Page 30 of The Hardest Fall

Kayla cleared her throat and fidgeted in her seat before glancing at me and then at Jared, all the while shredding her empty paper cup into small pieces. “So, I think in light of this new development, I have to tell you guys something.” Before either of us could open our mouths to say anything, she went ahead and continued, “I might have gone on a few dates with Dylan.”

“Dylan who?” Jared asked, still chewing on a piece of toast as he eyed the rest of Kayla’s brownie.

“My Dyl—ah, I mean the Dylan that’s staying in my apartment? The wide receiver? Dylan Reed?”

“Yeah. That one.”

Jared stopped eating.

Something weird settled in my stomach. “Huh?”

“Two dates, Zoe,” she rushed out, lifting two of her fingers to emphasize her words. “It was just two times.”

Some guy bumped my chair from behind, and I scooted myself a little forward as I took a few sips of my already cold coffee, my attention focused on the table. It was fine. It was a surprise, sure, but still completely fine. It wasn’t like I was interested in Dylan in that way or anything like that. It would’ve also been completely fine if they had gone out more than two times. He was off limits anyway, wasn’t he? Not just because he was my roommate and out of my league, but because he was one of Mark’s players.

“It was freshman year, before I met you guys. I think it was a few months before actually. I was having this two-month hiatus kind of thing with Keith”—which meant he had broken up with her for some stupid reason—“and my dorm roommate was going out with this football player. She kind of forced me to go out with them because I was upset about Keith, and the guy was gonna bring a friend, so I was supposed to keep him occupied while also occupying myself. You know I didn’t have any friends other than Keith my first year here, so I said fine.” She grimaced and went back to shredding pieces. “He was really sweet actually, but you know how I am. I love Keith, and I just wasn’t into getting to know anyone else. I barely talked the whole night, and the second time…my roommate happened again. That time I actually managed to chat with him for a little while. We talked about our families, how we both had big, loud ones and all that, but neither one of us was acting like it could turn into something more. It was just a friendly night out sort of thing. I think my roommate started seeing the other guy—his name was something weird like Rap or Rip or something—so she didn’t need me to hold her hand after that second time. I barely saw Dylan again. Also, it was only double dates, never just the two of us. Plus, a few weeks after that I was back with Keith anyway. He would always say hi those rare few times we ran into each other on campus, but I don’t think I’ve seen him in a year.”

Jared hummed and drew my gaze back to him. “Those don’t count as dates, KayKay, at least not in my book.”

“I agree, but at the time I might have described it as if I went out on these big dates with a football player to Keith, just to make him jealous. I just wanted to mention it now in case Dylan saw me with Zoe and actually remembered and said something. I didn’t want it to be a surprise.”

“I wish I had my own little interaction with this Dylan guy. You girls have both met him one way or another, one of you in a much weirder setting, of course.” He gave Kayla a wide-eyed look and gestured at me with his chin.

That earned him another smack on the shoulder, which he barely managed to escape. “Haha. So funny.”

“And here I am, the guy who only watches…oh, I don’t know, all his games, and I’ve never gotten the chance to meet him? You will fix this horrible wrong, Zoe.”

It was the wad of paper hitting me in the face that brought me out of silence. I flung it right back at Jared and turned my head to look at Kayla.

“Nothing will happen between us, Kay. He is way out of my league. Trust me. So, even if you had dated for real, that would’ve been okay.”

“Because you have Mark to think about, right? And of course you’re paper bag ugly, can’t forget about that,” Jared piped up, his tone flatter than it had been just a few seconds before.

Yes, there was always Mark.

“I’m not saying I’m ugly at all. I happen to find myself beautiful at times, but he is still way out of my league. You’d know what I mean if you saw him up close.”