Three weeks later …
* * *
I drop my paper teacup into the trash and head for the door. “Are you two lovebirds coming?” I call back to Laney and Austin, who are still cuddled together in the booth. “We’re going to be late.”
“Hold your balls,” Laney says, downing the last sip of her coffee.
Austin slides out and offers Laney his hand, pulling her to her feet.
The three of us leave Peabody’s and climb into my car, Laney in the passenger seat and Austin in the back like always. As we drive the few blocks to school, Laney tries to give me a recap of the latest episode of some new comedy show they’ve been watching, but it sounds just as horrible as that other one they both like.
“Is this one full of fart jokes, too?” I ask, grinning at Austin in the rearview mirror.
“No!” he says earnestly. “Well, not really. Okay, maybe there’s a few. But for all intensive purposes, it’s fart-joke free.”
Laney and I share a conspiratorial look, then both burst out laughing.
“What?” Austin asks, leaning forward to stick his head between the seats.
“Nothing!” we sing in unison.
When we get to school, Laney and I say goodbye to Austin and make our way to the newspaper office, pausing in front of the display case to admire our latest gold statue that arrived last week.
On this one, the plaque says:
SOUTHWEST STAR
EDITORS IN CHIEF:
KENNEDY RHODES AND DELANEY PATEL
Laney fought me again. But this time I was insistent. Enough is enough. She deserves the title just as much as I do.
“It really does look good,” she says, pressing her fingertips against the glass.
“I agree. Awards should come in fours.”
She laughs and we walk into the office together. Tomorrow night is another Drop Dead. The issue is due in two days. But I’m much more relaxed this time. Or at least, I’m trying to be.
I sit down at my station and turn on the computer, cringing when that nauseating melody from Excavation Empire blasts through the speakers. “Ugh,” I whine. “Horace has been using my terminal to play that stupid game of his again.”
“I’ll talk to him,” Laney promises.
I close the game and open the file for our latest issue. “I doubt it’ll do any good,” I say, pressing Print on the front page and then leaning over to grab the proof from the printer so I can check it for typos.
“It will if I threaten to cut off his balls,” Laney says nonchalantly.
I stifle a laugh. “That’s a good point.”
“Uh,” a tentative voice says. “Is this the newspaper office?”
I glance up and my heart sputters to a halt when I see who’s standing in the doorway.
It’s none other than Dylan Parker.
His hair is still messy and falling into his face, but he’s no longer wearing his disheveled uniform that looks like it hasn’t been washed in weeks. Instead he’s dressed in a pair of jeans and a plain black T-shirt.
He looks amazing.
I launch out of my seat, tripping all over my feet as I stumble toward him. “Y-y-yes,” I stammer. “This is the newspaper office.”
He chuckles. “Oh, good. I heard some talk about ball chopping and I wanted to double-check.”
I flash a look at Laney, but she stares back at me with a clueless expression.
Of course she would.
She has no idea who this is. Dylan is a ghost from another life. Another universe. Another choice.
“What are you doing here?” I demand, trying to keep the shock from my voice.
“Uh,” he mumbles, sounding a little scared, “I just transferred here and I was hoping to join the paper.”
My mouth falls open. He just transferred here? To Southwest High?
Dylan chuckles at my reaction. “Hey, easy there, Crusher.”
I gape at him. “W-w-what did you call me?”
He points down at my hand and I realize I’m still holding the front-page proof. Although, holding is a generous description.
“Crusher,” he repeats. “You’re being pretty merciless on that piece of paper.”
I release my clenched fingers and the proof drops to the ground. Dylan bends down to pick it up and I catch a whiff of that delicious citrus scent of his.
It’s exactly the same.
He smooths out the page and looks at it. “I’ve heard great things about your paper. Do you have any room on the staff?”
I close my eyes and shake my head in an attempt to clear it. I fully expect him to be gone when I open my eyes, having vanished back into the depths of my imagination where I’m positive this whole conversation is taking place. But no. He’s still there. Still looking at me. Still waiting for a response.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “You transferred here?”
He laughs again. It’s such a beautiful sound in my ears. “Yes. From the Windsor Academy.” He rolls his eyes. “Thank God. I couldn’t stand to be there a second longer. I tried everything to get out of that place.”
I suddenly have a flicker of a memory. Something Dylan said to me in his room after I discovered he’d confessed to my crime.
“I would have found another way out eventually.”
“How did you finally manage to get expelled?”
He flashes me that scrumptiously wicked smirk. “Expelled? I like the way you think. But I didn’t have to get expelled. I turned eighteen yesterday and before the wax could even melt on my birthday candles, I dropped out, and voilà! Here I am.”
“Voilà,” I repeat softly. Wistfully. “Here you are.”
He stares at me and, for just a moment, our eyes lock. I can feel that same tingle I felt when he first touched me at the coffee shop. “Do I know you?” he asks somewhat dazedly.
I chuckle. “Yeah, maybe in some other life.”
He shakes his head. “No! I know you! You came by the Windsor Academy about two months ago. I met you outside the dean’s office.”
I smile. “That’s right. Good memory.”
“You were kind of hard to forget.”
I laugh. “I must have come off a little crazy.”
He holds his thumb and forefinger an inch apart. “Just a little.”
I cross my arms over my chest in mock offense. “And you really want to join our newspaper?”
He grins. “If there’s room.”
I turn back to Laney, who waggles her eyebrows at me. “There’s room,” I reply. “In fact, we need a story by tomorrow night about the school board election debate this afternoon. It’s supposed to get pretty nasty. Do you want to take it?”
He looks pleasantly surprised. “Really? Just like that? Are you sure? It sounds like a big story. You don’t even know if I have any talent.”
I shrug. “Something tells me you’ll be great at this. I have very good hunches.”
“Cool.” He grins and turns back toward the door, pausing just long enough to ask, “Hey, did we meet anywhere else? I mean besides outside of the dean’s office. Because you look really familiar.” He scratches his head, seemingly at a loss for words. “I mean, you feel familiar. Kind of. It’s weird. Like déjà vu or something.”
I bite back a smile as I shake my head. “Nope. It was just that one time.”
He stares at me for a long moment and I hold his gaze, daring him to challenge me. “Huh,” he finally says. “Okay then. I guess I’ll see you later.”
I nod. “See you later.”
Then he turns and heads out the door.
I float back to my computer, no longer able to keep the stupid grin off my face.
“Um,” Laney says, gawking at me, “what was that?”
I shrug and slide into my seat. “I haven’t the slightest idea what you mean.”
“You are totally into that guy.”
I scoff. “Don’t be ridiculous. We only met once. Like I said.”
But I can feel Laney’s glare on my face. I print another copy of the front page, pluck a red pencil from the basket on my desk, and go to work proofing.
“What were you even doing at the Windsor Academy?” she asks.
I circle a misspelled word. “Oh, nothing. I stopped by to see if they had any open spaces. There was a time when I really wanted to go there.”
“Well, it sounds like there’s an open space now,” she points out.
I look up and stare curiously at the doorway where Dylan was just standing. Five minutes ago, it was just a doorway. Now it feels like some kind of magic portal to another world. Another life. One that happened all on its own. Just by letting it.
I guess you never really know who’s going to walk right into your life. Unexpected. Unplanned. Uncertain of what it all means and where it all goes.
I guess that’s the whole point.
“Nah,” I tell Laney, returning my attention to the newspaper. “I think I’m good where I am.”