“Sure, Allie,” Dani said.
Our conversation drifted to music, the new clothes we'd gotten for Christmas, and the start of school which was growing close. Despite the change of subject, though, I continued to feel distracted and lost.
Delaney cackled in glee when she beat the rest of us. “I can't remember the last time I won.”
“Allie is off her game today,” Molly said. “She should have beaten you.”
My phone dinged and I flinched as I realized who it must be. I snatched it up and jumped to my feet.
“I'll be right back,” I blurted as I hurried from the room so I could read the message in private.
Seth: Got time to talk, sexy?
Me: Flattery will get you nowhere. I have a couple of minutes. Playing Monopoly with friends
Seth: And you stay friends after playing?
Me: We usually don't get to actual bloodshed
Seth: Good to know. So are you still up for tomorrow night?
I desperately wanted to make an excuse not to go, but I just couldn't bring myself to lie to him.
Me: Sure
Seth: How about dinner at Chili's then a concert?
Seth: It's a local group, but they're good and cover a lot of cool bands
He listed off several that I liked. Well, at least I could listen to some decent music.
Me: Sounds good to me
With a concert I wouldn't have to spend a lot of time talking to him and making evasions. I could do it and get it over with and make sure he never wanted to go out with me again. Not that I believed I'd have to do much. It was the pattern with every guy I went out with, after all.
Seth: Can I pick you up at 7?
Me: How about I meet you at the restaurant instead?
Seth: Suit yourself. I'll see you then
Me: OK. See you tomorrow
I closed out of the text window then went back to Delaney's room. All conversation stopped as soon as I walked in the door and three pairs of eyes watched me expectantly. Laney plunged in while the other two were still dithering.
“So what was that all about?”
My first thought was to lie, but they'd hear about it eventually anyway.
“I'm going out with Seth tomorrow night.”
Laney dropped the dice she'd been shaking. “Seth?”
I tried being flippant. “You know—tall, good-looking pizza delivery guy? Seth.”
“But I thought you liked Dylan now?” she asked.
“I do. But he's not interested and Seth asked, so I'm going out with him.”
“Oh, Allie,” Molly said sadly.
Dani didn't say anything, but she patted my arm when I sat down.
Laney wouldn't let it go. “Why, Allie? Why go out with him if you don't want to?”
“I agreed to it before I could come up with a good excuse. I didn't want to back out once I'd said yes.”
Molly gnawed on her bottom lip as she considered it. “Maybe it's for the best. Go out with him and get your mind off of Dylan.”
Dani shook her head. “I don't think you should.”
“It's too late now,” I told her.
But I wished I had backed out, and my Monopoly playing didn't get any better. I lost every game. It was not a good omen for things to come.
I met Seth at the restaurant as I'd agreed. We made small talk while we ordered and ate, but I ignored all of his attempts to flirt. I tried to stay pleasant but distant in hopes that he'd get the message and never ask me out again. As we finished the meal he leaned back and looked at me with a bemused smile.
“You don't want to be here at all, do you?”
Suddenly I was ashamed of the way I'd been acting. Seth didn't deserve it. All he'd done was ask me out and try to be nice.
“I'm sorry.”
“I shouldn't have put you on the spot at the gym yesterday. I was just under the impression that you kind of liked me.”
I blushed at that because I'd never intended for him to know.
“I did,” I admitted. “But...”
“But you've gotten over it.”
I stared at my plate and nodded.
“My loss,” he said.
“I'm sorry.”
“You can take off if you want, Allison. I appreciate you going through with this even though you didn't want to. Most girls would have just lied about being sick or something to get out of it.”
“Well, I thought about it.”
He laughed again. “Look, I've already got the tickets for the concert. Why don't you come with me and try to have a good time? I promise I won't hit on you or ask you out again, and afterwards we part as friends. Deal?”
I smiled despite myself. Somehow I'd always known that Seth was one of the good guys.
“Deal,” I said, and we toasted each other with our iced tea.
I enjoyed the concert immensely once there was no pressure about the date, and when we said goodnight I went home feeling good about the evening. Seth had made it clear that there were no hard feelings, and I knew that he was out of my system for good. I felt better than I had since New Year's Eve.
School was starting in two days, and that had me excited and restless. I was ready to go back. My friends were spending these last days with their boyfriends, which left me at loose ends most of the time. Another winter storm had blown in as well, bringing with it cold rain with flashes of lightning outlining low, heavy clouds to the bass accompaniment of thunder. It was perfect bookstore weather.
I'd finished Wuthering Heights, and nothing on my bookshelves appealed to me. Rain was spattering down in ragged sheets when I got to the store, and I stepped inside with a relieved sigh as the weight of the past few days lifted from my shoulders. With a cup of coffee in hand I proceeded to browse through the seemingly endless shelves. I wandered idly, not looking for anything in particular, just enjoying the ambiance.
The place was fairly empty since it was a work day and few kids were interested in spending their last couple of vacation days, so time passed in dreamy solitude and I lost all track of how long I'd been there. It was just me and that maze of shelves that went on forever.
I finally settled on a lovely hardbound edition of Jane Austen's novels. I'd been meaning to try them for a while, because I'd seen a couple of movies based on them. The book is always better than the movie, though, so I'd wanted to read them to get the full effect. Once I'd gotten a refill for my coffee I found an empty sofa by a window where I could listen to the rain softly pattering against the glass and the low, distant rumble of thunder. I quickly lost myself in Austen's lighthearted prose while the rest of the world receded to a hazy memory.
I'd paused to sip on my coffee when a voice from behind brought me crashing back to reality.
“That must be some book.”
I turned and found myself face to face with Dylan, who was stretched out on the couch behind mine.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
He held up a thick, creepy looking tome titled Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos. “Just a little light reading to get me into the mood to go back to school. So what is it that had you so engrossed you didn't even notice when I sat down?”
I showed him my book, and he frowned thoughtfully.
“That's Sense and Sensibility, right? My mom loves that movie.”
“Yeah, although I'm reading Pride and Prejudice now.”
“Is it a sequel or something?”
“No, that's just how they're named. The books don't have anything to do with each other. Yours looks kind of dark.”
“Yeah. Like I said, preparing for back to school.”
“And here I was looking forward to it.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because all of my friends have boyfriends, and I've been on my own and bored.”
“Oh? What about Seth?”
My jaw dropped. “Seth?”
“Kylie and her friends saw you two at the concert the other night. I think they were kind of jealous.”
His lips tilted in a wry smile. “I guess he's every girl's favorite pizza guy.”
“We just went as friends. We're not dating or anything. And I don't have any plans to go out with him again.”
Dylan nodded, but I could tell he didn't believe me. There was nothing I could do about that, though, so I tried to change the subject.
“Speaking of Kylie...” I looked around pointedly, noting her absence.
He merely shrugged. “She's not much of a reader.”
“I'm sure she's got other talents.”
Dylan drew back and raised his eyebrows. I guessed I'd gone a little too far.
“Sorry. That was uncalled for.”
Mentally I crossed my fingers, though, because I totally did mean it. I grabbed my coffee and stood up.
“I need to be getting home. I always lose all track of time when I'm here.”
“See you at school.”
“Yeah, see you.”
I hurried away before I could say something to make the situation even worse. When I glanced back, Dylan was still watching me. I huddled into my hoodie and walked faster. That whole hiding out in my bed under the covers until summer vacation was looking better all the time.
Chapter Ten
Going back to school didn't help nearly as much as I'd hoped it would. Happy couples surrounded me, constantly reminding me that I wasn't part of one. Worse, I saw Dylan almost every day. While he wasn't a part of our close circle of friends and didn't hang out with us, we did share the same lunch period. Besides that, our high school wasn't that big. While I couldn't claim to know every person who went there, it was hard to avoid noticing someone that you did know.
It wasn't at all like when I'd been crushing on Seth. The mere glimpse of him in the halls had been enough to set my pulse racing and to release a swarm of butterflies. The sight of Dylan wrung my soul. My chest tightened with longing and I missed the happy hours we'd spent together, the mischievous light in his eyes when he teased, the clear music of his laughter. I missed it all more every day, like a piece had been stolen from my heart.
While I did my best to hide my feelings, I guess my acting wasn't as good as I'd hoped. Dannika caught me alone before school, and the concern in her eyes made me want to run in the other direction. I knew she'd just track me down later, though, so there wasn't much point.
“How long are you going to keep doing this?” she asked.
“Doing what?”
“Pretending like you don't care and everything is peachy?”
“How do you know it isn't?”
“Please. Maybe you can fool the others for a while, but I've known you longer. You bleed when you look at him, Allie.”
“I'm getting over him.”
She uttered a derisive snort. “Pretending not to care is not getting over it. I should know.”
“It's a start. It will get easier with time. That's what everyone always says about broken hearts, right?”
“It doesn't have to be broken, silly.”
“That's easy for you to say when you have Ashton.”
“But I almost lost him. Don't make the same mistake I did.”
“Kylie and her friends saw me at the concert with Seth, and they told Dylan,” I said. “He's never going to trust me, even if he does want me, which I don't believe for a minute.”
“You're wrong about that.”
“How do you know?”
“I don't,” she admitted, “but I can feel it. I know both of you, and I'm not wrong about this.”
“Dani, I'm afraid that this time your matchmaking already did its job too well with Kylie.”
“Just be patient. He'll get tired of her.”
“I can't afford to be patient. It hurts too much. I need to get over him, even if it means just pretending to be over him at first until I really am.”
“That's what I thought with Ashton.”
“It's not the same. How long were you two together before? I only had a few days with Dylan.”
She waved that away as insignificant. “If it's the right person, only a few hours is enough.”
“Dylan isn't the right person. He's made that crystal clear. And I will get over him.”
Dannika sighed in exasperation, but let it go. “For your sake I hope you're right.”
I didn't even believe my own words. Why should she?
As though to hammer that doubt home, two days later Dylan showed up in my world literature class. He handed a slip of paper to the teacher, who studied it with irritation.
“Schedule change?” she asked.
“They messed it up and just now got it fixed.”
“All right. We can talk about it after class.”
She waved him to an empty seat a couple of rows in front of mine, and for a brief instant our eyes met before he sat down. I was too stunned to react, not sure whether to laugh or cry at this latest twist of fate. I would have no chance to forget him now, for him to fade from my memories. I'd have to watch him sitting in front of me every day in class.
At the front of the room the teacher was handing out papers.
“Your next assignment is a book report, due in two weeks. The instructions are on the handout, and you can find a list of approved books on the class web page.”
She continued talking, but I barely heard her. I stared at the handout without focusing on it. How was I supposed to concentrate on anything now? The school which I'd thought would be my refuge from loneliness and the constant thoughts of Dylan had turned into a prison. It was like the universe was out to get me or something.
All of my friends had boyfriends. Even Nicole, who had just come back to town after over six months, was seeing someone. When I wasn't interested in him anymore, Seth asked me out. I was avoiding the gym now because he might be there, which was funny because he used to be one of the main reasons I went. Now I wasn't sure I trusted him not to ask me out again, even though he'd said he wouldn't. I was staying away from the bookstore because I was afraid I'd run into Dylan there again. But now he was in one of my classes, which guaranteed I'd have to see him every day. There was no escape, and summer vacation was long months away.
What was I going to do? My shoulders slumped and I let my head fall into my hands. It was going to be a long semester.
I checked the class web page when I got home and found Wuthering Heights listed among the approved books. I practically knew it by heart, which suited me because I wasn't in the mood to write about something new. But although I tried to get started on the project to distract myself from thoughts of Dylan, instead of Cathy and Heathcliff my mind kept filling in the blanks with Kylie and Dylan.
How had Dani been so wrong? Whenever she worked her matchmaking magic she was always right. Now more then ever I wondered whether the problem was really with me. Maybe there was something wrong with me that turned all the guys away after they got to know me. The words of those two guys on the beach last summer floated through my head, mocking all my efforts since then. The truth was that Dylan could do better than me, and he undoubtedly knew it. It only took one look at Kylie to see that.
I stopped going to the gym, leaving the house only to go to school, and at home I hid in my room so I could wallow in my misery in peace. I knew it wasn't a good thing to do, but I couldn't seem to help myself. Seeing Dylan every day dragged my heart deeper and deeper into darkness. I also avoided my friends as much as I could. I should have known that wasn't going to fly for very long.
On Saturday night I sprawled on the couch in front of the television, although I wasn't paying any attention to anything happening on the screen. My thoughts were far away when the doorbell rang, and the sound barely registered. After a minute it rang again.
My mom's voice rose from her room. “Allie! Get the door!”
I dragged myself off of the couch and trudged to the door, where I found Molly tapping her foot while she hummed a little tune.
“Hey, babe!” she said brightly, and pushed her way past me to go inside.
> “I wasn't expecting you.”
“Of course not. If I'd let you know I was coming you wouldn't have opened the door.”
She kept on going until she reached my room, and I had to hurry to keep up with her. Without invitation she perched on the edge of my bed and gave me a stern look.
“Get dressed.”
“What? Why?”
“We're going out. You're not sitting here alone all night brooding and feeling sorry for yourself.”
“I don't want to go out.”
“I know that. But I'm your friend and I'm not going to let you keep doing this to yourself.”
“Molly...” I groaned.
“No. I've been where you are. You'll sit here making yourself miserable for weeks—months—if we let you. Well, Delaney wouldn't let me do it, and I'm not going to let you do it. So get dressed.”
“Fine,” I growled through clenched teeth.
There was no use fighting it, and I didn't have the energy for it anyway. I'd humor her and get it over with, and maybe they'd leave me alone for a while. I made no effort to pick out clothes, and just threw on a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and a plain gray hoodie. They were clean; that was as much trouble as I intended to go to. Molly gave me a hard look, but she didn't push it.
“Good enough,” she said. “Let's go.”
I didn't even bother asking where as I trailed her to her car. I didn't care. I met her attempts at small talk with single syllable responses or grunts that did nothing to encourage her. Molly refused to be put off, though, and chattered amiably about whatever came to mind as she drove. I groaned again when she pulled into the parking lot at Caroline's.
“Really, Molly?”
She turned off the car. “Tell me you aren't in serious need of a cinnamon roll right now.”
“Some things a cinnamon roll can't fix.”
“That's not what you've always said.”
“So I've been giving out lousy advice. That shouldn't surprise anyone.”
“Oh, stop it.”
She grabbed my hand and dragged me inside. There were less than half a dozen customers, and the waitress told us we could seat ourselves. Molly took us to a corner booth, and I slumped into the seat.
“Cheer up,” Molly said, then smiled as the waitress approached.
The Perfect Match Page 9
