I let two weeks pass before I work up the nerve to talk to Bryan. They had to have been the worst two weeks of my life. And though I was often dramatic, I wasn't far off. Patience wasn't one of my strong suits, and I came home from school every day extra crabby. My father noticed and hovered until I told him it was just school stress. I wasn't lying. I was stressed about something, or someone, at school.

I waited by Bryan's truck for him to get out of basketball practice to pop the question he would surely laugh at, internally of course, because he wasn't a dick like his friends. I didn't know where else to ask him to be my escort. I still couldn't believe he failed to get nominated for Homecoming king. If we won the homecoming basketball game, it would most likely be because of him. He deserved a crown. He deserved to be in the spotlight. I didn't deserve this. I was beginning to feel more and more like an imposter. Aurora and all of her cronies were shooting daggers out of their eyes in my direction every day in gym class. I wanted to abdicate, and I didn't even have a crown or a damn throne.

When Bryan rounded the corner of his truck and found me leaning against his driver's side door, I yelped. I was so lost in thought. I never heard him coming.

"Oh, hey." He didn't smile. He stood still, looking me up and down. I saw heat in his dark blue eyes. I had never been this close to him.

I crossed my arm over my chest, feigning confidence, and pushed off his vehicle.

"Hi." An awkward moment went by where we just looked into each other's eyes. I was an idiot every time I was in his orbit. Speak. Say something!

I needed to move. I was in his way, and he was going to stay frozen in his tracks if I didn't woman up and talk, so I stepped away, the gravel crunching under my sneakers. "Sorry to startle you. I need to ask you a question." At least I didn't say “can I ask you a question?” I hated when people did that.

He went for his door, opened it, and threw his gym bag into the back seat.

This was a dumb idea. This was the dumbest fucking idea I ever drummed up in my life.

I pushed a spider web off his truck, the silver shining under the streetlight, just under the mirror. I was looking for anything to keep me distracted. When I looked up, Bryan was leaning against his door, in the same spot I had just left. Could he feel the heat of my body there still?

"What's that?" He bit his lip, and I was back in his English class again. Watching him torture me. Squirming, with sweaty palms and other embarrassing bodily functions overcoming my self-control. I shifted my weight and cleared my throat.

"So, as you know,” I was suddenly talking with my hands, something I only did in front of my friends, “I was nominated for the homecoming queen senior class representative. And I guess I need an escort. Someone to walk me into the middle of the gym for the crowning and all that. So, I was hoping you wouldn't mind doing that for me? Since you didn't get nominated." What. The. Fuck. Was. Wrong. With. Me? Why did I have to say it like that? Like I was holding something over him?

I wanted to run away. Just run the hell home right that instant. He could tell all of his friends that I was a freak and I wouldn't win, which, who was I kidding, I wasn't winning this shit.

I huffed out a breath and stared up into the sky. How red were my freckled cheeks? I hated myself. I wanted to pretend this was all a dream. I pinched myself on the arm discreetly. Nope. I was awake. No getting out of this one.

"I'd love to."

I blinked in response and looked down, away from the sky. My hand went to my throat. "Okay. Thank you." I turned on my heel, started walking into the night. I needed to get out of there before he realized he said yes. Right on cue, he called after me.

"Sev?" He didn't use my full name. He called me by what my friends called me.

"Yes?" I turned back, eyes wide and sweat on my brow.

"So I can't dress up. Because I'll be playing the game. I hope that's okay." There was a tone you used with people you knew. So different from the one used with people you saw day to day that did not know you intimately. His tone was somewhere in the middle. I felt a chill.

"That's okay." I shook my head back and forth.

"What are you wearing?"

"I don't know. I haven't bought a dress yet." Just a few sentences, but I was flying high. We were talking. Really talking. We never talked. We looked at each other from across rooms. We brushed each other in the halls, sometimes. I found myself walking closer, pulled in.

"I'm sure it'll look great." He couldn't know what his words would do. The way I would latch onto that. I would write poetry about it. Analyze it with Akia, and Britt, and Christina. I blushed, then looked away. I was smiling. All teeth and my biggest temptation right there. So close.

"Thanks." We both turned as more basketball players walked out of the west entrance. Bryan's posture stiffened, and I felt my stomach drop. "Okay. Well, I better get home." I hitched my thumb over my shoulder, pointing in the direction of my little yellow house. So different from the one he lived in.

"You're walking, right? Just across the street?"

"Yeah. I live in that house."

"You don't need a ride?"

"No. It's just right there." I pointed into the dark. When I turned back, I saw Bryan’s younger brother, Ben, walking toward us. A strange smirk on his face. I could see his braces.

"Yeah, but it's dark,” Bryan said, pulling my eyes back to him. “And people die on the road every day." I thought of being in his truck. Stuck in a small space with nothing but the scent of his mint breath, his sweat. And now I knew Ben would be in there, too.

"No, that's okay. Thank you though." I waved, then walked away, shivering in the night. I could feel their eyes on me until I stepped onto my porch steps. I didn't hear his truck start, the old engine unmistakable, until I closed the door.