by Kars, C. M.
By C.M. Kars
Contents
Acknowledgement
Author’s note
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
About the Nerdy Author
Acknowledgement
This book would not be on your Kindle, Nook, iPad, or whatever e-reader you have without these very important people.
To Jessica Daoust, for the being the very first one to read it and hound me for more chapters. For the understanding and reassuring texts that I’m sure were so annoying at times, you wanted to break your phone. For the serious I never thought that this would get published, and if you were to check our texts, I waffled back and forth I don’t know how many times (more than the Winchesters have died, that’s for sure) about how much it sucked, how much I loved it, only to go back again. Without you, I wouldn’t be sharing Sera and Hunter with the world.
To Skyla Dawn Cameron for my beautiful cover that’s so beautiful I started tearing up when I saw it. Oh yeah, and she’s a badass editor, too.
To all the nerds out there. I know sometimes it feels like no one really gets you, that you just wish you could find that one person who gets all your references, and knows how awesome you are. Accept the nerd, be the nerd. The nerd life chose me, guys, and there’s no other way I could imagine myself to be living.
Author’s note
How to pick up a Nerd 101:
Go to a bookstore or a library. Go up to a guy/girl perusing an aisle that you can talk about (I stay out of the gardening section since I don’t want to look like a fool). Comment on the book, ask them what they think about it. And you know what? Offer to buy it for them.
Yes, you might get rejected. Yes, this might not lead anywhere, and this might not be the person who will understand when you say frak or bloody hell, or care that you know senseless trivia from science class, or movies, or other books you absolutely loved. But you know what?
What if? What if that person gets your nerdy references? Plus, what if they recommend you an awesome series of books? Win-win. I think at least, you’d find a new friend, and friends are good to have.
The point I’m trying to make is… be brave in your nerdiness. I think a lot of us hide that part of ourselves because we’re worried that people find us weird that we’re so passionate about anything and everything Joss Whedon writes, or how that last episode of Sons of Anarchy knocked you flat on your ass, or the sweet agony of watching Supernatural and Doctor Who. We feel things on a different level than most people, I guess.
Just know that you’re worthy of a person who understands that joy, that passion you have for the things you love, and knows how goddamn lucky he/she is to be in your life and to be sharing that passion with them.
Be gentle to yourself, and wave that nerd flag high and proud.
Happy reading, nerds!
I’m Drew Barrymore.
Obviously I’m not really Drew Barrymore, but rather the character she played in the movie Never Been Kissed. So I’m Josie Geller.
Josie and I have the same little problem. Just like her, I’ve blown out all twenty-five candles of my birthday cake and still have never been kissed. That’s where the similarities end, I swear.
Fine, I don’t have that awful blonde-bleached hair, and while I do have her pudgy demeanor which I blame on my love of food and that exercise is really, really hard, I think our personalities are way different.
For one, I don’t really care if your English is off. While Josie will tell you that you are feeling nauseated instead of nauseous, I think there are more important things to think about – like how in hell did Sherlock survive the fall? I might have to punch you in the throat if you say irregardless. That word doesn’t exist. Stop saying it.
Second, I’m not overly shy like Josie is throughout the flashbacks in her high school days. Obviously I’m not going to let on how much of a book and movie nerd I am with people I just met. And no one ever gets the words on my nerdy t-shirts, so I end up keeping quiet at social gatherings. Doesn’t mean I’m shy.
Third. No guy experience, and I mean none. Josie got a date to prom, even if it ended badly for her. And! Josie got Mr. Coulson in the end (not Agent) whereas I have never even held a guy’s hand. The whole palm-to-palm contact thing freaks me out. What if mine gets sweaty and I’m forever known as Sweaty-Palmed Sally?I might as well have a love life in another dimension ‘cause there’s nothing happening here.
Shit. Maybe we are more alike than I care to admit. Bloody hell. The first step is admitting you have a problem, right? Fine. I’m Josie Geller.
***
Holy shit, do I have to pee.
Looks like even revelations of Hollywood proportions will not take my mind off the pain in my bladder, or the way I’m not cussing myself out because I should’ve gone before I left work.
“Let’s go, let’s go,” I mutter, rocking from foot to foot in a special kind of dance. My asshole bladder squeezes down, and I swear to God that I’m going to pee my pants right here in the elevator car.
Just my luck that a week since move-in into my new building and there’s already a problem with the elevator ‘door close’ button. And I can’t waddle over fast enough to the staircase and climb six flights without leaving a trail on all the steps. No. I need to wait.
But for the love of Harry Potter, these doors need to close NOW!
My bladder does that pulsing thing again as I watch the doors slowly inch forward, just as a couple squeezes in all while staying attached at the mouth. They’ve got some skills and are clearly unaware of their surroundings. I might as well be wearing the invisibility cloak.
I’m not sure if it’s rude or damn right awe-inspiring, but I stare. This can’t be happening. I yoga deep breathe, and wonder if they think I’m going into labour. I watch, mouth open, as the guy maneuvers his girl into the far corner opposite me still kissing her, the elevator car ringing with the sound two pairs of lips make when they move away from each other for a better position.
I watch the couple rooted to my spot, bladder momentarily forgotten. I’m enthralled with a sort of perverse fascination of the passion they have for each other, the way they both can’t get enough. I can’t even imagine being kissed like that. Even in my fantasies with Tom Hiddleston, the whole image just fizzles into nothingness as soon as he comes to kiss me.
I’m sure my eyes are wide and huge taking in every detail, even as my fingers curl around the strap of my purse. I want that, goddamn it. I want that so bloody badly.
They’re beautiful... and I’m not. She’s got wicked boots on and he’s half a head taller than her, plastered together like
they’re sharing the same skin underneath their clothes. She’s a bottle red-head, the red so vibrant it can’t be anything else, and he’s wearing a black hoodie, hood up, and jeans that fit. They make the clean and shiny elevator car look decrepit and dirty. I half expect a camera crew to shout for me to hold the doors – they both look model gorgeous. Assholes.
My cheeks burn as the girl lets out a moan, setting my heart beating faster in my chest. Entwined as they are, I’m free to look and notice everything – everything I can’t have. The way the guy’s big body gets impossibly closer to hers, brushing his six-pack (probably) against her, his thigh going between her legs. I end up chewing my lip as I watch him buck his hips into her, and she hooks one of her bloody long legs up on his hip. Look away, look away!
Just one more look.
The doors have closed. It doesn’t matter anymore.
My eyes get snagged on his upper body, the way it looks stretching out the material of the hoodie, and down, down, down to his muscular ass and legs. I don’t know why his hood’s up. It’s May and not that cold.
It’s not hard to tell that he has a killer body. So killer, my ovaries take notice, basking in his masculinity. I mean, I have guy friends, but none of them are manly in the way Tarzan is a man, and none of them have ever made me feel this way, like my body’s about to combust. Which is kind of an asshole thing to say about your friends, but I figure since I’m only thinking it, it doesn’t really matter.
I know all my guy friends are good guys, deep, deep down. The kind of guys that’ll be cool if you called them at four am to get your ass home from a bar or whatever, even if they have work the next day. And good trumps good-looks every single time.
Just look at this guy. Oh my God, he just lifted her up, and they are full on grinding in front of me. I’m trapped! Ah! I’m going to be the sole spectator in a live porno! And I have to pee!
I keep staring; I can’t seem to look away. My mouth has gone Sahara dry. So this is what I’ve been missing all these years. This hunger for someone else that makes the world disappear. I hate them. I hate him.
I hate him because he’s beautiful and strong, and he would never want a girl like me. Who would ever want a nerd bigger than Josie Geller? Bloody hell, but to have a guy like that, a guy who can’t wait for you... I’ve only ever read this kind of passion in books, watched it in movies. It’s real. It exists.
I shut down a sigh, and make myself look away.
Please, please, please let there be no unzipping of jeans. God doesn’t answer, but I don’t hear anything that would lead to actual sex with me two feet away. I jab again at the number six, and ignore the sounds she’s making, moans and whimpers that would fit right in a porno. Jesus Christ.
There’s no air left in this elevator car, and the temperature has for sure gone up ten degrees. I need to get out of here.
The elevator chimes the doors open on the sixth floor, and I bolt out, cussing myself out that I don’t have my keys in hand. I feel the pain in my bladder as I waddle to my door, horrified to see the guy gently slam his girl into the strip of wall separating my apartment and next door, giving her the kind of kiss that is seconds away from fucking.
I swallow and look down to fumble with my keys.
“Hunter, baby? Where are your keys?” the girl pants.
I struggle not to let out a moan. I live next door to a sex god, whose name is Hunter. The sexiest name a man can have. How did I miss him since move-in? Simple, really, I don’t pay attention to the world around me, like any good little reader. Even then, if I noticed him, a part of my brain would’ve declared: he’s not for you. Because really... what would a hunk like that ever want with a fat-ass nerd like me?
Their combined breathing is faster, like they’re trying to catch their breath. I don’t want to see what he looks like. If the back-view was fine, what’ll his mug do to me? Ovary damage.
“Baby? Are we going to go inside? Please?” the girl asks.
Whining. She’s whining for him to give it to her. A spike of green jealousy lances its way through my heart at the sound of her voice. It’s fine to want that, to want to experience that need and lust for a man. The truth of my reality is I’m judged on what I look like all the time, and no one has ever wanted me. I’ve never been chased by anyone; I wouldn’t even know what to do. I don’t see it changing in the future.
Shaking my head, I open my door, shut away my little dose of excitement for the day. I lock it, waddling to the bathroom even as my bladder decides to give up on me. When I’m done, I raise my hands in the air, and do a Rocky Balboa victory run around my bathroom. This is what my life has been reduced to.
I’m really glad I didn’t see Hunter’s face. Super glad. Liar, liar pants on fire!
Moving to the mirror, I pull my hair out of my bun, massaging my scalp. I’m sub-average, with a giant ass and thighs. I wear nerdy shirts, jeans and Converse. I wear glasses, and somehow I’ve lived twenty five years of my life and never been kissed. Whatever, these are the cards I’ve been dealt and it’s not an awful hand.
Moving back to the kitchen, I pull up my ‘Suck it Up’ playlist on my iPod dock. Pop songs only, anything from The Wanted, Backstreet Boys, N*Sync, and lots of tracks from Glee. I let my giant ass move the way it wants to the beat, trying to stop imagining what the sex god next door looks like. Are his eyes dark or light? Hair long or short? Tattoos?
Sometimes life isn’t as you expected it to be. That’s okay because my life’s pretty good. Books are just books and stories are just stories. They have to stay on paper. And Hunter and I... what cracked universe would we live in if he and I ever got together? In Neverland, maybe. Or the alternate universe where Peter Bishop is originally from. Maybe in another time and place where the Doctor has kept Rose Tyler and another version of himself.
Not here, not now. Not ever.
And I’m okay with that.
I’m such a champion liar, I almost convince myself.
“Nice shirt.”
I’d been scrolling through my ‘Suck it Up’ playlist, waiting for the elevator to come down, looking for something particularly happy. I glance up at the source of the voice.
“Huh?” Shit. Double shit. It’s him. The sex god from next door.
I’ve managed to avoid him all week, knowing that most people start work later than my own seven to three shift, thus missing him both going in to work and coming back home. Now he’s here, in front of me, saying something about my shirt.
Since it’s the weekend, I get to wear whatever I want. Namely, a pair of loose Adidas shorts that aren’t so loose around my ginormous bon-bon, and a nerdy shirt. I have an extensive collection and I’m really proud of them. Synapses firing as they are, my brain is simultaneously dealing with his question, trying to remember which one I’ve worn, while the sound of a pterodactyl shrieking in alarm echoes in my head. I’m not sure I can speak.
“Your shirt. I like it. Most people would say thank you.” Hunter’s grinning at me. The kind of grin a hot guy gives a girl, knowing exactly what kind of effect it has on her. Oh, I hate him. Somebody should tell him jackpot genetics don’t really make us who we are.
Snapping my mouth closed, and making sure I don’t have a look on my face like I just found out Tom Hiddleston knows my name, I don my armour against him – my ability to be snarky.
Which is hard to do when the guy in front of you is as hot as Hunter is, and the plain black tee with that same hoodie and dark jeans look indecent on him instead of casual street-wear. His skull-trim makes him look even more dangerous, total badass, and I’m ashamed that my body is reacting to his good looks. In another dimension and I if didn’t look like I do, I would give him a seductive smile, invite him back to my place for some sweaty hours of sexercise.But my ass is big enough to be seen alone on the Marauder’s Map, and Hunter would never want me. So I’m going to treat him like a friend, and a creeper.
My hands are fists at my sides, and my jaw hurts where I’ve grinded my teeth
. I don’t know why I’m so mad. “Okay,” I say, trying to stare through him, enjoying the blurriness of his features without my glasses on. “Do you even know what my shirt’s about?”
“Babe.” So much badass and attitude injected in that one word, it’s a wonder my panties haven’t floated down to my ankles. The guy could be even more badass than Jax Teller and Dean Winchester combined.
He’s not for you. He’s just like my buddies, just like Josh, Tommy, Eli and Alex.
“Don’t call me babe,” I say, trying to be cool and badass like Jo Harvelle. Jo Harvelle who wasn’t flustered or anything when she almost-kissed Dean, and knows her way around a knife and rifle.
Hunter smirks. “Do you like apples?” he asks, mimicking a perfect Southie accent. The man has seen Good Will Hunting. I will not swoon, I will not swoon. Be professional, be a badass. Yeah, right. Rocky’s doing victory laps in my head, ghost-jabbing the air because Hunter likes one of my shirts. I’m pathetic.
But he knows Good Will Hunting.
I grin, hold my hand out for a shake. “I’m Sera. Nice to meet you.” I wiggle my fingers when he takes too long. “Most people shake the other person’s hand when it’s offered to them.”
He looks down from my face to my hand and back up again. Just when I start to feel dumb about the whole thing, he puts us palm to palm and pumps up and down.
“Hunter,” he says, letting me go.
I just held his hand. Fine, for like three point four seconds, but I did it! And I’m not even blushing! Score!
“HUNTER!” A female’s voice rings out from behind us. I don’t cringe, instead, keep my smile on my face. I’m smart; I’m intelligent. He commented on the awesomeness of my shirt. That’s all, he just made my day. But this is reality.
“See you later,” I say, stepping into the elevator once the doors open. I turn my attention back to my iPod, replaying 1D.
Glancing up before the doors close, I look at him, rubbing the back of his neck, staring at his feet. In my head, Hunter would look at me longingly, and maybe even tell me he likes more than just my nerdy shirts. He’d tell me I’m stunning or one of those words that aren’t so overused like beautiful. He’d tell me I’m funny and awesome, and badass and he wants me in his life based on this short encounter.
