“I know that.” He sounds defensive as he reaches for the bag and peeks inside. His lip curls as he reaches into the bag and pulls out a pair of navy-and-white checked fleece pajama pants. “What’s up with these?”
“Monday is pajama day.” I do my best to keep my tone even. Pleasant. “So we’ll wear matching PJs and T-shirts.”
“Aren’t you cute? With the PJs?” He’s mimicking me, his voice rising to a higher pitch. “I think you just want to think about the two of us in bed together, Callahan.”
“Stop it.” I yank the pants out of his hands and stuff them back into the bag. “Your stupid remarks are just that: stupid. If you want to win, we have to dress up together and match. Plus we have to play the games together and actually try to win. Participation counts.”
“Maybe I don’t want to play the games.”
“Then we won’t win.”
“Maybe I don’t want to do that either.”
I roll my eyes, but deep down inside, I’m worried. I’m dying to win, not that I can ever admit it to him. But I won’t win if I have to carry Ash through the entire week while he does nothing. “Come on. Winning won’t be that bad.”
“If I have to play a bunch of stupid games to win, then it’s going to suck.” He slumps in his chair and crosses his arms, reminding me of a big ol’ baby.
Maybe I need to approach this in a way that will matter to him. “Won’t winning homecoming prince, like, earn you status with girls or whatever? If you win, they’ll all know who you are.”
“The only girl I want to notice me hates me.” He sends me a knowing look and I can’t help but think—yet again—that he’s talking about me. If I said that, he’d say the world doesn’t revolve around me and I’d end up feeling stupid. So I keep my mouth shut. “She’s not interested. She never will be.”
“You don’t know that for sure.” My voice goes soft and I lean toward him a little bit, like an idiot. “She might be interested.”
Those brown eyes meet mine, and I lose myself for a second in their depths. He has the darkest eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re beautiful.
They’re also unnerving.
He sits up straighter, his arms dropping to his sides. “She’s not my type. I’m wasting my time.”
Mr. Curtin enters the class and I turn away from Ash, focusing my attention on what the teacher is writing on the board. Forcing myself to not think about what Ash said. Yet his words run through my head over and over, on a continuous loop. Who is he talking about? It can’t be me. I’m reading too much into his words. He’s not interested in me. He thinks I’m gross, just like I think he’s gross. He’s not my type. At all. I need to make a move on someone safe and sweet. Someone like Ben.
The problem with Ben? He’s safe and sweet and also clueless. As in, I don’t think he realizes that I like him so much. If he did, he’d ask me out, right? We’d at least be talking, like seriously.
I can’t help but notice when Ash discreetly stuffs the bag I brought him into his backpack that’s sitting on the floor, then zips it up. He glances up at me and catches me watching him, his hair flopping over his forehead and hanging in his eyes. I blink away, my stomach doing that weird twisty thing it does when I think about Ash for too long.
I need to stop thinking about him. So I do.
I do it so well, I don’t even notice halfway through class that he’s trying to get my attention. He taps the edge of the old table extra hard, causing Curtin to pause in his lecture for the briefest moment before he resumes, and I look at Ash to see he’s now lightly tapping the edge of his notebook with his pen.
Glancing down, I see he’s written something. A note.
For me.
What do I wear Monday?
Pressing my lips together, I flip to an empty page in my notebook and write him a response.
The pajamas. I left a note in the bag listing what to wear each day.
He reads my reply and pulls the notebook toward him before he hunches over and starts writing again, biting his lower lip in concentration.
Like a complete dork, I can’t help but stare. He’s extra attractive for some reason, and maybe that’s because he’s not saying rude things or taunting me. He’s treating me…normal, and I like it.
I’m startled when he moves the notebook closer to me so I can read what he wrote.
I don’t own a suit.
My heart falls. He needs to dress up a little bit for coronation night. I love the dress I found last weekend when Kaya, our friend Daphne, and I dragged my mom to the mall the next town over. We shopped for hours. Mom never complained once when Kaya and I tried on dress after dress, Daphne offering up her opinions, the both of us moaning and groaning we were never going to find anything.
Well, I eventually found what I wanted, and so did Kaya. Mom didn’t say I told you so, but the smug smile on her face as we drove home told me that’s what she was thinking. Daphne reassured us that we both chose gorgeous dresses, and we were glad we brought her. She’s our most honest friend, and you need that type of friend when dress shopping for one of the most important nights of your life.
Realizing Ash is waiting for me to respond, I scribble something quick.
Do you have a button-down shirt?
His gaze meets mine and he slowly shakes his head.
How about a pair of black pants?
Reaching over, his arm presses against mine as he writes on my notebook this time.
Black jeans.
He doesn’t remove his arm from where it rests next to mine, and I’m tingling. Literally tingling all over just from that simple contact. I don’t move my arm either. His is warm and strong, and I know that’s his throwing arm. Where all the power lies, as my father might say.
Okay, maybe he wouldn’t say that. I think I’ve been reading too many love stories about football players on Wattpad lately. My secret addiction.
Are they faded? I write.
Ash frowns, his eyebrows crinkling. I write some more. The jeans.
He shakes his head. Still doesn’t remove his arm.
Then they should be fine. Just make sure they’re clean!
Oh my God, I sound like a total mom. I sort of want to slap my forehead, but I restrain myself.
But he doesn’t call me out on it. Instead, he scribbles across the paper:
I’ll work on finding a shirt.
I’m about to write a response when the classroom phone rings and Mr. Curtin stops lecturing to go answer it. The entire class starts talking in a low murmur and I glance over at Ash to find he’s already looking at me, his dark brown gaze unreadable.
“I’ll look for a shirt this weekend,” he tells me, finally removing his arm from where it rested against mine. His voice, his entire demeanor is nonchalant. Like this moment we just shared was no big deal. To him, it probably wasn’t. I’m the one who’s making something out of nothing. “I might be able to scrub one up, or borrow a shirt from somebody.”
“Okay.” My voice cracks and I clear my throat, feeling dumb. This was nothing.
Nothing.
And when he zooms out of class the moment the bell sounds, his actions confirm my thoughts.
Nothing at all.
Seven
“I miss you.”
I turn at the sound of the male voice behind me, shocked to discover it’s Ben standing there with a forlorn expression on his cute face. And I really do mean it when I call Ben cute. He’s got golden hair that curls at the ends, he’s really tan and he has bright blue eyes. He had a total glow up over the summer, growing a few inches so now he’s just under six feet, and he’s not as scrawny as he was when we were freshmen. I liked him back then too, but he didn’t really notice me.
At least, I don’t think he did.
Smiling brightly, I tilt my head to the side. “What do you mean, you miss me?”
My heart is thundering in my chest as I wait for his reply. It’s just before lunch, and I need to go meet Asher in the quad so we can play our homecoming-themed game. The nominees are supposed to participate every day. We won our round Monday playing a complicated ring-toss game that involved me sitting on Ash’s shoulders.
Talk about awkward.
Yesterday, we came in second with the build-a-snowman game. It’s not easy wrapping a dozen rolls of toilet paper around Ash in a quick manner. I kept having to touch him and it made me nervous.