Page 66 of Study Buddies

“I just got a mouthful of hair.”

Oops… my ponytail must’ve whipped around when I ducked my head.

He brushed the strands away from his face. “I’m going to start calling you Rapunzel.”

I laughed. “She had blonde hair.”

“Yes, but it was long, like yours, and if you were trapped in a tower, I’d do my best to climb up it to rescue you.”

“Thank you.” I giggled again. “And if you were about to be slain by a dragon, I would—well, honestly, I’d probably take a picture. It could be worth a lot of money.”

He shoved me playfully, and we both laughed. But the next moment, everyone around us was on their feet, shouting.

Kyle was running top speed toward home plate while his teammates ran the bases. He landed on the plate with both feet, and then he sprung into the air, doing a forward flip. The crowd loved it, and the other players came out to high five him, but I just stared. How on Earth had he done that?

Another one of Kyle’s teammates scored, and the volume of the crowd increased. “Did they win?”

“Yep!” Jayden had to shout to be heard.

It was hard to see with the people in front of me standing, but I watched Kyle celebrating with his teammates and I was happy for him.

Jayden took my hand as we walked down the stadium steps. His eyes were on the now-empty field. “I always forget, when I haven’t seen him play in a while, how good he actually is.” Jayden steered us around a sticky mess that looked like nachos someone had dropped. “The way he acts sometimes… it makes it easy to forget that he’s so talented.”

I agreed wholeheartedly. But there was something else I was curious about. “This game didn’t count, right?”

“Not toward the regular season, but it’s still awesome that they won the last game of the year.”

“Yeah, it is.” I couldn’t quite get the images out of my head. Of Kyle batting. Stealing bases. Taunting the pitcher. And playing to the crowd, who obviously loved him. “So… those things he did during the game, were they just because this game didn’t count?”

We reached the base of the stadium, and Jayden cocked his head to the side as we walked along. “What do you mean?”

“Well… it kind of looked like he was hamming it up a bit. Not that he wasn’t very good, but it seemed like he was kind of showing off for the crowd.”

Jayden smirked. “He wasn’t showing off for the crowd.”

“Really? Because?—”

“He was showing off foryou, Tori.”

I stopped dead in the middle of the walkway. “Me?”

“Yep. Come on, let’s head home.”

The next day,I had some time to kill between my morning and afternoon class. Since I wasn’t far from the Social Sciences building, I went back to the coffee shop Jayden had shown me.

Mia was behind the counter, and she greeted me kindly. I ordered a muffin and some hot tea and took it to a table in the corner. The place was as empty as it had been when Jayden brought me here.

I pulled out my journal and read through the notes I’d taken in my World Literature class while I picked at the muffin. My phone was on silent, but it vibrated with an incoming call. For a moment, I hoped it was Lucas, even though he usually texted. Things had been a little weird between us since the awful way movie night had ended. Things were a little better on Saturday, but then he’d found out that Jayden and I were going to Kyle’s game. So yeah, things had been a bit tense.

But it wasn’t Lucas. The screen showed it was a call from my mom.

I debated letting it go to voicemail, but just before it did, I answered it. “Hi, Mom.”

I stood up, ready to take the call out in the hallway so as not to disturb anyone, but Mia caught my eye. She gestured to the empty café and indicated that I could just stay, so I did. It would probably be a short phone call. We didn’t have a ton to talk about these days.

Mom asked about my classes. Asked how Hailey was, whom I’d mentioned before. She didn’t ask where I was living, and I didn’t volunteer the information. She probably thought I was still sharing a house with Todd, but she didn’t ask about him, thankfully.

“Are you coming home for Thanksgiving, Tori?”

---