CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
So of course when I woke up, the very first thing I did was check my phone. No texts from Chase yet, but there was that tweet. Best night ever. Ha. Only if his definition of “best night” was “Nobody got kissed.”
It was almost noon when I went into the kitchen to get something to eat. Lexi sat on the couch with one of her feet propped up on the coffee table, giving herself a pedicure. “Late night?” she asked with a sly grin.
I growled in response, not ready to talk until I had sustenance. I poured myself a super nutritious bowl of Lucky Charms and sat at our little kitchen table.
She’d lived with me long enough to know that I needed some time in the morning before I turned into a human again. She painted her toenails a bright candy-apple red and hummed a show tune to herself.
I drank the milk right out of the bowl and then put my dishes in the sink. “What does it mean when the guy you’re dating hasn’t tried to kiss you yet?”
“Gay.”
“Just because that happened to you once—”
“Eleven times,” she corrected, applying the polish in short, careful strokes.
“Seriously? Eleven times? Okay, just because that’s happened to you eleven times doesn’t mean that’s what’s happening here. And maybe you should stop dating fellow theater majors.”
She nodded in agreement as I collapsed onto the couch next to her.
“Do you want me to do your nails, too?”
What did it matter? It wasn’t like anybody was going to see them. But I was too tired to move. “’Kay.”
She put my right foot in her lap and used the file. “He really hasn’t kissed you yet? Haven’t you been out a bunch of times?”
“Yes. Apparently I’m too hideous to be kissed.”
“Stop it. That’s not true, and you know it.” Lexi pushed my right foot off, and I swung my left one up for her to file. “You’re assuming it’s because he’s not attracted to you. Which has been the case for me eleven times. But maybe that’s not what’s going on. Maybe it’s intentional. You know when somebody says you can’t have something, and it makes you want it more? By not kissing you, that’s all you’re thinking about now, right? Wondering if it will ever happen. Dying of anticipation. So by the time it does happen, it will be the most amazing thing ever, and you’ll be head over heels for him. Even if he’s not any good at it.”
That sounded a little far-fetched, and Chase didn’t strike me as the devious type. “Do men actually do that?”
“I saw it in a TV movie once, but other than that, I don’t know. Usually they can’t wait to get their lips all over you.” She realized immediately it was the wrong thing to say and shot me a “sorry” expression. “When are you guys going out again?”
“Not for a while. He has to go to—out of town for business. A couple of weeks.”
I switched my foot again, and she applied a base coat of the same red polish she wore. “Maybe that will be good. Give him a chance to miss you. Did he ask you to take him to the airport?”
“No.”
“Too bad. Because that’s a very girlfriend thing to do,” she said, blowing on my nails. She finished my other foot quickly and then separated my toes with those foam inserts. I rested my feet on the coffee table. Lexi picked up her phone, and I felt sorry for myself. “Gavin was supposed to text me. He is my boyfriend, and sometimes I feel like I don’t know where we stand, either.”
I knew she was trying to be sympathetic, but Gavin clearly adored Lexi. Possibly even loved her. She couldn’t have been questioning that.
And I knew from unfortunate firsthand experience that he was definitely attracted to her.
“Well, you know what they say about when life hands you lemons.”
“Make lemonade?” I responded.
“No. You throw that crap back and demand chocolate. Hey, have you seen this?” Lexi asked, handing me her phone. “Chase Covington has himself a new skank du jour.”
I tried to swallow past the knot in my larynx but couldn’t. My ears rang as a metallic taste filled my mouth. Yesterday the potential ramifications of people taking pictures of Chase hadn’t even occurred to me. My concern had been only for his well-being.
But now . . . now, with adrenaline skittering and buzzing through me, I realized how very bad this could be for me. If both my mom and Lexi found out.
The headline of the article read, WHO IS CHASE COVINGTON’S MYSTERY GIRL? Had Lexi recognized me? Was this a test I’d already failed? I glanced up at her, but she was packing up her pedicure tools.
I did a quick image search and found multiple pictures of us. I hadn’t realized at the time that Chase had been shielding me as best he could with his body. You couldn’t see my face in any of the shots. You could see my hands, holding my Mace and ready to spray the crowd down, but that was it.
Because nobody had been trying to take my picture. They’d wanted a picture of him.
“Like Amelia Swan’s not bad enough, now he has secret girlfriends?”
Again, I thought I should tell her. This was the perfect opening.
Only I couldn’t explain it to her until I understood it myself.
Which I most definitely did not.
Chase texted me routinely and tweeted shots of himself on set and in his costume. Nothing spoiler-y, just stuff that made his fans happy.
Then he’d tweet stuff that left me totally confused.
Was that some kind of cryptic clue? He wanted us to eye-kiss first? That presented a problem, given that most of my flirting consisted of awkward eye contact. We’d never get to eye first base.
Or—
Inappropriate thoughts? What, had he imagined us hugging?
The thing was, I seriously missed him. I was okay being on my own. Introverts are like that. I could go long stretches of time without talking to anyone and be fine. I did what I’d done before we met—went to class, babysat the Mendel girls, worked at the Foundation, helped out with my brothers and sisters. But somehow Chase had wormed his way into my heart.
And I wanted him to come back home to California.
His girl? Just an expression, or did he think of me as his girl?
I probably should have just womanned up and asked him outright. But frustrated as I was, I didn’t want to lose whatever we had. And some part of me feared that if I pressed him, tried to force him to define the relationship, he’d define it as a friendship, and we’d be done.
I also did tweet some posts that were meant for him.
He liked that tweet, and I noticed I had, like, forty new followers. All Chasers. Probably because of how often he liked what I tweeted.
About a week in, I had plans to go to my mother’s for Sunday dinner. As I got ready, he sent me a text that made my heart slam against my rib cage.
It was hard to type a reply as my fingers kept fumbling.
My phone rang a second later. It was him.
“You’re super funny,” I told him.
“I know.”
“It’s all fun and games until somebody doesn’t pick up on the sarcasm,” I said while slipping on my shoes.
“I’m sending you something. It should be there tomorrow or the day after.”
“It better not be a car.”
I could almost hear him rolling his eyes. “It’s not a car. It’s a script. My agent sent it over. It’s about a high-functioning teenage boy with autism whose parents die in an accident, and he’s sent to the East Coast to live with his aunt. He wants to go home, so he walks back to Idaho. It’s about how he survives, the people he comes into contact with, having his first kiss, that sort of thing. I want your opinion on it.”
I shut my front door and hurried down the stairs. “Why? I don’t know anything about scripts.”
“But you like movies, and you’re familiar with my acting.”
“That doesn’t make me qualified.” I put my car into reverse and tried to steer while talking to him. Realizing I wasn’t being safe, I put the phone on speaker and set it down.
“It does. They’re considering Ryan Hofstead for the role.”
Ryan Hofstead was one of those beef hunks who had risen to fame in a franchise based on a YA vampire book. To say he was a talentless hack would be insulting to talentless hacks. He literally had two expressions but somehow kept being cast as the lead in movies.
“He would butcher this part.”
“Probably. After you’ve read it, give me a call and tell me if you think I should do it.”
Didn’t he have a manager and a publicist and an agent for this kind of stuff? Even One-F was probably far more qualified to give Chase professional advice. Honestly, I didn’t even need to read the script. I couldn’t let Ryan Hofstead stink up another movie, given that his relationship with subtlety was strained at best.
“When it comes, I’ll read it. And let you know what I think. Anyway, I need to go. I’m heading over to my mom’s for dinner.”
“Cool. Be sure to give Zia a kiss from me.”
Oh, sure. Zia got kisses. And I got scripts.
“I will.” I gripped the steering wheel tightly, willing myself to be strong and tell him something true and honest, like he wanted. Put myself out there. Maybe he’d return the favor. “And Chase? I miss you.”
I hung up the phone before he could reply, too scared of his reaction. My phone buzzed. I didn’t know if it was a tweet or a message. I didn’t check until I got to my mother’s.
Zia tumbled out of the front door, holding out her arms for me. I picked her up and gave her a big kiss on her baby cheek. “That’s from Chase.”
“I love Cheese,” she said, hugging my neck.
“I know you do.”
“He comes sees me?”
I carried her inside and put her down on the hall floor. “Maybe. I want him to come see me, too.”
That seemed to satisfy her, and she toddled off. I got out my phone. I had a new text.
Although I hadn’t had the chance to hear his reply, I got to read it.
The next day was Gavin’s birthday. He and Lexi had made plans to go to the fanciest restaurant in town, La Bella Vita. It was only three o’clock in the afternoon, but Lexi had started getting ready.
“It’s so unfair. He’ll take a shower and shave while I have to do all this.” She gestured to her body, then went back to putting her hair in curlers.
“At least he’ll appreciate it.”
“He will. Hey, did I tell you I ran into Ron on campus today?” Ron was this cheating jerk Lexi had dated for about three weeks until she’d caught him on a date with another girl. “He had the audacity to tell me I’d made a mistake breaking up with him because I’d never find anyone like him again. I was all, ‘That’s the point, moron!’”
Before I could agree with her, the doorbell rang. I knew it couldn’t be Gavin yet, and we weren’t expecting anyone else. I looked through the peephole and saw a huge bouquet of flowers. “Lexi! I think there’s a present for you!”
I opened the door, and the delivery man smiled at me. “I’m looking for Zoe Miller.”
“That’s me,” I said in shock because he was holding a vase of white roses bigger than our TV.
“Can you sign for these?” He handed me a pad, and I gave him my signature. He had a manila envelope clamped under his arm and gave that to me. I was surprised at how heavy the vase was when he put it in my hands.
“Thanks!” I said. I’d never gotten flowers before.
“That’s not all. I’ll be right back.”
If that delivery dude came back with car keys, Chase was in trouble. I set the flowers down on the kitchen table just as Lexi entered the room. “Are those for me? Gavin’s not supposed to send me gifts on his birthday!”
“Actually, they’re for me.” I opened the card with my name on it and read.
I didn’t know what you liked.
There was a soft knock at the door, and the delivery man carried in two more giant bouquets of flowers. One was purple tiger lilies, and the other was bright-yellow sunflowers. I told him to put them in the kitchen and noticed he wasn’t alone. Two other men followed behind him, carrying tulips and daffodils and daisies and other flowers I didn’t recognize but were beautiful.
They had to make one more trip to bring all the flowers inside. We were running out of places to put them.
“Does your man have a trust fund?” Lexi asked in awe, deeply breathing in the scent of the roses.
“He could.” Not technically a lie. Chase could have family money beyond his acting earnings.
“Why can’t more men be romantic like this?”
I was only half paying attention, overwhelmed at the gesture. “Mormons can’t be romantic?”
“No, I said more men. Not Mormons.”
“Your boyfriend is very romantic.”
“I know.” There was a wistfulness in her tone. “But nobody’s ever bought out a flower shop for me.”
Nobody ever had for me, either. But Lexi already knew that.
“Don’t get me wrong,” she said, catching my expression. “I’m super happy for you. But a tiny bit jealous, too.”
“Makes sense.” It was how I’d felt about Lexi for most of our lives. “I’ve got some reading I need to do.”
“And I’ve got some painful waxing I need to do.”
I took the manila envelope into our room and slid the script out. The front said Spectrum. The pages were the color of goldenrod, and I opened it and began to read. At first it took some getting used to, with phrases like INT.—RICK’S ROOM and camera directions, but once I understood it, it was almost like reading a book. I could see all of it in my head.
The second I finished, I jumped up and shut the bedroom door so Lexi wouldn’t hear me call Chase.
He answered on the second ring. “Hey.” His voice was warm and so clear it made me miss him all over again.
“Thank you for the flowers. They’re amazing, and I absolutely love them, and nobody’s ever done anything like that for me before. And you have to make this movie. You are going to kill it and win every award in the entire universe.”
“Even the Martian Academy Awards?”
“Especially that one.”
“You liked the flowers?”
“Liked them? Cartwheels might have been involved.”
“I wish I’d been there to see that.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “I didn’t know which ones were your favorite.”
I lay back on my bed. “Pink tulips are my favorite. My grandmother always had them at the house. She said they reminded her of Pennsylvania. They took a lot of work. Like, she had to keep them in the fridge before she planted them. But she thought it was worth it. So did I.”
“Noted. Speaking of things we weren’t talking about, a good friend of mine is getting married this Saturday. Would you like to go with me?”
“To a wedding?” My question ended in a squeak. “Isn’t that more of a girlfriend kind of event? For people who are dating?”
He stayed quiet for so long I thought we’d lost the connection. “What do you think we’ve been doing here?”
“You keep calling it hanging out. I thought that’s all it was. If you feel differently, that’s news to me.”
He let out a frustrated sigh. “This is more of an in-person conversation. I’ve been putting in extra hours so we can finish early. We should be done shooting by Friday evening, and I plan on being home by Saturday afternoon. I can send a car to pick you up. What do you say?”
A whole week earlier than I’d thought? My heart twirled around inside my chest, deliriously happy. “Okay. I’ll see you on Saturday.”
My first fizzy, thrilled thought after we hung up was, Yes! Chase thinks we’re dating!
And my second overwhelming, intimidating thought was, Oh no! Chase thinks we’re dating.
He would have expectations.
I was seriously out of my depth.