Page 14 of How to Score Off Field

Absolutely none.

I sulk, wishing I were cool.

“Yeah, he’s dropping by. He gets a kick out of me wearing cowboy boots.” She reaches forward and grabs a grape from the bowl she keeps on the counter. “They’re silver.”

Of course they are.

Mine are pink—super cute, right?—but I don’t think I’ll be wearing a pair tomorrow. I left them at my parents’ house with no plans to pop in and fetch them.

“Tess, what’s the worst thing that could happen if you…you know, tell Drew you’re harboring a mad crush on him?”

I laugh. “The same thing that happened the last time I tried.”

She tilts her head. “When was that?”

Oh god. “It’s not something I want to remember.”

“Humor me…”

I pause.

I hesitate, searching for not only the memory but also the words to tell it…

“I was a freshman, and he was a junior, two years older but so nice. Kind. Tall. Good-looking in a non-traditional way. Always had a fresh haircut, always shaved, unlike his twin brother with his unkempt hair and the scruff on his chin.

“He was the boy of my dreams, literally, ’cause I dreamed of him almost every single night.”

Miranda listens, spellbound.

“My brother’s friends were always at our house. We had a huge pool, and Mom always preferred to have a houseful rather than not know where we were off to. So every weekend, after all the games, Grady would invite his teammates over. Sometimes girls would show up too.”

“Anyway, on this particular night, our parents went to dinner. They weren’t far from the house, so they thought it would be okay. They trusted us, you know? We weren’t allowed to be in the pool, but they let him have people over to watch movies. So that’s what Grady ultimately did.”

“At some point, I came out of my room, and they had stopped watchin’ movies and wanted to play games—seven minutes in heaven or whatever.”

God, this is so embarrassing to talk about.

I’ve never told another soul.

I haven’t even written about it in my journal. That’s how humiliated I felt.

“Grady hadn’t wanted me to play, but his buddies and the girls gave him shit about it. Plenty of other girls there were my age, so it’s not like he was tellin’ them to sit on the couch by themselves. So I got on my knees on the carpet like everyone else and played the game like everyone else. Lucas had put a book down on the floor and on top of that, an empty Coke bottle. You know, for spinnin’. Drew was there.”

Or I thought it was Drew.

When he spun the bottle, and it landed on me, my heart stopped beatin’ completely. Every nerve in my body was hummin’, I swear.”

Miranda reaches over and grips my hand, squeezing it, mouth pulling at the corner as if to say,Aw, you sweet thing.

“My god, I was so nervous.” I clear my throat. “This is it, I had thought. This is the moment my lips are going to touch Drew Colter’s.”

My first kiss.

Or it would have been had he actually kissed me.

“We both stood and headed for the coat closet. Like, why a group of high school kids were playin’ that dumb game is beyond me, but I felt like I was going to throw up walkin’ through that closet door.”

“What happened?” Miranda whispers.

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