Awkwardly Ever After Read online

  “Hello, arrogant jock.”

  Mackenzie kicked me under the table again as I smiled innocently.

  “What? I thought we were giving each other cute nicknames based purely on first impressions.”

  Spencer at least had the good sense to meet my eyes directly. “Okay, not my best opening line. Does it help if I admit that I had a thing for Pocahontas as a kid? I mean, that ‘Colors of the Wind’ stuff was hot.” His smile quirked up at the side and I began relaxing in spite of myself.

  I shrugged. “Yeah, I’m still not thrilled with the comparison.”

  “It’s the long brown hair,” Mackenzie pointed out.

  “And your eyes.”

  “And my skin tone. Not exactly a secret here, guys.”

  “I think mainly it’s your eyes.” Spencer leaned closer, as if an intense examination was required to settle the matter. “They’re almost the same shade of dark chocolate as your drink.”

  I blinked up at him. “Okay, I get it. You weren’t trying to be a jerk. Message received. You can tone down the flirting now.”

  He laughed and glanced over at Mackenzie. “Does she give everyone such a hard time?”

  Only when I’m not entirely clear what game someone wants to be playing with me. If I think it will prevent a mess in the making, I have no trouble speaking up. Probably because I can’t afford to clean up after anyone else—not without crumbling inside. That’s why I only truly relax around a handful of people who don’t push me too far.

  Except that doesn’t apply to my feelings for Dylan.

  “Um, actually she never has be—”

  “Hey, Mack.” Logan Beckett interrupted her words with a quick kiss. Not that she appeared to mind, judging by the way her fingers gripped his hockey jersey. “Did you catch the show?”

  “Nah, I hardly noticed you at all.” The foolish grin plastered all over her face gave her away. “Melanie and I were discussing the Boston Tea Party.”

  He groaned. “No more history lectures, I beg of you.”

  “Actually, I was thinking the four of us could get together to watch Pocahontas.”

  Oh crap.

  Logan glanced over at his best friend, whose face I now found impossible to read. “Um . . . I’m not so sure Spencer enjoys discussing historical accuracy, Mack.”

  “He was just telling Melanie how much he loved that movie as a kid. Weren’t you, Spencer?”

  “I—”

  “Great! It’s settled. We’ll see the two of you at Logan’s house for movie night tomorrow. Say . . . six o’clock?” She was already pulling on her backpack and entwining her fingers with Logan’s. The two of them were so fricking adorable together it was almost nauseating. “See you then!”

  And just like that they strolled out of the ice skating rink together.

  Leaving me alone with a hockey player who had just been shanghaied into a movie date with me that I didn’t even want in the first place.

  Because I was still stupidly hung up on someone else altogether.

  I was so screwed.

  Chapter 2

  The ballots for prom court will soon be passed amongst the student body. And while Smith High School sophomore Samantha “Sam” Wilson has loudly protested this tradition, calling it “nothing more than a popularity contest that only strengthens the patriarchal culture of this country,” many people believe this is merely because she isn’t in the running....

  —from “Preparing for Prom,”

  by Lisa Anne Montgomery

  Published by The Smithsonian

  “So, on a scale of one to ten, how uncomfortable are you right now?”

  Spencer’s obvious amusement about the whole thing made me grin right back. I mentally began revising my estimation of him. At least he had a solid sense of humor . . . something we would both probably be needing with Mackenzie’s brain tuned to matchmaking mode.

  I shrugged. “Mackenzie means well. I’m not sure about her judgment when it comes to, y’know . . .”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah.”

  He flopped into the seat that Mackenzie had recently vacated. “Fair enough. She has a terrible track record. I mean, that guy she’s dating? No good. I don’t trust him as far as I can slide him on the ice.”

  I mentally replayed the way he had hauled Logan away from Patrick, and smiled at the joke. “Yeah, Logan’s just the worst.”

  “That’s what I’ve been saying for years. I’m biding my time now. Waiting for my parents to buy me the captaincy.”

  His parents could probably do it. Everyone knew that the new wing in the gym was courtesy of the King family fortune. I studied him carefully, searching for even a trace of truth behind his joking words. Spencer’s green eyes were bright, but I suspected that it had less to do with hockey and more to do with messing with my head.

  “Would you really want to be team captain?”

  “Nah, probably not. That would mean I’d have to give all the pep talks.” Spencer scoffed. “Show up early. All of that cr—garbage.”

  I didn’t know what to make of his quick bit of verbal sanitation, whether it was his way of trying to impress me with his chivalry or if he considered it bad form to swear in front of an impressionable freshman girl. The sardonic edge underlying his every statement left me wondering if he ever meant anything he said, or if life was one big joke to him.

  “Would all of that be such a bad thing?”

  “It certainly would be for Patrick.” He glanced down at his phone. “Listen Poc—Melanie. It was fun meeting you, but I have places to go, people to see, and parties to crash.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Of course you do.”

  “So I’ll be seeing you tomorrow night.” Spencer stood and I knew that if I kept my mouth shut he would saunter out of the hockey rink as if he owned the place, which he sort of did. His parents had paid for its remodel after all.

  “I don’t get it,” I blurted out, before he had taken more than two steps. “We have nothing in common. Why on earth would you want to hang out with me? If you really wanted to get out of this, you could convince Mackenzie to let it drop easily enough.”

  His smile quirked up at the side. “That’s for me to know . . . and you to find out.”

  “Seriously? You couldn’t come up with anything more original than that?”

  “Nope, but I’ll do better next time.” Spencer winked. “Catch you later, Melanie.”

  That was the last thing I needed. Especially if Spencer developed real feelings for me and I had to explain to Mackenzie why I was reluctant to give one of the hottest guys in the junior class any of my time.

  Sorry, Mackenzie. I’d just rather date your little brother than your boyfriend’s best friend. That’s fine with you, right?

  The only thing I found myself dreading more than trying to explain that to Mackenzie was introducing anyone to my dad. Not when he passes tipsy and moves on to getting thoroughly trashed before five o’clock every evening. Just because my dad wasn’t an angry drunk didn’t really change anything; I still hated watching him stare at the television for hours on end while he poisoned himself into an early grave.

  I absolutely refused to let anyone else see him that way.

  Which was why I waited until the next morning before school to corner Izzie for advice.

  “So, hypothetically speaking, if someone tried to set you up on a date with Spencer King . . . how would you worm your way out of it?”

  Izzie barely glanced up at me from the AP Statistics textbook she had propped open against a tree, giving herself an excellent view of her surroundings while remaining relatively invisible. Not that Isobel Peters ever needed help going unnoticed. “I would let my trusty dragon take care of the situation. Or ask a warlock friend to intervene. Those things are way more likely to happen than a date with Spencer King. At least for me. What’s going on, Mel?”

  “Okay, so let’s say someone was trying to set me up on a date with Spencer King. Hypothetically.”

&nbs
p; She shoved her glasses higher up her nose and stared at me in disbelief. “Nothing about this conversation seems hypothetical. Do we need to review the definition again?”

  “Fine. It’s . . . well, honestly I’m blaming Mackenzie for this one.”

  Izzie grinned and closed her textbook with a resounding whump. “Let me guess: Mackenzie wants to set you up with Spencer because he is Logan’s best friend and she feels guilty about interrupting their bromance time.”

  She might not like being the center of attention, but that’s never stopped Izzie from paying attention to the intricacies of everyone else’s lives. That, combined with her analytical nature and her inability to lie with anything even remotely resembling a straight face, made her the world’s best confidant. I could trust Izzie to keep my secrets safe. I imagined it’d be similar to admitting my sins to a priest; what happens in the confessional, stays in the confessional.

  Forgive me, Father. I’ve been having some thoughts about my best friend’s little brother that probably don’t meet up to your godly standards or whatever. . . .

  Yeah, I didn’t think saying fifteen Hail Mary’s would really help in this particular situation. I’d also kept my embarrassing crush on Dylan to myself. And luckily, Izzie had never needed to know every particular to point me in the right direction, which was why I considered her undeniable talent for giving advice as one of Smith High School’s best kept secrets. Nobody would think to ask a girl who acted like she had a supercomputer chip wired into her brain for relationship pointers. Izzie might be good at understanding people, but she didn’t exactly come across as a people person.

  “I think Mackenzie’s in the mood to play matchmaker, but I don’t think her relationship with Logan has anything to do with it.”

  Izzie laughed outright. “If that was the case, don’t you think she would have noticed by now that you’re head over heels crazy about her little brother?”

  “What are you talking about? I’m not—”

  The three-minute warning bell cut me off and I watched in stunned silence while Izzie began methodically packing up her backpack.

  “Sorry, was that supposed to be a secret? You mention him all the time, Mel.” Izzie pitched her voice higher, which sounded doubly absurd coming from her. “So I spent the night at Mackenzie’s house and Dylan told us the funniest story about his soccer practice. And then he challenged Mackenzie to a game of basketball, but when she pointed out that he had an unfair advantage, he said they would play on rollerblades!”

  I felt my cheeks turning redder. “I don’t remember going into that much detail.”

  But Izzie was into her act now, and I could tell by the sparkle in her eyes that she wasn’t going to let it drop.

  “So they took Mackenzie’s rollerblades to a nearby court and both put one of them on and used me as the referee.” Izzie’s voice finally dropped to her normal husky register. “This is the point in the story when you get a glazed look in your eyes.”

  Yeah, it was. Because that’s when I started thinking about the way Dylan’s dark hair had looked windswept and tousled as he focused on beating his older sister, only to look up at me and flash a bone-melting smile.

  “You’re doing it again.”

  I forced myself to concentrate on Isobel.

  “Look, Dylan isn’t . . . we’re just—I’m not . . .” I stumbled incoherently.

  If anything, Izzie’s grin only widened. “Uh-huh, that clears everything right up.”

  “Nothing can happen between us, okay! Not without jeopardizing my friendship with Mackenzie. So . . . drop it.”

  She instantly sobered, met my gaze squarely, and nodded. “Consider it dropped. But if you ever need to talk, well, I’m here.”

  The last part usually went without saying. O f course Izzie would be there for me. That’s how it works when you’ve been best friends since the first day of middle school. I mean, if you can make it through that without hating each other, you’ve got a pretty firm foundation for friendship. Although the real test had come in seventh grade when she dropped by my house unexpectedly and saw my dad passed out in a drunken heap on the couch. I had been mortified; frozen in place by an overwhelming rush of shame. And I had desperately hoped that somehow she wouldn’t notice him—or the noxious smell of stale beer that filled the room. I had braced myself for the inevitable; I waited for her to turn on the pity eyes and start making excuses to bolt.

  I forgot, there’s . . . somewhere else I need to be. Right now. Sorry, Mel. See you tomorrow. Or . . . whenever.

  I couldn’t even imagine an alternative. Nobody in their right mind would want to deal with the rank reality of my home life—not if they caught one good whiff of it. There were days when I thought I could wash my clothes a thousand times and never completely remove that smell. Days when I checked the recycling bin outside so I would know what to expect when I opened the front door. Nights I spent hovering over my dad, listening for the next quiet intake of air just to make sure he was still breathing.

  Then I’d leave a large glass of water and an aspirin on the nearby coffee table for him.

  If there had been a way out, I would have taken it a long time ago.

  So even as I had braced myself for Izzie’s knee-jerk reaction to flee, I didn’t resent her for it. I accepted it as the way things worked.

  Except instead of splitting, Izzie had tentatively placed one hand on my shoulder and said, “What do you need me to do?”

  That’s why I didn’t care if everyone at Smith High School thought it was weird that I chose to spend my time with a girl they’d already dismissed as a chubby nerd when I could be hanging out with the most popular kids at school. All I had to do was ditch Izzie and every lunch from then on I could be eating at the most prominent table in the cafeteria with the rest of the Notables.

  Never going to happen.

  Because if I had to pick between joining the Notable clique or staying Isobel Peters’s best friend, it wasn’t even a contest.

  “Thanks, Izzie.”

  “So you were saying something about Spencer King.” Izzie’s lips curved up into a half-smile. “Hypothetically . . .”

  I laughed. “Mackenzie made a big deal out of inviting us both to watch a movie at Logan’s house tonight . . . and I don’t know how to get out of it. Which is why I need you to give me some of that genius-level advice of yours.”

  Izzie rolled her eyes. “I’ve got fantastic advice all right, if you want to get a jump on prepping for the PSATs. Guys like Spencer King—ones who are good looking and rich and could get away with murder—yeah, not my area of expertise.”

  “Come on, Izzie! Pretend I’m asking for an anthropological study of the . . . Homo, um, make that Hockey erectus clan. How can I turn him down without pissing him off?”

  Izzie’s expression turned thoughtful. “He’s proud, right? Probably used to getting his own way and equipped with a competitive streak a mile long. So make it seem like his idea. As long as you distract him with a bet or a dare—some kind of feat to prove his manliness—he’ll probably forget you even exist.” She zipped up her backpack and then paused as if reconsidering the last part of her statement. “Sorry, he’d forget that I exist. You’re too pretty for that, so . . . not sure how you’ll pull this one off. Keep me posted, though.”

  Izzie brushed off the dirt on the seat of her pants and started walking toward her science class while I tagged along beside her. I probably should have let the subject drop and left for the English wing, which happened to be located in the opposite direction, but I couldn’t let it go. Not without a solid, workable plan in place. Not when it was entirely possible that Mackenzie was scheming how best to throw me at her boyfriend’s best buddy.

  I needed a wingwoman.

  And it looked like Izzie was it.

  “You know what would make a really great distraction, Izzie? Having someone else come along to keep it from being a double date. That would really help keep the pressure off.” I looked pointedly at he
r. “I just need to convince someone I trust to play the role of the fifth wheel for a single night.”

  Izzie feigned ignorance. “Oh? Well, I’m sure you won’t have any trouble locating a volunteer. From what I’ve seen, all Spencer has to do is grin and almost any girl here will leap into his arms.”

  Funny, but I never noticed anything special in his smile. I mean, yeah, the guy was good looking, but he always seemed a bit too . . . polished. His whole attitude was a little too slick for me; he knew exactly how he came across and used it to his advantage. I could totally picture him naming his dog something obnoxious like “Babe Magnet” and still walking away with phone numbers in his pocket.

  Part of me couldn’t believe that anyone would fall for his lines, especially at a small high school where everyone knew exactly what you did last summer because they were probably there with you—or they knew someone who was. Maybe that explained his sudden interest in me, though: He was expanding his dating pool to include freshmen because he had already hooked up with everyone else.

  Or at the very least dated everyone else’s best friend, thereby invoking the Girl Code. Although I suspected plenty of girls would be willing to overlook the code for a shot at Spencer King. And that an equal number of girls felt gut-wrenchingly foolish when he launched into his whole I don’t do serious relationships speech. Everyone at Smith High School knew about his talk, and yet somehow heartbroken girls still ended up crying in bathroom stalls while they crossed out the hearts they had drawn around their linked names.

  Dylan’s smile, on the other hand . . . yeah, his name was something worth etching into the ugly chipped blue paint on the stall doors.

  Not that I ever would.

  Probably.

  “I don’t care if other girls would be interested in him. I need you, Izzie. Please say you’ll go with me. Please.”

  She picked up her pace and pretended to consult an imaginary watch. “Oh, will you look at the time? I’ve got to—”