The next morning, I sat in first period, tapping my pencil on my chemistry book. I was waiting for Mr. Barnes, the seventy-five-year-old chemistry teacher, to walk through the doors and get started.

People were milling around, either standing by their tables or sitting in a cluster of lab stools. Everyone had someone to talk to. Except me.

It was probably my fault. That’s what happens when you take an advanced class. Most everyone here was a senior. But I was okay with that. It was better than being stuck in Gen Chem.

Movement by the door caught my gaze. I glanced over to see Tyson walk in. Instantly butterflies erupted in my stomach. I focused on the crisp, clean notebook paper in front of me. How did this happen? I have a class with Tyson?

When I glanced up again, Tyson had moved from the doorway over to Brutus, one of his posse members. They did a bro-shake and then Tyson sat down at the table with him.

Of course he would sit with his friend. Why was I so delusional as to think that he would sit next to me? I was a nobody.

Before I allowed myself to wallow in self-pity, a slender woman in sharp heels entered. The class grew silent as she scanned the room. She had a stack of books in the crook of her arm.

“Good morning,” she said, walking over to Mr. Barnes’s desk and placing her belongings on top of it. We were all watching what she was doing.

I could hear whispers in the back. Something about Mr. Barnes.

The woman shuffled a few things around and then straightened. “I am Ms. Swallow. I will be replacing Mr. Barnes.”

“Did he die?” someone from the back asked.

She glanced in their direction. “No, Mr. Barnes did not die. But he is in the hospital. He had a nervous breakdown and went there last night.”

The murmuring grew louder.

Ms. Swallow held up her hands. “I’m sure you are all worried for him. But I can assure you that he is in good hands and recovering quickly.” She clasped her hands together and stepped out from behind the desk. “Because he will not be returning, I will be picking up where he left off. Since this is only the second day of school, I’m anticipating that this will be an easy transition.

“Now, I’ve looked over Mr. Barnes’s curriculum, and while it taught the basics, it did not go into the detail that I had hoped.” She ran her gaze over the room. “So I have made changes. If you decided to take this class for an easy A, I will tell you that will not be the case. With the proper amount of work, you will leave my class with a deeper understanding of chemistry, which will carry you through college.”

There was a collective groan. A few students stood and made their way to the door stating they needed to talk to Mr. Applegate, the school counselor.

I was cheering inside. Finally, a teacher who wasn’t scared to challenge their students. I had to refrain from clapping.

When I saw Brutus sling his backpack over his shoulder, I half-expected Tyson to follow after him. But, he didn’t. I snuck a peek back at him. He had an uneasy expression as he glanced down at the table in front of him.

Why wasn’t he leaving? It wasn’t a secret that his grades were subpar. Why was he sticking with a class where the teacher literally just told him that she was going to challenge him?

Before I could delve deeper into my curiosity, Ms. Swallow made her way to the front of the classroom and grabbed a stack of papers. She began handing them out and talking about her plans for the class.

“And now for partners.” She tapped her chin as she glanced around. “Well, I guess the old alphabet trick has never let me down. Might as well continue it.”

Once she located the class list, she began to read off names. As people were called, the sound of lab stools scraping against the floor filled the air.

“Blake…”

My ears perked at Tyson’s name. Hope filled my chest for a moment before I reminded myself that there was an entire letter between his name and mine.

“Carter.”

Of course. Brutus. How guys like Tyson were so lucky to magically get paired with their friends boggled my mind. But me? I’d probably be stuck with the kid who licks the beakers.

“Brutus Carter?” Ms. Swallow called out.

And then realization hit me. Brutus had left. Maybe—

“Alright, since there is no Mr. Carter, let’s see…Davis.”

And my stomach sank to the floor. I closed my eyes as I waited for her to admit that this was all a joke and that there was no way on God’s green earth I was going to be paired with Tyson Blake.

But the scraping of chair legs surrounded me, and Ms. Swallow began calling more names.

“This seat taken?” Tyson asked.

I swallowed, counted down from three, and opened my eyes. “No,” I squeaked. Great. Every time I talked to Tyson I sounded like an idiot.

He glanced over at me and then pulled his notebook from his backpack. “I hope the Boss will be okay with this.” He held up his hands. “It’s mandatory. He can’t get mad at me if another teacher is forcing us to talk.”

Ouch. Forced to talk.

I let out a nervous giggle and turned back to the list that Ms. Swallow had included in the packet she’d handed out. Truth was, I wasn’t sure how my dad would feel about me getting paired with Tyson. I was about 99% sure he’d hate the idea. But like Tyson said, it was mandatory. Dad couldn’t very well march up to Ms. Swallow and demand that we change lab partners. Could he?

The rest of class was spent going over the syllabus and Ms. Swallow’s expectations. By the end, I was pumped to be taking this class. She had a lot planned, and it excited me.

Tyson, on the other hand, looked less than thrilled. He packed up his notebook, shouldered his bag, and headed out of the room.

I sat back in my chair, watching his retreat. A bubble of excitement exploded in my stomach. I was partnered with Tyson. Me. Girl that was banned from ever talking to a boy. Ever.

I grabbed my belongings, shot Ms. Swallow a smile, and headed out into the hall. I was supposed to meet Rebecca at my locker so we could walk to second period together.

Thankfully, she was waiting for me when I arrived. My smile must have tipped her off because she raised her eyebrows.

“What’s with you? Why are you so happy?”

I shrugged as I pulled open my locker door and slipped the beast that was my calc book onto the top shelf. “You will never believe what just happened to me,” I said, glancing over at her.

Her eyes widened. “What?”

Taking a moment to bask in what had just happened, I turned and took a deep breath. “Tyson is in my Chem class and is partnered with me.”

“No!”

“Yes! Mr. Barnes had a panic attack, so he’s gone. And the new teacher did the OCD method to pair us up, and D comes after B, so…” I turned back around to grab my art book and slammed my door.

Rebecca was nodding. “Nice. Now your dad can’t say anything if he talks to you. It’s teacher ordered. You have to get to know Tyson Blake.” Rebecca wrapped her arms around her books as we headed down the hall. “It’s perfect.”

I spent the rest of the day too excited to focus. I wanted to get to practice to see if Tyson was going to treat me any different. Part of me hoped that he’d walk up to me and ask me something. And when my dad came over, we’d just wave him away, saying it had to do with school.

So, when the bell rang at two o’clock, I practically sprinted down to my dad’s office. He was sitting at his desk doing paperwork.

“Hey, Tiny,” he said when I walked in, dropped my backpack on the floor, and collapsed in my chair.

He seemed like he was in a good mood. I debated on whether I should tell him about my new lab partner or wait.

Knowing he would most likely ruin my excitement, I went with wait.

“Hey, Dad.” I glanced around the room while he kept writing on a piece of paper. “Do you know about the new Chem teacher we have? Ms. Swallow?”

He glanced up at me with wide eyes. His expression threw me off as he mumbled something like, there were a lot of teachers and how was he supposed to know just one. Then he turned his attention back to his paperwork.

I studied him. That was weird. Was he not telling me something? Instead of asking, I just brushed it off. “I’m excited to be in her class. She’s really nice, and she’s going to be a good teacher. I can tell.”

He nodded and then looked up. “Jug, hon,” he said, pointing the tip of his pencil at the big and circular, orange water cooler I had put away yesterday.

Right. If he wasn’t focused on killing my love life, Dad only thought about one thing. Football.

I grabbed the table, jug, and bag of cups and shuffled out of his office. It was a long walk out to the field by myself. Unfortunately for me, no one on the team would ever think of helping. They were too worried about the laps they would have to run if my dad caught them.

Just as I pushed open the gymnasium door to head outside, the table slipped from my grasp and crashed down on my foot.

I yelled and jumped, sending the jug tumbling down to the ground. The noise echoed off the gym’s high ceilings and hardwood floors. I bent down to pick up what I’d dropped, grateful no one had been around to see me.

“You need help?” Tyson asked.

I glanced up to see him, dressed in his football uniform. The one that hugged him in all the right places. Bless the creators of football uniforms.

I swallowed. What was I supposed to say? I wanted to say yes, even though I knew what my dad would do to him if he found Tyson anywhere near me. I couldn’t help it. When the captain of the football team and most likely to be homecoming king asks you if you want help, you say yes.

So I obeyed that one very obvious rule. “Yes,” I said, nodding my head a bit too vigorously.

Calm down, Tiny. He’s just helping you with the water set-up, not giving you a kidney.

So I slowed my nod and tried to act relaxed. “That would be okay, I guess.”

He glanced over at me as he bent down and picked up the jug that had rolled across the gym floor. I bent down to pick up the table. When I straightened, I yelped.

Tyson had magically appeared right next to me.

“You’re a ninja,” I said, the words slipping out. I winced. Who says that?

“What?” he asked. When I glanced up at him, I saw that his lips had tipped up into a smile. “Did you just say ninja?”

I scoffed. How the heck was I going to get out of this? Deciding it would be best to just roll with it, I shrugged. “You’ve never been told that?”

He shook his head. “Not even once.”

I’d been so focused on watching his expression that I didn’t notice he’d reached out to grab the table from me until his fingers brushed against my own. I swallowed as I glanced down. His fingers were touching mine. Mine!

I let go, snapping my hand back, and glanced around. I half expected my dad to come barreling into the gym, all red-faced and snarling. But nothing happened.

I let out the breath I had been holding. When I glanced over, Tyson was studying me. I felt like I needed to say something.

“Thanks for that,” I said, nodding toward the table. I took a few steps back, just in case good ole Dad saw us.

He shot me a smile. “No problem. The table is about the same size as you.”

“Hey,” I said, shooting him a stern look. I turned and pushed open the door, holding it as he walked through. “Only a select few people can make fun of my height.”

He shrugged as I let the door shut behind us. The heat clung to my skin. I led the way down to the field. Tyson had grown silent, and I wondered if I had offended him. As I replayed our conversation over in my mind, I couldn’t figure out how that could have happened. He’d made fun of my height. Right?

“Can I ask you something?” His voice had grown so quiet, I wondered if I had heard him right.

Grateful I hadn’t offended him, I glanced over. “Sure.” Then I backpedaled. “Well, it depends on what you want to know.” I pushed my hair from my face. It clung to my skin like octopus tentacles. I should have put it up in to a ponytail before coming outside.

“Are you smart? Like, really smart?” He glanced over at me, his eyes a deep blue.

“Um.” How was I supposed to answer that. Was this a humility test? If I said yes, I’d sound conceited. If I said no, well, that would be a blatant lie. So I settled with, “Sort of?”

His eyebrows knit together. “How is someone sort of smart?”

We were at my usual spot, so I dropped the bag of cups onto the ground and waved for him to hand me the table. He shook his head, set the jug down, and began to unfold it. Not sure what to do, I stood back, watching his perfectly formed muscles move as he set it up.

“Well, I’m not sure how to answer that without sounding conceited.” I pulled my hair back into a bun at the nape of my neck.

When he stood and glanced over at me, I could have sworn I saw his gaze hesitate on my neck. I blinked, and he was back to looking at my eyes. It was my imagination. It had to be.

“So you are smart. I figured that since you were in a senior Chem class.” He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “Do you tutor? Like, could you help me with Chem?”

My heart hammered so hard that I thought it might leap from my chest and take off down the field. Was Tyson Blake asking me for help?

He widened his eyes. “Oh, it wouldn’t be anything like that. It would just be one lab partner helping another lab partner out.” He held up his hands, as if spending time with me outside of a school assignment would be absurd.

I tried to not let that hurt my feelings. He was probably just trying to protect himself. If my dad caught wind of any of this, the answer would be a flat-out no, and Tyson would be running laps from now until graduation.

“Of course,” I scoffed. “I knew that.” Other football players began to appear on the field. I knew my dad was moments behind them. My mind raced as I tried to come up with a way to pull this off.

“Here,” Tyson said, reaching out and grabbing my hand. Tingles erupted from his touch and raced up my arm. “Do you have a pen?”

I shook my head.

“Hmm.” He glanced around, while still holding my hand. I couldn’t focus on anything other than how small my fingers looked next to his.

Suddenly, he dropped my hand and bent down, grabbing a stick. He wrote the number 714-555-9823 in the dirt. “That’s my number,” he said, motioning toward it. “Text me when you’ve decided.”

“BLAKE!” my dad bellowed.

My stomach sank as I glanced up to see Dad barreling toward us. His face was red, and his gaze was fixed on Tyson.

“I gotta go,” he said, turning and running to meet my dad.

After a brief exchange, Tyson’s shoulders dropped, and he began a slow jog around the field. My dad turned to stare at me. He pointed at me and then to the jug. I sighed as I nodded and picked up the bag of cups to set them onto the table.

And then my gaze made its way over to Tyson’s number. To his personal cellphone—that he gave me permission to text. I blinked a few times, but the numbers remained, scratched into the dirt.

I was going to talk to Tyson Blake again.