Page 36 of Someone to Watch Over Me

Nothing has ever surprised me more than that does. “You did?”

“Hell yes, but you were so much younger than me. My parents held me back for an extra year going into kindergarten, so I was an almost-nineteen-year-old senior. You were fifteen, so my mom told me I was absolutelynotgoing to date someone so much younger than me. But I certainly knew you were there.”

“I had no idea. I thought it was the most tragic unrequited crush in history.”

“Definitely not.”

“Wow,” I say with a laugh. “Who knew?”

“I did. I knew. And that night when we met up again for the first time since high school, it was rather amazing to realize I still had a massive crush on you all these years later. You were even lovelier than I remembered.”

“As I recall, I looked ridiculous, as I’d just come from the gym to have a drink before going home, and there you were.”

“You looked gorgeous.”

“Stop it.”

“I’m serious.”

Finding out he’d been aware of me in high school is a huge shock. I felt like I walked around with a sign taped to my back that saidI Love Tom Hammettin those days.

“What are you smiling about?”

“I’m thinking about how silly I was over you back then. I felt like the whole world had to know I was crazy about one of the most popular guys in the school and how ridiculous I was.”

“You weren’t ridiculous. I remember you as a very serious student who played the flute and was the cutest member of the marching band.”

I cringe. “Said no one ever. Those uniforms were hideous.”

“Not on you.”

“Stop it.”

“I won’t stop it. You were adorable. I used to watch for you when the band took the field during halftime when I was supposed to be listening to what the coach was telling us.”

“If I’d known that then, I would’ve literally died on the spot to know you were watching me in that ridiculous uniform.”

“You rocked the uniform.”

“Now you’re just lying to my face.”

He laughs—hard—and then winces. “Don’t make me laugh.”

“Then don’t say ridiculous things!”

“Every word is the truth. I swear. I was this close to asking you to the senior prom, but my mother told me I absolutely could not ask a fifteen-year-old.”

His confessions have left me breathless. “I was almost sixteen.”

“Still. My mom wasn’t having it. She reminded me that I was a legal adult, and you were, technically, still a child, and I wasn’t taking you to a dance or going to be alone with you in a car. So I didn’t go, which made her really mad.”

“You’re making this up.”

“I am not! I swear to God.”

“You skipped your senior prom because you couldn’t take me?”

“I did.”

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