Chapter 1
20-year-old Allison was just wrapping up her final volunteering shift for the 2015 Toronto Pan Am games at the downtown Beach Volleyball Center. She hated standing in front of a venue and greeting the spectators that were walking around. She was very shy and unopen. But she knew that by volunteering for the event, she was in return going to get a break on her student loans. She was walking in small circles, holding a sun umbrella that the crew gave her. Quietly, she hummed her favorite song 'Since U Been Gone' by Kelly Clarkson. Her manager, Evan, snuck up behind her asking if everything was alright. Evan wasn't quite trusting of his volunteers since last night when one of them left a bag unattended and almost caused a bomb scare.
Allison was caught off guard and flinched. Her face was a bit red, hoping he didn't hear her hum. She was about to say that everything was ok, when a big gust of wind came out of nowhere. Evan warned her that the fence beside her was going to fall over. She quickly ran away, just narrowly dodging serious injuries to herself. Now drenched in sweat from both the summer's heat and the adrenaline of cheating potential death, her nipples were poking out through her pink tank top and Evan was blushing big time. But more importantly, this male volunteer, Joseph, that Allison was eyeing since her very first shift was also staring at her from the volunteers' tent. His ginger hair, cute freckles, and chiselled jawline were what mesmerized her. She didn't have the nerve to ask Joe out. The only prior interaction they had during the past two weeks was when they did a crossword puzzle in the newspaper one morning before their shifts. But now that she got his attention, she knew that she had to take advantage. He was a dancer who was tasked with entertaining the crowd during the intermissions for the volleyball matches. Therefore, he was going to leave immediately after the match, in thirty minutes. Evan advised her to get cleaned up at the tent.
After wiping the sweat off with her towel and spraying deodorant, she reached for a pen on a table and ripped a corner off of the morning's newspaper off. Joe already left the tent and was out dancing for the crowd. She decided to write a succinct message. 'Joe, I saw you staring at me being dripped in sweat. If you are interested in seeing more, please call' and included her number. His bag was right there, on a seat at the table. But she couldn't do it, she couldn't put it in. She was facing mental struggles of whether or not she was pushing boundaries with such a blunt message. Allison decided to think on it, as she still had twenty minutes before he's gone for good. But then she heard Evan's voice shouting. He was recruiting all the volunteers to get a big huge group photo on their last day. As everyone was getting ready, Allison was worried that this was going to eat heavily into the last twenty minutes she had. After a few takes, Joe came running from the volleyball court and jumped in the crowd for a few final photos with the group. Afterwards, he ran off to the tent to get his bag and leave. Allison knew he was going to leave for good at that instance. But she was still conflicted on whether or not it would be stepping boundaries. After this day, the summer is over and it would be back to school. No student on campus was nearly as eye catching as Joseph.
She couldn't bring herself to run after him. She watched him in his white top, rocking the cargo shorts in his toned butt, his bag slung over his right shoulder, walking off into the sunset.
Chapter 2
It was back to the University of Toronto for Allison. Her second attempt at trying to pass Organic Chemistry. Lecture was the typical: nagging professor and boring, unattractive students. Most were only there for attendance marks. An assignment was coming up, to be done in groups. She was assigned a group with two nerdy looking females, one of them was named Kathy and still wearing braces. Allison thought to herself that at least they can carry the workload for her. Like all college students, they coordinated by being contacts on Facebook, a platform that Allison herself only used for school.
That night, she got on her Microsoft surface pro and checked the Facebook messages from her group mates. They introduced each other in the group chat. Kathy noticed that Allison was very unenthusiastic about the whole thing. So, she asked what was up. Begrudgingly, Allison explained her whole situation of letting a chance of love slip from her. Kathy was completely understanding and encouraged her to find him on Facebook. She told her that the worst that can happen is that he declines the friend request. Being infatuated with Joseph from the get go, she obviously remembered his last name as well, Diez. Tried as she might, she couldn't find a Joe or Joseph Diez. Kathy assured her that some guys might go with other alias as their Facebook name. So, Allison decided to play around. First name with last initial, last name with first initial. The latter did it as she eventually found a 'Jay Diez' with a profile pic of the same cute ginger she stared at for two weeks. The pic had him in sunglasses on, tilting his head upwards towards the Sun. Twitchy, Allison tapped 'add friend' on the laptop's touch screen. She decided to download the Facebook app on her phone for easier access to follow up on it.
Two nights later, Allison had only mustered up a paragraph for the assignment whereas her group mates already completed three pages together with the full bibliography. Her group mates definitely lived up to their nerdy appearance. But then, she saw a notification on her phone that 'Jay Diez accepted your friend request'. Excited but still very nervous, Allison messaged him, hoping he'd recognize her from the profile picture; that Kathy herself spruced up for her using photoshop. She waited fifteen minutes for a reply but nothing. She decided to head for the shower and drown her emotions there, or at least hope the water can relieve her from writer's block for the assignment.
In the shower, she played with her nipples, knowing that these bad boys were the only ones that gave her the slightest chance with him. That maybe, they were ingrained in his mind when he stared at her and gave the slightest bit of justification for her randomly messaging him. She tried hard to get them to stick out like they did when she was sweating like crazy that day. She decided to take her detachable shower head, turn the water to very cold, and aim it on her boobs. She was shaking in the cold but it did make her nipples were rock hard. She decided to gently lick them, thinking of Joe as she was slightly becoming aroused.
She didn't bother drying her hair afterwards. She just wrapped it up in a towel and went straight to bed naked, pitying herself as a hopeless romantic.