Page 28 of The Girlfriend Zone

Oh. Right. I’m still wearing it. I stupidly couldn’t bring myself to take it off. My cheeks flush as the lie slips out. “Oh, this? Just grabbed it at a thrift shop.”

“It’s pretty,” he says.

“Yeah, I might have to steal it sometime,” Riley teases.

I smile, but beneath it, guilt knots in my stomach.

The food arrives a minute later, and I’m grateful for the distraction. Before everyone digs in, I take a picture of Riley and my dad—a candid here at the table. They’re so used to me snagging pics like this that they just keep talking as I frame the shot and snap it. Then, it’s selfie time for all of us. They lean in close and I take the pic. I want to capture all life’s moments, big and small. I want to experience everything, and sometimes that means beingable to look back and remember a moment that’s passed you by.

“The camera eats first,” my dad says, faux grumbling.

“And the camera is very hungry,” Riley adds with a huff.

“Please. You both love my pics,” I say. “I’ve seen your smart hubs.”

Riley rolls her eyes but bumps my shoulder—her subtle acknowledgement. As for Dad, I get his acknowledgement nearly every day. I gave them both digital photo frames for Christmas last year and they eagerly display the pics on them that I upload to our family album. And nearly every day my dad takes pics on his phone of the pics the frame scrolls through and texts us notes like “Remember that day?” or “That was fun!”

It’s so meta, I love it. But I love, too, that the pics make him happy.

When breakfast ends, I have some time before I meet the other photographer, so I make a quick decision—I can’t hold on to this necklace. It feels like it belongs to someone else. I take a bus to the Presidio and hike along Tennessee Hollow Trail until I find the lockbox I visited yesterday with Miles.

I try to remember the code, but he found it through an app. Dammit. I don’t even know what app he used. Crouching by the stream, I go to the app store and search for geocaching apps. There are five.

I sigh, downloading them one by one, and after ten minutes of setup with the first one, I plug in the location and find the cache. Well, lucky me on that count.

I click on the info and there it is—the code. I punch it into the lockbox as a curl of hope rises up in me. Maybehe left something for me this morning. A note? A trinket? A small token that would show yesterday mattered to him.

Stop it, Leighton.This is so ridiculous. I’m not that girl—the one who hopes for gifts from guys.

“Just move on,” I mutter.

I yank the box open…and it’s empty. The bracelet is gone. My heart sinks heavily, but really this is fine. This is so fine. The bracelet didn’t matter that much to me anyway.

But the necklace? It feels like it could have meant a lot. Like yesterday did. It’s a day I don’t want to forget. I have pictures of Miles and me in the studio, but none geocaching of course. That would have been too much to capture. I don’t want to forget it though—how I felt when we were together. Effervescent, hopeful, heady. Like everything was possible. I run a finger over the heart locket, tracing the grooves and ridges of the metal before I take my phone out and snap a picture.

Something to remember yesterday.

Then, I let it go so someone else can have it.

I take off the heart locket and set it inside the box, its weight lifting from my skin. I close the box, leaving the necklace—and Miles—behind.

10

THE ABRIDGED TALE

Miles

It’s not Birdie’s fault. Not even a little. But still, as my grandmother slides an espresso in front of me—an espresso that is not at all vile—I figure she needs to hear the story. Well, the abridged version—no way am I spilling every detail of yesterday to her or anyone.

“Best date of my life, and guess what?” I say, leaning in. I glance over my shoulder, scanning High Kick’s crowded tables. For what though? Coach McBride himself? The thought alone makes me shudder. But really, it’s for anyone who might know me through hockey. Wrong ears and all that.

I nod toward the back room, and Birdie doesn’t hesitate to follow. Once we’re away from the espresso machine buzz and the morning crowd’s chatter, I drop the bomb that still feels like it’s dropping on me. “She’s the coach’s daughter.”

Birdie freezes mid-step. “Shut your mouth.”

“I only wish I were lying.” I lift my arms in mock surrender, but my smile doesn’t reach my eyes.

“No, no, no,” she says, her brow furrowing as if she’s rewinding through every moment since she met Leighton, searching for hints she might’ve missed. “That can’t be right.”

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