by Tiana Smith
Then I realized I was being an idiot.
I’d gone to extremes to get Vince to like me, and now I was thinking of reasons to dodge his advances? What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I just enjoy it?
I hated that I’d somehow let Logan into my head. Logan was a flirt. It wasn’t like he meant anything by it. He didn’t care about his education or future the way I did. I needed to get my priorities straight. Plus, I’d promised Robyn. I smiled up at Vince and leaned in a little bit. He took that as an invitation and brought his arm all the way around my waist.
We got to my locker, and Vince dropped his arm while I did the combination. I took my time opening it, my emotions twisting like the numbers on the lock.
“Oh man,” he said while I put my books in my locker. “I forgot to ask Coach about our soccer schedule. I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow.”
“Do you want to go talk to him now?” I sounded hopeful, which was ridiculous. But my gut was clenching with the memory of Robyn’s words, and my hands felt suddenly sweaty. Why did Robyn think we wouldn’t work?
Maybe it wouldn’t be as easy as I’d thought to keep Vince interested for two weeks. And I needed him to stay interested, which meant I’d need to think of more conversation topics, for one thing. Just because he’d asked me out didn’t mean I was in the clear—I still needed him to save my reputation and Robyn’s business. He’d be the perfect boyfriend for me. I just needed to make sure he saw that.
“And stop talking to you? Never.” He leaned against the lockers, crossing his arms on his chest in a way that made his pectorals flex. He grinned at me, fully aware of the way his stance put his body at its best advantage.
Maybe Vince already saw it. I didn’t have to fake the smile that stretched across my face. Robyn was wrong—I could be myself and Vince would still like me for who I was, because we were a good match.
“Want to help me with my journalism article?” I asked, angling my body toward him. Vince was still smiling, but he cocked his head to the side.
“Is that what you were doing when you left the game on Saturday? Working on your article? Elena said she thought you already had it all written.”
Should I lie? No, Elena already knew the truth, and apparently, she and Vince were best buds who braided each other’s hair and kept no secrets.
“Uh, actually, I was with Logan.”
Vince frowned, and I hurried to explain myself.
“I owed him. He caught me breaking into the computer lab after hours, and he was basically blackmailing me.”
“Breaking into the computer lab? Man, you really are a nerd if you can’t bear to leave school after hours,” he said with a smile.
“I…” This conversation was going downhill. Vince smiled, but it wavered uncertainly, which made my stomach clench like a nutcracker.
“It’s all good,” he said. “You know what, though? On second thought, I really should talk to Coach before classes start. You work on your article, and I’ll see you at lunch, yeah?”
“You sure?” I asked. “We could—”
“No worries,” he cut in. “Really.” His star smile was back in place. He reached out, gave my hand a squeeze, and then disappeared down the hall.
I let out a gust of air and fell back against my locker. Elena was right—I needed to cut Logan loose. Vince hadn’t started acting weird until I’d mentioned Logan’s name, so it was all Logan’s fault. This whole thing was making me crazy. I tried to remember what I’d been thinking before Logan took me on the date and why I thought Vince and I would be great together. Vince obviously cared about school and his extracurriculars, which meant he was devoted. And that sort of thing was good for a relationship.
The morning passed slowly. Each class dragged on until I was sure someone was turning back the clocks. By the time lunch came around, I’d developed an eye twitch that rivaled my dad’s when he’d had too much coffee.
I was at my locker, and I wasn’t hiding. I was just … waiting for the crowds and the gossip to die down. Right.
“You okay?” Logan said by my ear, and I jumped.
“What? Oh, yeah, I’m fine,” I lied. “Why?”
“Because your head has been stuck inside your locker for the last three minutes and you haven’t come out for air. I was worried I’d need to send for a rescue crew.”
“You’ve been watching me for three minutes? Why?”
He smiled. “Don’t try to change the subject. Are you sure you’re okay?”
I glanced around, all too aware of the other students milling in the hallway. Yes, I needed to talk with Logan, but I couldn’t talk here.
“Yep,” I sighed.
He narrowed his eyes at me. “If we went somewhere else, would you feel comfortable enough to tell me the truth?”
“Yes.”
In a flash, he’d closed my locker door and was guiding me down the hall with a hand on my back. He stopped at an unmarked door and opened it, motioning me inside.
“A janitor’s closet?” I said, looking around and seeing toiletries and cleaning supplies stacked against the wall. I stepped inside, and he shut the door behind us.
“Yeah. Now what’s the matter?”
“I don’t really want to talk about it,” I said. Yes, we were alone now, but for some reason, that didn’t make me want to break things off with him. Sort of the opposite, actually. I wanted to take his hand and pull him close. And even though that was a bad plan, my heartbeat picked up a notch and made my hands itch at my sides.
I studied the rows of cleaning supplies and bulk packages of toilet paper, as if that could somehow make me focus on something other than the fact that we were alone in a janitor’s closet. I needed logic now more than ever, but around Logan, I didn’t exactly want to be logical.
“You know, I think I know something that will take your mind off things.” He was leaning close, and there wasn’t that much room in the closet to begin with. This. This was why it was hard to think logically. I needed my mind on things. Not off.
Logan placed one hand on the wall behind me and took a step forward. “I can also think of something that will help you feel better. They might even be the same thing.”
How could he expect me to take him seriously when he said things like that? Obviously, Logan was simply trying to get a reaction out of me.
At least, I thought that was what he was doing.
He was even closer now, only a few inches away. He brought his face closer to mine, hovering just out of reach, as if waiting for what my response would be.
I forced myself to put my hands on his chest and push him away.
“That would just make my problems worse,” I said with a small smile. I quickly pulled my hands back so I wasn’t touching his chest.
His eyebrows drew together in confusion for a moment before smoothing out.
“You mean you still like Vince.”
Now would be the perfect time to say something. To cut him loose. Especially if he was simply playing games.
So why wasn’t I doing that?
“I … yes.” Simply wanting to kiss Logan right now didn’t mean it was a good idea. And surprisingly, I did want to kiss him.
I hated that I was so easily played. Especially when there was someone like Vince in the picture. Someone guaranteed to give me an honest shot, because he’d signed Robyn’s contract. This thought calmed my stomach flutters, and I tried to give the same message to my mouth. I should be speaking up, not puckering up. Get with the program, mouth. But I couldn’t get the words out.
I watched Logan’s face for some indication of what he was thinking, but he was like one of those British guards who never twitched.
“You know what would really fix your problems?” he asked after a moment.
“What?”
“Figuring out what you really want.” He smiled then, but I couldn’t decipher it. I wasn’t as good at reading him as he was at reading me, so I could only wonder whether he was imagining a kiss in his he
ad the same way I was. “Or who. Because I’m not so sure you like Vince the way you say you do.”
Logan ran a hand through his hair and hitched his backpack up on his shoulder.
“Just don’t take too long, okay?” He opened the door. The words were on the tip of my tongue. I was going to tell him things could never happen between us. But he didn’t give me a chance.
He left, and I was stuck pondering life’s mysteries in a broom closet.
nine
Alone in the janitor’s closet, I tried to sort things out. The way Logan acted didn’t make sense to me. He’d been gone a whole thirty seconds, and still my heartbeat was dancing erratically. Was he trying to make me crazy? It certainly seemed like it. But why? What was his endgame?
I knew why Vince was interested. Logan, on the other hand … well, it was hard to trust a flirt. But judging by the way my thoughts kept drifting back to how he’d brushed his hair with his fingers, or how his voice sounded when he’d leaned in close, it was also incredibly hard to resist. Logically, I knew we weren’t a good match. We were completely opposite, like when I tried to push the wrong sides of a magnet together. So how come I was having such a hard time pulling us apart?
Vince wasn’t messing around. No matter how well Logan seemed to know me, Vince was the one who’d asked me to homecoming. Vince was the one making a real move. Vince was the one for me.
So Logan wanted to play head games? Fine. He could play them with someone else.
Goodbye, bumbling, confused girl who changed her mind every other minute. I was the girl who knew what she wanted and set out to make it happen, and no teenage boy, no matter how tousled his hair was, was going to change that.
I squared my shoulders before placing my hand on the doorknob. That girl was going to make a comeback, and it was going to be epic.
I swung the door open and came face-to-face with Vince.
He stood with his arms crossed, and for the first time since I’d emailed him, he didn’t look happy to see me.
This wasn’t good.
“Uh,” I said, slowly closing the door behind me. “Hi. What are you doing here?”
“We were going to meet for lunch, remember?” His shoulders were tense, making his shirt pull in all the right places. “I guess you forgot, though, because I saw you go into the janitor’s closet with someone who looked a lot like Logan Sanders.”
So. Not. Good.
“So what are we? Because I guess I thought we were official.”
Guilt made my cheeks flush but then a spike of anger shoved all other emotions aside.
“Vince, we haven’t held hands, and we haven’t kissed. We haven’t even talked about it. So how does that make us official?”
If I was going to turn down Logan, I needed to know where I stood with Vince. Sure, he seemed to trust Robyn and her matchmaking, but how far did that trust go?
An anxious feeling was creeping its way up my throat, strangling out all common sense. Any minute, Vince would realize his mistake and then he’d be out of here. I needed concrete answers, and I was nothing if not desperate, so I was going to push for them.
I wouldn’t get another chance with Vince, so I had to make it work. This was my only shot—it wasn’t like he would have noticed me without me pulling a few strings. I needed to forget about Logan and focus on Vince right now.
Vince, who still hadn’t said anything.
“Okay,” he finally said. “Fair enough.” His shoulders relaxed slightly, and he reached out to touch my arm. “Sorry I overreacted.”
My anger dissipated as we walked over to a bench in the hallway and sat down. He took my hand in his. People passed us on either side, and I couldn’t help but wish there were somewhere a little less public we could talk. Vince was used to the spotlight, as Logan had said, so I guessed he didn’t even notice.
“Have you…” He paused. “Have you done all those things with him?”
“What things?”
“Like, have you kissed him?”
“No!” I almost shouted the word. The last thing I needed right now was for Vince to get scared off. Robyn would kill me for ruining her business’s reputation. Plus, I really wanted to see where things went with us.
“I guess this will be a shutout, then.” Vince smiled and turned to me, taking my hand in his. “So what were your three conditions? Talk about it, hold hands, and kiss?”
“I—”
“Well, I call this talking about it, but I’ll say it straight out if that’s what you want. Mia, I think we should date for real. I want to give us a shot and go all in.” He was practically quoting Robyn’s contract. I would know—I’d helped her write it.
“I’m holding your hand now, so I guess that’s checked off, which means there is only one more item on the agenda.”
Before I could even think about what he’d said, he was leaning over and kissing me. There, in the middle of the hall. With our classmates all around. And our teachers.
A few guys hooted in response, some even going so far as to make suggestive comments that made my ears burn. I tried to ignore them and focus on the kiss. Because, hello! Vince was finally kissing me! And I was kissing him back. I’d dreamed of this moment ever since I’d first set eyes on his beautiful face. Sure, I’d always pictured it in a more romantic setting, but whatever. There were still sparks, and I knew more could come with time.
When Vince pulled back, he was giving me his brilliant smile.
He certainly seemed confident. And why shouldn’t he be? He was, after all, gorgeous, talented, popular, and everything else a girl could want in a boyfriend. What I wanted.
“Listen, Mia, I think we’d be great together.”
I expected him to mention Robyn. After all, she was the whole reason he’d asked me to the dance, but Vince didn’t bring up my best friend. He let go of my hand and stood up. I felt the moment slipping away from me. “I’ll talk to you later, okay? Tomorrow? When you’ve had a chance to think about everything I’ve said.”
Why was he giving me space? Was that a good thing? Maybe it was bad. Maybe it meant he had doubts. Was I a bad kisser? Maybe my breath smelled.
I didn’t know where I’d gone wrong. I was supposed to be making Vince fall madly in love with me, but nothing I did seemed to work out the way I expected. I was already failing, and soon Robyn would know. If Vince emailed her, would she tell him the truth? Would my public humiliation know no bounds? Would I be dateless for homecoming? I still thought Vince and I could work. We could be great together. How could I make him see that?
“The team does weights together on Tuesday mornings, so I won’t be able to pick you up, but I’ll catch you at lunch tomorrow? We can eat over by the locker rooms.”
Smelly locker rooms? Okay, maybe Logan had a point when he said jocks weren’t so good with romance.
“Great, see you then,” I said, and Vince rewarded me with one of his smiles. He spotted someone down the hall and held up one of his fingers in the universal wait a sec gesture.
“Thanks, babe. See you tomorrow.”
Babe? I tried not to make a face. He gave me a quick peck on the cheek and moved down the hall, where Elena was waiting for him. They were probably going to go eat lunch with their normal group because Vince was now giving me space. I smiled and waved at her, but she turned around without acknowledging me at all. I was used to Elena going all drama queen on others but never with me. Then again, a lot of things were changing lately, and maybe that was one more thing to add to the list.
* * *
Robyn was waiting for me in the lunchroom.
“I know something you don’t know,” she sang, tossing me an apple. We found seats, and I pulled out my sandwich. Robyn popped open her drink and took a long swallow. “It’s about Mr. Quince.”
She was the lucky one who got our journalism teacher for homeroom. I was stuck with Mr. Good, who was anything but.
I bit into my sandwich. “What?”
She frowned. “You could s
how a bit more enthusiasm. I’ve been waiting all morning to tell you this.”
“Sorry,” I said around a mouthful. It was hard to get worked up about my journalism teacher when the ground was shifting under my feet.
“Whatever. Trust me, you’ll love this. You know how our newspaper readership has been down?”
“I’m supposed to love that?” The possibility of our paper shutting down was the last thing I needed to hear about right now.
“Hush and listen. So Mr. Quince decided to run a contest. The person who can bring in the most readers for this whole month will get an internship spot at the Athens Daily Chronicle over the summer.”
I stopped chewing. A journalism internship would be perfect for my college applications. I needed this more than I needed air.
“How will he know who’s bringing in the most readers?” I asked, setting the sandwich down.
“He can track page views on the digital version. Fewer people read the physical copies, so I guess he’ll let those ones slide.” Robyn opened her bag of chips and crammed a few into her mouth.
That was true: Most students preferred the digital version. So Mr. Quince’s method made sense, even if I did hate the idea of letting even a few readers go unrecorded.
“An internship at the Athens paper—that’s pretty exciting, don’t you think?” I asked. The wheels were already turning as I considered the possibilities. Step one, land this internship. Step two, snag a spot on a college paper. Mr. Quince always said that getting experience and knowing the right people were crazy important to a journalism career, so this was a no-brainer.
Robyn shrugged. “For someone like you, maybe. I have better things to do this summer. Hopefully.” She ate more potato chips, chewing on them noisily, but I was too focused to be bothered by her table manners. Weird, though—what summer plans hadn’t she told me about?
