab table next to a life-size, plastic skeleton.
     
                  “T hank ya, Hun,” I said, smiling.
     
                  “Just remember. I want it to be eighteen holes, and maybe we can have a press conference, just so everyone knows how to say it. It’s Will, Will Stephens . It doesn’t have the same effect if it’s not said right,” he reiterated.
     
                  “Okay, OO7,” I said, humoring his ridiculousness.
     
                  “Oh, and have fun in your next quote, unquote class, otherwise known as study hall,” Will jeered at me as he quickly kissed my cheek before the teacher in the front of the room could turn around. “I’ve got to quote, unquote, check some English answers after this hour,” he said in a hushed tone, at the same time, making quotation marks with his fingers.
     
                  “Okay, my little scholar. I’ll see you later,” I said, smiling back at him.
     
                  “By the way, I’ve decided what I want to be when I grow up,” he said before he turned to walk away.
     
                  His words came out so casually that I almost didn’t notice he had said them at all.
     
                  “Really?” I asked, slightly delayed, and I’m sure looking somewh at shocked by his announcement.
     
                  “What?” I asked.
     
                  “A firefighter,” he announced