Page 23 of My Star-Crossed Summer

I tap my fingers on my neck, in the approximate area where her smudge is. She lifts a brow and then catches on, rubbing her skin and frowning when she sees the grease on her hand. Her cheeks turn pink, as if she’s disappointed that the smudge is what held my gaze. She rubs her hand on her dark jeans, where the knees show some dirt, and turns her attention back to the stage.

Sophie introduces the two instructors, Dr. Cassie and Dr. Sanjay, both of whom insist the kids call them by their first names. Dr. Cassie, a petite blond woman from the University of New Mexico, was here last year and has this endless energy that we’d all love to bottle for ourselves. Dr. Sanjay is new to us—a doctoral student at the University of Virginia, he interned with NASA down in Cape Canaveral. He towers over Dr. Cassie, but his big blue-framed glasses and orange sneakers give him an approachable yet nerdy vibe that the kids will no doubt love. In between space puns, he tells them about how during his internship, he experienced zero gravity just long enough to make him puke.

The kids groan and laugh. Already, he and Dr. Cassie are their heroes.

“I think that’s the closest I’ll come to being an astronaut,” Dr. Sanjay says. “Does anyone here want to travel to space?”

Hands shoot into the air as the kids shout excitedly.

As he and Dr. Cassie take turns at the microphone, I keep my eyes fixed on them, where there’s zero chance of staring at Victoria and her lovely collarbones. I can’t for the life of me figure out how she ended up here—what are the chances that we’d ever cross paths again? And the chances of meeting her in a summer camp for kids? It seems more likely that I’d win the lottery. But here she sits, somehow even more beautiful than she was in college, turning my world upside down all over again.

On the day we met,I knew two things for certain: one, that Victoria was not like any other girl I’d met before, and two, that I had to find a way to spend more time with her.

We collided at a Halloween party freshman year. My roommates were throwing a huge bash, and our house was overflowing with people, most of whom I’d never met. Our tinybackyard was beyond capacity, so I’d escaped to the upstairs balcony because it was the only space left where I could sit still without being elbowed in the kidney.

My cousin Ray had insisted I wear a costume, but I’d refused to wear anything that wasn’t inside my closet already because I didn’t want to be at that stupid party at all. Exasperated, he’d dug through my clothes until he found a white tee shirt, jeans, and my beat-up motorcycle jacket. “Looks like you’re either Danny Zuko or Wolverine,” he said, tossing my old harness boots at me. “Take your pick.”

The choice was obvious.

Hours later, I escaped to the balcony and had been out there less than twenty minutes when a woman came bursting through the skinny French doors connecting to Ray’s bedroom. The glass panes rattled as she fumbled with the doors, which never wanted to come together just right. When they finally banged shut, she leaned against them and let out an adorable irritated grunt.

Cheers and shouts erupted below us, where someone was doing yet another keg stand.

“Hi,” I said. It seemed a greeting would make the moment less awkward since I was sitting a few feet away from her in a corner, deep in the shadow of a palmetto.

“Sweet baby cheeses,” she said, holding a hand to her chest. “You scared the daylights out of me.”

“Said the bull in the china shop. I could barely hear the music over that clatter.”

She cocked her head and pursed her lips, fixing me with a curious stare. Long blond hair fell in waves past her shoulders. Her emerald-green dress hugged her curves and flared out at the bottom like a mermaid’s tail. Atop her head sat a crown made of flowers and two small deer-like antlers. Ethereal and lovely, she was like something from a fairy tale—and entirely out of place at a raucous party like this one.

“Well, in a moment, this bull will be out of your way.” She nudged past me and peered over the iron railing, studying the line of the roof as she reached for the trellis that was overgrown with ivy and lord knows what else.

“Easy there, Rapunzel,” I said. “That thing’s historic. And likely teeming with tetanus.”

“Rapunzel brought the princeup,” she said, slipping off her green heels. “I’m looking for a way down.”

“Don’t even think about that trellis. It’s entirely decorative and not one bit practical.”

She turned and fixed me with her stare, her plump lip caught between her teeth.

“Who are you hiding from?” I asked, suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to protect her. Hopefully, whoever she was trying to outrun wasn’t twice my size, but I could easily see myself making all kinds of bad decisions for this girl.

She snorted. “You’ve been out here longer than I have. Who areyouhiding from?”

“Everyone.”

Her brow lifted, her attention fully on me.

“I don’t love these parties,” I grumbled. Being packed in a house with people I didn’t know or especially like was the worst.

“Then why did you come?”

“I live here.”

She smirked. “So the unlikely hero is also the unlikely host. That tracks.” She waved her hand in front of her in a small circle, as if to emphasize my whole ensemble, from the leather jacket to the jeans and beat-up boots.

I fought back a grin, shoving a hand into the pocket of my jacket. “Does it count as a costume if it’s your normal clothes?”

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