Page 17 of Wish Upon A Star

I mean, sure, my headlights are probably pretty prominent. This is a thin shirt, and my breasts are almost more nipple and areolae than actual breast. Meaning, calling themsmallwould be generous.

Why am I thinking about this?

Deep breath.

He wasn’t checking me out—just noticing something he can’t help but notice. It was a nice little fantasy while I allowed it, though. There’s just no sense working myself into a hyper-romantic tizzy over nothing.

Mom reappears on the stairs, now more appropriately clad in khaki capris and a T-shirt with a cardigan. “Hi.” She breezes in beside me—this foyer hallway isn’t big enough for two people abreast, but here we are. “Jo, why don’t you go get dressed and I’ll make our guest some coffee.” She smiles at him, now competently in charge. “Would you like some coffee, Mr. Britton?”

“I would love some, Mrs. Park. Thank you. I know I’m probably intruding, I just…I wanted to meet Jolene in person.” His expression suggests that this statement covers a lot more territory than merely meeting me in person.

Mom turns to face me. “Go put on some clothes, Jolene.” Her eyes flit meaningfully to my chest.

What’s so embarrassing about free-boobing it in front of one of the most famous humans on the planet, and a man I recently proposed to on a global social media platform?

What’s that you say? Everything?

Oh, right.

I sneak a glance at him, and then turn and head back up to my room. Change into jeans and a T-shirt, with a bra, this time. I don’t really wear makeup, and it would be weird if I went to that extent when I don’t normally, so I compromise with myself and put on some lip gloss. My hair is still short enough that all I have to do is mess it up a little more, and I’m good to go. Some deodorant. Mouthwash. I draw the line at perfume.

I pause, in my bathroom. Westley Britton ishere. In myhouse.

He didn’t respond on social media—hecame to my house.

I let myself feel giddy, for a moment. Squeal—albeit silently. Jump and flap my hands and do the whole girly freak-out thing.

Just…get it out of my system.

Thusly expressed, my need to freak out and embarrass myself subsides. Hopefully I can interact with him like a normal person, now.

Mom is on the other side of my bedroom door when I open it, about to knock. “Jo. Why is Westley Britton at our house? Why does he need to meet you in person?”

“Um.” I wince. “I may have done something. On, um…TikTok.”

“That’s the one with all the short videos? Where people do the weird dances?”

I roll my eyes. “Yeah.”

“Explain for me how that leads to him showing up at our house at eight thirty in the morning.”

I didn’t think my parents would ever see it.

My dad still carries the same Nokia he’s had for twenty-some years—carried, as aforementioned, in a clip on his belt. He uses T9 for texting. Enough said.

Mom has a smartphone and Facebook and IG, but the former is mainly for keeping track of old high school friends and exchanging, like, casserole recipes, and the latter one is primarily the digital equivalent of motivational cat posters, except instead of cute little kittens in, like, flowerpots, it’s flexible girls a quarter of her age doing impossible yoga poses with pithy captions about seizing the day and living your best life and no filter and I just woke up like this.

I follow her, and I like her posts, because I’m a good daughter.

But the point here is that I assumed they would never catch wind of what I’d posted. Obviously, I had no way of knowing it would go viral the way it has, much less that Westley himself would show up at my freaking house because of it.

“Just a…um. Just a TikTok thing, Mom. I didn’t know he’d show up.”

She doesn’t buy it. “Show me.”

“No! He’s out there in the kitchen waiting.” I shake her by the arms. “Mom—Westley Brittonis in our kitchen.Alone. Waiting for our four-thousand-year-old coffee maker to slowly percolate freaking Maxwell House coffee. It sounds like a steam engine having a seizure.”

“Jolene Park. What did youdo?” She’s wise to my topic-changing ways, blast her.