Page 38

REED

“Just message her,” Grayson said. “This is getting ridiculous.”

It was Friday afternoon, and I’d been hiding in my room since school finished. My brother clearly hadn’t caught the hint my closed door was supposed to provide—leave me alone.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I replied, keeping my attention on the book I was holding. I was supposed to be reading it for English, but I hadn’t managed to comprehend a single paragraph since I’d opened it over an hour ago. I was way too in my head right now.

“Violet. She’s clearly the reason you’ve been in a mood all week.”

“I’m not in a mood.”

“You’re in such a mood,” Grayson said. “You’ve been moping around the house since Monday. And even though we’ve got our biggest game of the season against the Saints in just over a week, you’ve been like a zombie at training. It’s got to stop. Just send her a message.”

As much as I tried to deny it, Gray was right.

I’d started the week feeling disappointed I wouldn’t get to see Violet until Saturday, but as the days dragged on, I’d only gotten worse.

I found myself missing her more and more, and I was growing increasingly worried that our remaining time together was rapidly coming to an end.

All I wanted was to stop playing pretend and for our relationship to be real.

But it was hard to convince her of that when I hadn’t seen her all week.

My run-in with Jeremy and conversation with Mia hadn’t helped much with my mood either.

The two of them had left me with a strange mixture of fear and cautious optimism.

After talking to Mia, I was curious to see if there was any foundation to the sliver of hope she’d given me.

But my interaction with Hoffman and his reminder about my freshman-year heartbreak had left me worried I was headed down a familiar path with Violet.

I knew I shouldn’t listen to him, and he was clearly still trying to win Violet back. But it was hard not to let his words get under my skin.

“You’re lucky it’s me in here trying to give you a pep talk and not Paige,” Grayson continued. “Even she’s noticed something’s up, and she’s been threatening to come up here and talk to you ever since she came over today. I figured you’d prefer to talk with someone who knows the truth…”

I grunted and finally placed my book down to focus on my brother. He was threatening me with Paige, so it wasn’t like I had much choice. And he was right; I’d rather talk to him about this. “I can’t just message her. We’re not really dating, so I need a good reason.”

“You don’t need a good reason,” he replied. “People text people all the time."

“I guess,” I conceded.

“And while you’re at it, tell her how you feel,” Gray added.

Now he was just being ridiculous. I’d thoroughly considered Mia’s similar advice and decided now wasn’t the right time. Why risk scaring her off before I really had to. There was still a week left for me to turn this relationship from fake to real without putting my heart on the chopping block.

“I can’t tell her,” I said. “I don’t even know if she likes me that way.”

Grayson shook his head. “Have your balls gone on vacation?”

“Shut up.”

“It certainly sounds like they have.”

“Okay, fine. My balls are in Bermuda. I’m not going to tell Violet how I feel and risk ruining everything.”

“So, what, you’re just going to sit in your room and sulk?”

“It’s working well for me so far.”

“No, it’s not. Text her. Or man up and call her. You can speak to her without professing your undying love…”

“Yeah, and what would I say?”

He lifted one eyebrow. “Do I look like a dating guru to you?”

“There’s practically a glowing halo behind your head.” I grinned because he was the last person anyone should ever ask for dating advice.

He rolled his eyes. “Well, this dating guru says to tell her the truth.”

“Nope, anything but that.”

“Then tell her you have a fake dating emergency.”

“A fake dating emergency?”

“I don’t know,” he replied, clearly starting to get frustrated with the whole thing. “Just tell her whatever will convince her to see you.”

I started tapping my fingers against my lips. “You know what, I can probably work with this.”

“Finally,” he grumbled.

Grabbing my phone, I called Violet before I could reconsider and started pacing as it rang. I thought I might have a little time to think about what to say, but she answered on the second ring.

“Reed?” She sounded confused and also slightly breathless.

“Sunshine.” I didn’t know how I’d done it, but I’d somehow managed to sound quite nonchalant. My heart was racing like Coach had just made me do sprints though. “Am I interrupting something?”

“Uh, sort of…”

“Not at all,” another girl called out in the background. It must have been Mia.

I chuckled under my breath. “So, which is it?”

“You’re not interrupting,” she replied, sounding slightly surer of herself this time.

“Ah, but now you have my interest piqued. What exactly are you doing over there?”

“Moving furniture.”

“Really?” I laughed. “Why?”

“Mia didn’t like the feng shui in her room.”

“It was totally off!” Mia shouted.

“She has a lot of heavy furniture,” Violet added. I could practically hear her eye roll from here.

“Well, I happen to know someone who’s great at moving furniture…” The opportunity was almost too perfect, and my stupid little heart started dancing.

“Thanks, Reed. But I wouldn’t ask you to do that, and we’re pretty much done now anyway.”

“Oh.” So much for my dancing heart. It practically tripped and fell over its two left feet.

“Was there a reason you called?”

I was derailed. This wasn’t a situation I was used to. Probably because I didn’t talk to girls that often, and when I did, I wasn’t nervous because I didn’t care. It was different with Violet.

Grayson waved his hands at me, encouraging me to continue.

“Uh, yeah,” I finally and oh so eloquently responded. “I wanted to see if you’re free.”

“Really? Why?”

“Yeah, uh, I have a fake dating emergency.” It felt so stupid as I said it out loud. How come it hadn’t sounded that dumb coming from Grayson? Probably because he hadn’t been serious. He slammed a hand against his forehead, making me grimace. Even he thought I was an idiot.

“A fake dating emergency?” Violet’s soft voice sounded puzzled, and I didn’t blame her.

“Yep, that’s right.” I was going to have to run with it. “I’m going bowling with Grayson, Paige, and a bunch of friends tonight. I just realized they’re all going to think something’s up if I’m not out with my girlfriend on a Friday night.”

“Bowling?” Grayson hissed, obviously unimpressed he was being dragged into this.

I waved him off before turning away so I couldn’t see the annoyed look in his eyes. He’d gotten me into this mess, so he was going to have to live with the consequences.

“You’re asking me to go bowling with you?” Violet said, her tone still far more uncertain than I would have liked.

“Yes.” I was committed to the bowling excuse now. There was no backing out. “Are you free?”

There were scraping and rustling sounds on the other end of the line, and I thought she might have dropped the phone. But then Mia’s voice came through the speaker. “She is free, and she’d be happy to come.”

I laughed. “Okay, thanks, Mia.” We barely knew each other, but she was being the best wingwoman ever.

“No problem,” Mia replied. “Just give her twenty minutes to get ready and then feel free to swing by and pick her up.”

“I can speak for myself,” Violet complained in the background.

There were more rustling sounds, and I guessed the girls were fighting over the phone. “You there, Reed?” Finally, I heard Violet’s voice clearly once more.

“Yeah, I’m here.” I smiled. “So…”

“So, I guess I’ll see you in twenty minutes.”

“Great, I’ll see you then.”

I hung up the phone, a wide smile on my face as I turned to Grayson who was still scowling at me. “Better go tell Paige the exciting news. We’re going bowling.”

“I heard,” Grayson replied, but he didn’t complain as he skulked off to find Paige. Now I had to round up a crowd, or Violet would know something was up.

* * *

“Does bowling really constitute a fake dating emergency?” Violet asked as we walked through the parking lot to the bowling alley.

She’d been poking holes in the excuse I’d used to get her here ever since I’d picked her up.

It was like she could smell the stench of my desperation to see her radiating from me.

“Afraid so,” I said.

“But does it really matter if your friends aren’t fully convinced?”

“Not especially,” I said. “I’m more concerned about everyone else. The bowling alley is usually packed with kids from Ransom this time of year, and they’ll notice if I turn up without you.”

A group of girls was standing outside the front of the alley, and they all started giggling at each other as we passed. I really hated when they did that, and I wasn’t the only one who seemed to have noticed.

Violet was frowning in their direction. “And by everyone else, you mean the girls…”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Did the Instagram post help at all?” She sounded somewhat flustered.

“A little,” I said. “I definitely heard more people at school talking about us after the weekend. But maybe we need to post a few more pictures to make sure everyone gets the message.”

“Well, we haven’t got long left.”

I did my best to ignore her comment, but my stomach clenched uneasily at the mention of our impending fake breakup. I could not handle the thought of only having one more week with her.