Page 56 of Things I Wish I Said
At least a dozen boys are watching a baseball game on a television hanging above a large outdoor fireplace. Others are clustered throughout the rest of the yard, with a huge mass of people huddled around a keg where a boy chugs frothy liquid from a cup, spilling half of it down his shirt while the others cheer. A few feet down, several tables hold an array of cups I assume are for beer pong, and in the middle of all this chaos sits a huge indoor pool, surrounded by smooth, brown stone. There are a dozen or so bodies in the water and a dozen more dancing on the pad of concrete just outside it.
This is the last place I should be, yet it’s exactly where I want to be.
Any doubts I have vanish as we weave our way through the crowd while Grayson says hello to nearly everyone he sees. If he walks by, people notice. Heads turn. Girls blatantly ogle him. Guys dab him up. If it weren’t already clear where he stood on the high school social ladder, it is now. Grayson De Leon is the guy every boy wants to be and the one all the girls want.
With so much attention on the boy at my side, it’s not a surprise when several curious glances flick my way, and I’m oddly comforted by the fact that no one here knows me. I can be whoever I want. I don’t have to be the girl with cancer or the soccer superstar, and I especially don’t have to be the girl everyone used to admire but now pities.
We meander past another group of people that Grayson slaps hands with.
I nudge his shoulder once we hit a break in the crowd. “Well, aren’t we Mr. Popular.”
“Hardly.” He rolls his eyes and stops, and I wonder how he can be so confident yet modest at the same time.
Turning to face me, he spreads his arms. “So . . . this is it.”
“If you were here alone, what would you be doing right now?” I ask.
“Do you really want an answer to that?”
“I want to know more about the illustrious Grayson De Leon, so yeah.”
Grayson snorts. “Right.”
“I’m serious.” I nudge him in the ribs.
He exhales, and I wonder if he’s deciding what version of himself to share. “One of three things.” He ticks them off his fingers. “Getting drunk. High. Or hooking up with whatever girl seems like the least likely to cling. Most likely a combination of all three.”
I stare at him for a moment, wondering why someone like him would waste himself like that. More importantly, why do any of it when he seems pissed off about it.
“And that makes you angry?”
He rubs a hand over the back of his neck. “I mean, I’m not proud of it.”
“Some would be.”
He lifts a shoulder. “I should be focused on training, hanging with my friends, working out, and getting ready for college.”
“Is that all?”
He shoves his hands in his pockets. “Okay, and maybe I’m a little pissed because I’m not the kind of person you should be dating. Real or not, you deserve a hell of a lot more than this.” He nods toward the throng of people behind us, and it’s this exact moment I realize there are a million layers of Grayson De Leon I’ll have to unwrap if I want to get to the center of him.
I bite my lip, glancing around the party. “Let’s dance.”
“What?” His brows rise.
“Let’s dance,” I repeat.
“Um, how about you dance, and I watch?”
I roll my eyes. “You’re not getting off the hook that easily, and I’m also not going to dance while you watch me like some kind of creep.”
“Doesn’t sound so bad to me,” he murmurs under his breath as I tug hisarm.
He lets me drag him halfway toward the dance floor before he must realize I’m dead serious and plants his feet, unwilling to move.
“Come on.” I tug his arm.
“No way.”
