The Story of Us- Part II

THE 2 WEEK FRIENDSHIP
APRIL 2, 2004- APRIL 15, 2004

Friday, April 2nd: Danielle went to the SIIS open house (as usual) and ended up hanging out with Chip and his former roommate, Matt Braham, for a couple of hours.

Chip's thoughts: I remember somehow finding myself in Braham's room with Braham and Danielle, talking about fish (he was already a fish-lover back then.....) and other random things. I had her ask this senior computer guy, Norm, if she could be his girlfriend (a joke I had going with him) so that was fun; but I specifically remember being bored and wanting to leave, but we all decided to go make sure Cricket's door was open 6'' (that was the rule and he had just gotten a girlfriend). Then for some reason, I started introducing her to other SIIS boys I knew, I'm not sure why, probably just cause I was kinda bored. I remember her saying in Braham's room that we should eat breadsticks sometime, but not knowing who she was talking to. Then she specifically asked me later that night, which cleared that up. I knew her as the "floor whore" (it really was an endearing term in the group of guys...) and thought she did this type of thing all the time (which she probably did) and so I thought very little of it and said yes, but was very very unusual for a girl to ask me if I wanted to do something, so that got my attention, but like I said before....she was the "floor whore".

Dani's thoughts: We started hanging out that night because I saw him walking down the hall to his room and for some reason I had a HUGE urge to stop him and talk to him. I remember calling out his name but having NO CLUE what I would say after that! Chip turned around and I found myself blurting out the words "Have you fed your fish lately?"(I knew he had a piranha) This was what got us talking about fish and we went into Braham's room because he had a fish, too. Unlike Chip, who was bored, I had a really good time. (Probably because I was a nerdy little freshman who thought seniors were cool...) I remember asking him to eat breadsticks because I really wanted to hang out again. The other thing I remember is that Chip had holes in his shoes and I asked him about them. I wanted to say goodbye to him when I left the floor that night, but I couldn't find him. (He had already gone to bed) So when I got back to me room I emailed him...and asked about breadsticks....for the 3rd time.
Something else I remember about that night, that I didn't write about the first time, was the fact that Chip told me he had never met anyone else named Danielle and that he thought it was a cool name. For some reason, that made me happy.

Monday, April 5th: Chip's schedule was very busy; he had horseback riding after dinner and then an ISD meeting at 11pm. He had just enough time to fit in breadsticks with Danielle between when he got back from horseback riding at 10 until his meeting. The reason we didn't do breadsticks a DIFFERENT night was because Monday night they were 1/2 off or something....so we were trying to get them on Monday night breadstick night. : )

Chip's thoughts: I remember talking with her about how she was going to get the breadsticks. She said that she had a friend with a car and if that didn't work, she said she had feet. Our conversation wasn't the greatest and it was like we were trying really hard to become friends for some reason. I thought she was a nice girl after this time together.

Dani's thoughts: We had spent the weekend emailing each other, trying to figure out a time and place for breadsticks. We ended up meeting at "the comfy couch" in the science building. Lori let me borrow her car to pick of the breadsticks from TOPPIT (The Only Pizza Place In Town). We talked and I made him a little late for his meeting (which I didn't know he had). I had fun.

Tuesday, April 6th: Chip's cousin Isaac came to visit him, to see Taylor during his college search.

Chip's thoughts: I was really busy with homework and Isaac was watching a movie. We wated to do something with Danielle, but Isaac was tired and only wanted to do something if it sounded REALLY fun. We didn't do anything.

Dani's thoughts: I remember REALLY wanting to do something that night because all I was doing was sitting in my room. Chip told me that Isaac only wanted to do something if it sounded really fun because he was tired and had to get up early. I tried REALLY HARD to think of something he'd think was fun, but the most fun at Taylor on a Tuesday night without a car that I could think of was playing games in the Student Union. It wasn't fun enough for Isaac, so like Chip said, we did nothing. I was pretty bummed. The funny part about this is that I was thinking what a great excuse it was to "want to see Isaac while he was visiting" when really I just wanted to hang out with Chip again : )

Wednesday, April 7th: Taylor was pretty empty. It was almost Easter break and quite a few students had already left for home. Danielle IMed Chip at 1am wanting to "play". They hung out until 4:30am.

Chip's thoughts: I was SO tired! and was all ready for bed and SO looking forward to sleeping, when I get this IM from Danielle asking me to "come out and play". I kind of wanted to, but mostly I just wanted to sleep. Something inside of me decided that I needed to go out and actually have fun with a girl. So I brought food (a cheese packet from a package of Mac N Cheese) and we met at the Sammy Fountains. It was fun and we talked about memories growing up that we had in common (ex: swim team) and eventually we decided to see if there was a way to get into this old closed down art building. We climbed through an unlocked window and explored the dark building which was very fun. We hung out in there until 4:30am and then went back to our dorms.

Dani's thoughts: It was 1am and I was not tired. I saw that Chip was online and decided I really wanted to hang out with him that night because I was leaving the next day for the weekend. I asked him to "come out and play". He responded pretty negatively. I tried to convince him a little bit more and it still didn't look good. I had pretty much given up when he suddenly agreed. We met at the Sammy Statues. I brought 2 blue Kool-aid Bursts for us to drink. We were for for 3 hours.


Sunday, April 11th: This was the day Danielle got back to Taylor from being at her brother's in Aurora, IL for Easter Break. As usual, she wasn't doing much and IMed Chip to see what he was up to. He needed to borrow a book from a friend off campus, so she went with him. Later that night at 10ish (the outing to get the book had been around 6pm) she went with him to return the book and then they got snacks and candy at Handy Andy (the local gas station). They went back to Taylor and ate it in the art building. The night ended 4 hours later (at 2:30am).

Chip's thoughts: Danielle and I were making small talk on IM and for some strange reason I asked her if she wanted to come with me to pick up a book I needed for homework from Howie's house off campus. She said she wanted to come, which I thought was very weird but it was fun. I was driving Hilty's stick shift car and on the way back had a very hard time. Later that night we had fun eating candy in the art building and we started to talk about deeper things. This was when I first started to like her a little bit.

Dani's thoughts: In the way to get the book from Howie's house, I found a fun play gun to play with. It made cool shooting noises. Chip's stick shift abilities started to worry me some when we were leaving Howie's because he couldn't get the car into 1st. But once we got going everything was fine. Later that night, I asked Chip if he wanted to go get candy with me at Handy Andy and he said he needed to take the book back anyway so we could go. I was really hoping to hang out at Handy Andy and eat the candy, but as soon as we paid, Chip headed out to the car so I just thought he was going to take me back to my dorm. When we pulled into Taylor he stopped in a random parking lot and asked if I had any ideas of where to eat our snacks. We ended up going back to the old art building and talking for almost 4 hours. I had started liking him the first or second time we hung out, and this was the first time I left myself think he MIGHT like me a little bit too : )

Tuesday, April 13th: Chip's piranha died and he asked Danielle to help him make a raft that afternoon. She had class so Chip waited to make it until Danielle could help. They collected sticks and then made the raft. Later that night at midnight, Chip invited SIIS and some girls to the funeral. Danielle was one of the girls. Chip told everyone to wear their clothes backwards. The piranha was set ablaze and put out on Taylor Lake while Chip read a poem and FJB (freshman Joe Beckman) read a poem. On the way back, Chip and Hilty and the girls started little gas fires on the sidewalks for fun. Then Chip and Hilty ran away when Campus Safety drove up. They all hung out in the Sammy lounge after Campus Safety left.

Chip's thoughts: This was a fun day. Making the raft with Danielle was fun and I had a good time. I was also excited to see around 30 guys at the funeral. I also liked that a couple of girls came because that was unusual for me to plan something and invite girls. I remember liking that Danielle dressed backwards and that Toll wore a black suit. The funeral was amazing with my poem being weird poetic things I found online and made up myself. FJB's poem was also quite fun, as he was a supporter of the fish that had killed my piranha. Hanging out in the Sammy lounge afterwards was a little strange. Karin was calling me her "side-dish boyfriend" in front of Emily Wilson and Danielle, and I didn't like that very much. And it was also weird having Emily and Danielle both there because I liked Emily and was starting to like Danielle more, and Emily liked Hilty, but he didn't like her.

Dani's thoughts: This day kinda confused me. First it made me excited because Chip had asked me to hang out and even WAITED since I had class. This made me think maybe he liked me. I was excited all afternoon because I knew I'd get to see him that night at the funeral. After the funeral we were still hanging out (participating in the illegal activities....) That also made me excited. (Not the illegal activities part...the hanging out part...) After the Campus Safety incident, we all went back to the lounge at Sammy to hang out a little more. The group ended up being Hilty, Chip, Tyson, Me, Karin and Emily Wilson. This was the night I started to think Chip didn't like me, because he was seeming pretty interested in Wilson. At this point, I decided that at least I had a new fun friend. I didn't really think anything else would ever happen. I can remember Chip talking to Emily about wanting to come to her track meet that coming Saturday. That was one of the things that made me think he must really like her, because you don't just go to a girl's track meet for no reason.

Wednesday, April 14: Chip, Danielle, and Karin spent the afternoon rollerblading. Karin got tired after awhile and went inside. Then, later that night, Chip and Danielle met at the old art building and talked for a few hours.

Chip's thoughts: At this point, Danielle and I were IMing a couple of times everyday and she said she was going rollerblading. I asked her if she was going alone and she said no, but then invited me which was what I was hoping for. After around an hour of blading, Karin wanted to stop, so we all went back to Olson- I wasn't having fun, mostly cause I am bad at bladin', so I wanted to stop too, but Danielle wanted to keep going. So we bladed more. So, while blading I asked her if she still wanted to hang out that night thinking that maybe she would say no cause we had just hung out, but she asked me what I wanted to do, so I said yes, just to do it, and she said ok, but in a very casual way that made me think she might not want to, so I was a little sad. We met in the old art building that night and I brought a candle to burn cause fire is fun and she brought lots of pictures and high school stuff to show me. Our conversation was deep and good and I kept liking what I saw in her. We stayed out late, probably until after 3am. Up to this point, she had already asked me if she could hug me and I had said yes. So it was a little awkward as we were leaving this night as it would've been a great time to hung, but I just stood there waiting for a couple of seconds and then we went back to our dorms. I felt like I was getting mixed signals from her.

Danielle's thoughts: Karin wanted to go rollerblading so I decided to go with her. Just as we were getting ready to leave I was IMing Chip and he said he wanted to do something outside because it was so nice out. I didn't think he meant that he wanted to do something with me, but I decided to invite him rollerblading anyway and he said YES so I was very excited. Karin wanted to go inside and even though I was tired of rollerblading too, I wanted to keep hanging out with Chip so I asked him if he wanted to keep going with me. I clearly rememeber TOUCHING him this day...haha. I pushed him backwards a little bit or something....just being flirty. It was funny, because I was VERY flirty, with EVERYONE.....EVERYONE EXCEPT the person I liked! I always had trouble being flirty with guys I liked because then it was actually revealing my feelings for them, instead of just being fun. Chip made this ESPECIALLY hard because he was NOT a flirty person and you knew he didn't have tons of interaction with girls, so I didn't want to come on too strong and scare him away. Because of this, I can CLEARLY remember being so nervous putting my hands on his shoulders or chest or something and pushing him backwards...for like 1 second! HAHA. At one point, he asked if I still wanted to hang out that night because we had planned to do so earlier. I REALLY wanted to, but, because of the night before and thinking he liked Wilson, I thought he probably didn't really want to so instead of giving a flat out YES, I told him we could do whatever he wanted. When he said we should I was SO excited! I had to hold it in so much. Apparently I held it in a little bit too much : ) That night we talked for a long time. He brought a candle- I thought it was for the mood, but no, it was just so he could play with fire. Earlier I had asked him if he was okay with girls hugging him (I had never seen him hug a girl) and he said yes, but that he didn't initiate hugs with girls, but if they wanted to hug him it was fine. As we left the building we stood there but I got WAY too nervous (for the same reasons I explained above) so we ended up just leaving. After this night, I thought I might have a chance again!

Ok. This is the farthest we got in our hand-written journal and I will stop here for today. From here on out I will tell the story as I remember it, like I said before. If/when Chip wants to throw in memories and details he is MORE than welcome to do so. I really like seeing the opposite views we had, especially in the beginning. If you made it through all of that...GOOD JOB! : )