Chapter 11

I was late to first period.

After calculus I went and officially declared my candidacy. The adviser had already known that I planned to run thanks to Ella’s hard work. She hadn’t been kidding when she said she had already started. In the main hallway, she’d managed to charm a janitor into hanging signs from the rafters. The first one in each series would say “Vote,” the second one “for” and the third “Mattie Lowe.” I noticed people pointing at them.

She had also gone out into the courtyard and completely covered the ground with “Mattie Lowe for President” in chalk of various colors.

She had also put up posters we had worked on together, which had this picture of me that was one of the few that I actually liked, in which I sort of resembled Jennifer Garner in that show she used to be on where she was the spy and had the fuchsia hair (which is admittedly where I got my current hair color inspiration from). We kept it simple. No clever little catchphrases (which I always found annoying)—just “Vote for Mattie.”

Ella was amazing.

Then I would think again about that morning and the feel of Jake’s lips on my cheek and get all fluttery and flustered.

Jake was amazing.

Everything just seemed so right, so perfect.

Life was amazing.

I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt this happy.

Unfortunately, the universe had no intention of letting things stay that way.

At my locker I felt Mercedes Bentley staring at me. Usually she looked at me in this condescending, sneering way. But today she looked royally confused, like I was some alien who had just landed and she couldn’t figure me out. I grabbed a pile of flyers I’d made up and smiled as I closed my locker.

I walked down the hallway, passing out flyers to everyone who would take them. Jake’s kiss had given me a confidence I’d never felt before. I even managed to tell people, “Vote for Mattie.” I couldn’t stop myself from smiling at everyone, and lots of people smiled back.

I stopped short when a freshman who looked like a Mercedes Bentley in training stood directly in front of me. She was pulling along a mousy, quiet-looking girl who stood two steps back with her head down. The quiet one didn’t even make eye contact with me. The other one just stared at me.

I found myself wanting to say something snide to this girl as she stared at me, but I couldn’t let all my hard work go to waste. I was running for president. I needed to behave like it. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Mercedes’s Mini-Me said, “Are you, like, dating Jake Kingston?”

I could feel my face flush. I knew my cheeks were a bright cherry red. Curse my stupid ghost-colored skin! “What?”

“We heard about what happened in the parking lot. Did you, like, steal him from your sister?”

“Stepsister,” I absentmindedly corrected her as I tried to take in this new information. People thought Jake and I were an actual couple? I had noticed people looking at me earlier, but I’d figured it was because of the campaign posters and the flyers. What if they were talking about Jake and me? My heart thrilled at the idea that people believed it was possible. That Jake could like me. I wondered what it would be like to have the satisfaction of telling this little twit that yes, Jake was my boyfriend and we were dating.

Wait, what if he thought I was the one telling people that we were together? After all, I had asked him to hug me. Maybe he would think I was trying to take advantage of the situation. He would think I was so pathetic. I had to set the record straight so it wouldn’t fall back on me.

“Um, no, we’re not dating.”

The first girl looked smug, the second crestfallen. The mini-Mercedes turned to her friend and said, “See, I told you he’d, like, never date someone like her. He only goes out with girls like Ella. Come on.”

My good mood totally evaporated. I wanted to protest, to call her back and tell her she was wrong. But I had the uncomfortable sinking feeling that she was right.

Jake did date girls like Ella. He never dated girls like me.

* * *

Jake continued to drive me to school, and we spent the time working on our manga Pride and Prejudice project. He would give me dialogue for the story, and I would edit it and insert it into the scenes I had already drawn. We worked well together, and his words went perfectly with my pictures. We would sit in the parking lot until we absolutely had to leave for class.

We talked mostly about the project, but we did talk about other stuff too. There was the day I discovered he was a Dodgers fan too. But when he told me he didn’t like Clayton Kershaw, I gasped and said, “Inconceivable.”

“I do not think that word means what you think it means,” he shot back.

“You like The Princess Bride too?” He nodded. Along with John Hughes’s films, it was one of my favorite movies ever. “Very quotable.”

“Agreed,” he said.

Over the next few days I also found out that, like me, he was not a vegetarian, and that he had a dog named Scooby due to his childhood love of cartoons. We even argued back and forth about the best manga and anime series.

I couldn’t believe how much I looked forward to the time we spent together. I tried not to read too much into it, because my imagination could very quickly go to an unreal place.

Although I never imagined a weekend could be so freaking long. Every minute felt excruciating. I wondered what Jake was doing, wondered if he wondered what I was doing, if he thought about me at all. I had never been so excited for Monday morning before.

Ella asked how things were going, and while I felt a bit more comfortable talking to her about it, I explained that there was honestly nothing to tell. Jake just saw me as a project partner. He hadn’t asked me out or acted like he wanted to spend more time with me. My head knew this, but my heart overanalyzed the tiniest inflections in his voice and every little expression, hoping that I was just misunderstanding and that, by some great miracle, he felt about me the way I felt about him.

“It’s not going to happen,” I told her for the millionth time.

She gave me that Ella shrug and said, “You never know.”

Oh, to be blonde and beautiful and totally delusional.

I sat in study hall and drew some pictures of Ella as a mellower version of Sailor Moon in my sketchbook. I heard a noise and glanced up. Mrs. Putnam was looking at me and quickly turned her gaze toward the window. I put my head back down and resumed my drawing. I used to like having Mrs. Putnam as both my art teacher and my study hall supervisor, but now it was awkward. I did my best not to make eye contact or ask any questions. My dad had been gone frequently in the evenings, and Mrs. Putnam seemed to be avoiding me just as much I was avoiding her, which pretty much confirmed my theory that they were still seeing one another.

Halfway through class the phone from the office rang. After she answered it, Mrs. Putnam raised her eyebrows and looked at me. “Mattie, they want you to go to the office.”

I could feel the eyes of every kid in study hall on me. “Oh, busted,” Mercedes said, and then she whispered something to one of her minions that made them both giggle.

The silvery, bitter taste of fear filled my senses. I racked my brain trying to think of what I could have done to warrant being in trouble yet again. I had been so well behaved! “Should I take my things with me?”

“They said it would only take a few minutes. Just leave them there.”

Having dismissed the possibility that I had done anything to get myself in trouble, I started worrying that something had happened to my dad or to Ella. Why else would they want me to come down?

I did a running/walking mixture trying to get there as quickly as I could without being caught running in the hallways.

I yanked the door open and found Ella standing next to the secretary’s desk. “What’s going on? Is Dad okay?”

“What? He’s fine. Everybody’s fine. Angie Ferber had to go home early, and she was supposed to record you and Jake today, and I told her I would take care of it. I would have just texted you, but they wouldn’t let me.”

Malibu Prep had recently instituted a strict no-electronics policy during school hours. Another thing that annoyed me and that I wanted to change if elected. “Record us? For what?”

Ella looked pensive. “Maybe I forgot to tell you. You guys were supposed to make a video announcement reminding the school about the upcoming speeches and to get them to vote in the elections.”

She handed me a one-page script, and I read it through quickly. It was kind of lame, but I thought I could muddle through it.

“When and where?”

“In the recording studio after school today. But you have to meet me so I can let you in and record it.”

Oh, that would be cozy. Just Jake, Ella, and me in a tiny little soundproof room. But I didn’t really have a choice. “Okay.”

“I have cheerleading practice, so come out to the field and find me after.” She must have noticed that I looked worried, because she added, “Just be yourself in the video, and everything will be fine.”

I don’t know why she thought that. So far being me hadn’t worked out all that well.

The bell rang just as I got back to study hall. I had to stand aside for the tidal wave of people exiting the room. I entered the class and went to my seat. I grabbed my bag off the floor and had started to leave when I noticed my pencil on my desk.

Right next to where I had left my sketchbook.

I put my bag down on my desk and opened it up to make sure I had the sketchbook inside.

I rifled through my folders and didn’t see it. I looked again, slower this time, thinking I must have missed it. Not there.

I picked the bag up and looked at the floor, under my chair, and on the desks around me. It was gone.

“Is something wrong, Mattie?” Mrs. Putnam asked.

I could hear my heartbeat thundering in my chest. “Did someone turn in my sketchbook? I left it right here on the desk.” My sketchbook could not be gone. Especially since it had all my pictures of Jake, with my signature at the bottom of each and every one. I blamed my parents for instilling that sense of vanity when it came to my art.

“No one turned anything in. You may want to try the lost-and-found box. If someone brings it to me, I’ll be sure to let you know. Okay?”

I nodded and, for the second time in the last fifteen minutes, tasted actual fear and panic. If someone showed those pictures to Jake, what would I do? My entire life would be over.

The rest of the day passed by in a blur. I checked the lost and found so many times that Ms. Rathbone told me not to come back and that she would personally call me if it was turned in.

I never got a call.

As much as losing the Jake drawings freaked me out, the loss of all that work I’d accumulated over the last few months depressed me more. I texted both Trent and Ella to tell them what had happened, and they both promised to keep an eye out as well.

While Ella had cheer practice, I searched the school for my sketchbook. I checked study hall again. I pulled everything out of my locker. I asked the janitors to keep an eye out for it. I sneaked in and checked the lost and found for the fortieth time. I walked up and down the hallways, sticking my head in classrooms along the way.

Nothing.

I looked at my watch and realized it was time to meet Ella. I headed out to the field, heart heavy. When I got outside, I held my hand up, letting my eyes adjust to the sunlight. I saw Ella and her fellow blondes practicing their cheers and throwing the little ones up in the air.

Then I saw something that stopped me cold.

Football practice seemed to be winding down, and Jake saw me. He waved, and in that moment I realized that he had been completely wrong about that Mr. Darcy thing not happening in real life.

I watched as he took off his football helmet, and suddenly the world lapsed into slow motion. He shook his head, and droplets of sweat went flying, glistening against the sunlight. He wore those football legging things, his shoulder pads, and a half-mesh shirt that left his six-pack abs completely visible. He came toward me slowly, all sexiness and swagger, just like Mr. Darcy, and I thought I might actually pass out. He ran one hand through his dark hair, pushing it off his forehead, and I wondered whether I should signal his coach to bring over that defibrillator thing and start my heart back up.

“Hey, you doing that video thing now?”

I had another gagrsnarf moment. I hoped I wouldn’t drool all over him. “Uh-huh.”

“Cool. I’m going to go get changed, and I’ll meet you guys there.”

He smiled again, and this time he walked at a regular speed. Which was fine, because I got to admire the back view, which was nearly as nice as the front.

If only I had been Elizabeth Bennet and he had been coming over to ask me to marry him. Instead I got a confirmation that we were going to shoot some stupid promo.

I guess beggars can’t be choosers.

* * *

I made one more pass at the lost and found before heading to the recording studio. Did I mention that our school had everything? One of the parents had been a pop star in a former life and had gifted the studio for the kids to do music. The school also used it for the morning video announcements because it was the only completely silent place on campus.

When I arrived, Jake was there, holding the door open. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Darn it, completely clothed. But his hair was still damp, and he smelled so good—he must have taken a shower.

“Ella got a janitor to open the door because the key Angie left doesn’t work. She’s going to find another one.”

He went inside, and I came in behind him, letting the door close.

“No, wait! Grab that!”

As I had explained to my mother in the past, my reflexes were bad. I missed it, and the door shut.

And locked us in.

I tried to push down on the handle. Definitely locked.

“Why would it lock on both sides like that?”

Jake grabbed the handle and twisted it, but it didn’t budge. “To keep people from barging in while they’re recording and ruining the sound.”

“Oh.” It apparently never failed—Jake showed up, and I did something stupid.

I called Ella, and she answered on the first ring. I explained the situation, and she told me not to worry—that even though Mr. Otterson, the janitor who had opened the door in the first place, had gone home, she would find somebody else to come let us out.

I told Jake what Ella had said, and he sat down on the floor. “If Ella says she’ll take care of it, she’ll take care of it.”

“That’s true.” There was nothing good old perfect Ella couldn’t do.

We were locked together in a sound booth. Oh my Buddha, this was just like that time on Degrassi when Declan trapped Holly J. in the recording studio so he could tell her that he had fallen in love with her.

Reality, reality, I reminded myself. We were not characters on a television show. Jake didn’t have some undying love for me.

But how awesome would that have been?

“What will we do to pass the time?” Jake asked in a teasing tone as I sat down next to him. “Truth or dare?”

“I don’t think so, Mr. Let’s Play Strip Poker.”

He laughed. “Come on, we’ll keep it tame. No stripping. So, truth or dare?”

What if I chose dare? What would he dare me to do? I would probably do whatever it was, especially if it involved kissing him, and would embarrass myself in the process. I liked to pretend I was brave and fearless, but right then I felt like a scared little bird. I hoped my cheeks stayed their normal color.

“Um, truth, I guess.”

I felt unbalanced when he looked at me like that, with his eyes all full of intensity and interest. “You never gave me a straight answer the other day about why you’re running for president.”

I couldn’t tell him the actual truth. That I mostly wanted to be president just to knock him off his pedestal. To make it so he didn’t always get everything he wanted. As a bit of payback for not noticing that I was alive.

So instead I told him the other part of my motivation. “To be more involved at school. But mostly so I can bring Hershey bars and Red Bull for lunch if I want to. You?”

“My dad wants me to ‘take advantage of every opportunity’ that will help me get into Yale.”

I recalled our conversation at my house. “Yale and then Harvard Law School, right?”

He looked surprised. “Right. But I’m not interested.”

“Then where do you want to go?”

“Not Yale or Harvard. I’m supposed to be a lawyer, a partner in my dad’s firm by the time I’m thirty. He’s planned out my whole life for me, and I don’t want it.”

I knew exactly how that felt. “So why don’t you tell him?”

He raised a single eyebrow. “Have you told your parents about your manga?”

What could I say? Nothing. He was right. So I sat there in silence.

“Didn’t think so.”

I sighed and wrapped my arms around my legs, pulling them closer to my chest. “Why can’t we just tell them?”

“I don’t think we’re the first teenagers to ask that.”

He smiled, I smiled. We were having another actual moment. It gave me goosebumps, sending tingly shivers up and down my whole body. I rubbed my hands over my arms, hoping he didn’t notice my trembling.

Of course he did. “Hey, are you cold?”

“I’m fine,” I started to say, but before I could finish my sentence, he was shrugging off his letterman’s jacket and handing it to me. I held it in my hands for a moment, thinking I should return it to him and not be this pathetic. It felt heavy, and the leather sleeves felt smooth against my fingers.

I might have been stupid whenever I got around Jake, but not even I was that stupid.

So instead I said, “Thanks,” and put the jacket on. If I’d felt a little foolish at first, now I was chastising myself for not thinking to play the cold card before if this would have been the result. It was too big for me; the sleeves covered up my hands. I’d never worn something that made me feel small. The jacket smelled just like him, and his body warmth still lingered inside. It was like hugging him again. I pulled the coat closed and snuggled into it.

Maybe John Hughes wasn’t a total liar.

“Do you think your parents wouldn’t like your art?”

I held in a very unladylike snort. “I doubt they would think it was art.”

“So you don’t even give them a chance to judge for themselves?”

I knew he meant well, but he didn’t know what he was talking about. They had been my parents for the last eighteen years, and I had a pretty good idea of what their reactions would be. “They would think it was garbage.”

“You don’t know that. They might even like it. I think you’re afraid of rejection. So you reject everybody else first.”

I so did not do that. “Thanks for the psychoanalysis, Dr. Phil,” I retorted. I looked away from him, willing myself not to cry. My throat felt tight, and an uncomfortable and unfamiliar feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. I wanted to argue with him, tell him he was wrong. But part of me knew that he was right. Otherwise I wouldn’t feel the way I was feeling. It was probably some psychological thing because my mom had left me, but in my heart I believed that everyone was out to get me, to screw me over and then leave me. I stayed mostly detached from everything and practically everyone. Like Jake said, I rejected them before they could reject me.

But sitting there on the floor with him, I realized how badly I needed that connection. How much I wanted it. I wanted to matter to someone like him.

I didn’t know if I could handle Jake’s rejection.

And I didn’t want to dwell on it. I ordered myself to calm down and gave him a tight smile. The very last thing I needed to do was cry in front of him. “My turn. Truth or dare.”

“I’ll take a truth too.”

Maybe it was because I already felt so awkward and figured things couldn’t get much worse, maybe I was part masochist, maybe I wanted to unsettle him for a minute. “Are you sad that you and Ella broke up?”

He took in a deep breath, brow furrowed, as if I’d confused or surprised him. “There’s not really a good answer to that question.”

“I didn’t ask for a good answer. I asked for the truth.”

Jake let that deep breath back out. “You never let up, do you? Fine, truth. It will make me sound like a jerk, but not really.”

I opened my mouth to reply, but he held his hand up. “Let me explain. We never really clicked, you know? We hardly spent any time together. I mean, it was cool to date the hottest girl in school. And my parents loved her. My dad keeps talking about what an ‘asset’ she is. Like he forgets that I’m only eighteen.” He fixed me with his disconcerting gaze. “And if I’m being really honest, I’m glad she broke up with me.”

“Oh,” was my eloquent response. Jake didn’t love Ella. He didn’t miss her. He was glad they had broken up. GLAD. My heart skipped several beats.

He thumped his fingers against his leg, looking around the room before his eyes settled back on me. “So does Ella ever say anything about me?”

Fury and indignation flared up inside me. “I am not talking about my stepsister with you.”

“No, I just, uh, is she okay?”

He was concerned about her. He’d just told me that he hadn’t really even liked her, and now he was worried about her feelings. I was both touched by his empathy and sort of repulsed by the reminder that he had dated Ella. “She’s fine. And you?”

“What? I’m cool. All good.”

I needed the ability to sort through and understand my emotions faster. I went from raging mad to helplessly in love to totally confused to completely embarrassed in the space of a few seconds when I was with him. I’d never really had this happen before, and I wasn’t sure how to deal and make sense of the insanity.

I realized that he was looking at me. And not just in the way he normally looked at me, but like he was really seeing me for the first time. It kind of took my breath away.

“You’re easy to talk to, you know that?”

My heart started beating fast, and his expression made my stomach do funny things. “Aren’t most people?”

One corner of his mouth tugged up. “No. Just you.”

I knew that he was going to kiss me. I was as sure of it as I was of my own name, which was . . . um . . . was . . . Okay, so I couldn’t remember my own name when he looked at me that way. My heart pounded furiously.

I don’t know how I knew he was going to kiss me, having never actually been kissed before. Some female instinct, I guess. But I knew it.

“Truth or dare, Mattie?” His voice was soft and unbelievably appealing.

I looked into his dark eyes and forced myself to speak. I understood what he was asking me. And I only had one answer for him. It came out as a whisper.

“Dare.”

Jake moved closer to me and leaned in so slowly that it seemed like all time had stopped just for that moment. He lifted one hand to the side of my face, and my skin burned so hotly that I briefly wondered whether there would be a permanent imprint of his hand on my cheek.

He edged even closer.

I closed my eyes.