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“You want to ditch?”

His grin grew wider. “You scared of getting in trouble?”

“Is that even a question? My mom would kill me.” I folded my arms over my chest and tried to look disapproving. I doubt I was very convincing considering the misery I knew was etched onto my face.

“You and your boyfriend just broke up. I think she’ll understand.”

His words caused another stab of pain to run through my chest. It was hard to hear my new reality spoken aloud, but I knew I couldn’t dwell on it.

I chewed on my lower lip as I considered my options. Cole was probably right. I doubted Mom would force me to go to school when I was this miserable.

“If it helps, I think our moms have been planning our wedding since the moment you moved onto the street,” he said. “You being single and us ditching school to spend the day together is pretty much both of their dreams come true.”

“If I get in trouble you know I’m leaving you at the altar,” I said, with a small smile.

A grin stretched across his whole face, and I felt slightly stunned as I looked at it. I was so used to seeing Cole’s overconfident smirk, that when he genuinely smiled at me, it felt like I was getting a glimpse of an entirely different person. It was hard not to be mesmerized.

“I’ll take that to mean you’re in.”

“Yeah, I’m in,” I said, trying to pull my eyes away from his lips. “Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise,” he said. “Come on.”

11

Cole

Madi seemed a little more like herself as we drove. It had nearly broken my heart to see her crying, and I wanted to do anything I could to stop her tears. The fact that Jake had been the cause of those tears was enough to make me want to punch him in the face. He was an idiot for breaking up with Madi, and I knew it wouldn’t take him long to realize. It would be less than a week before he came crawling back to her, begging her to take him back.

I stopped myself as I felt a smile begin to spread across my face at the thought.

“What are we doing at Peggy’s?” Madi asked as we pulled up outside my favorite diner.

“Only getting the world’s best pancake stack,” I replied. “Come on.”

I jumped out of the truck and walked around to open her door before she could argue. She stepped out of the cab and looked uncertain as she followed me. “I haven’t been here in years,” she murmured. “Not since…” Her voice drifted off and she gave me a sad glance.

She didn’t need to speak the words aloud, I knew Madi was going to say she hadn't been to Peggy's since she and Jake started dating. When we had all been friends, we'd often come together. But Jake ruined that the moment he had decided to make Madi his own and refused to let me talk to her. I wasn't bothered by his threats anymore though.

“You’ve been missing out,” was all I said in response.

We took a seat at one of the booths toward the back of the room. Madi immediately busied herself by scanning the menu. I reached over and snatched it from her hand before she could take a proper look though. “Don’t pretend you don’t know what you want,” I said.

She tried to grab the menu back from me, but I held it out of reach.

“Give me the menu, Cole.”

“What, it's not like you're going to order anything other than the BFP?”

“Maybe I don’t feel like the big fluffy pancakes.”

“You know that’s not what the ‘f’ stands for,” I replied.

She glared at me, and it made my heart swell. Her tears were nowhere to be seen.

Madi was saved from responding as Peggy came over. She was wearing the same retro blue dress she always wore, and while she had a few more grey hairs now, she still looked just the same as she had when Madi used to come here with me.

Peggy had been using a stick to help her get around after a bad fall last winter, but I sometimes wondered if she really needed it anymore. She rarely leaned on it and I saw her using the stick to nudge her husband when she wanted something far more frequently.