Page 118 of Fostering Chemistry
He nodded with a grin. “Come on.”
The next surprise was that I didn’t actually hate bowling—and that Cody was freaking amazing at it. The majority of the time, he rolled strikes. He could even pick up splits, though he only rolled one of those, and I half suspected it was only to prove to me that he could.
“How did you get so good at this?”
“I used to skip class and go bowling in high school.”
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?”
“I don’t know,” he said innocently. “I’m normally a model student.” Despite his use of sign language earlier, it felt like he was speaking so easily to me—and I loved it.
A few frames later, he said, “I liked being at a bowling alley. It’s so loud that no one really expects you to hold a conversation, so I could pretend I was normal.”
“Youarenormal,” I said, and then shook my head after his ball thundered down the lane and knocked the pins into the next time zone. “I take it back. No normal guy bowls strike after strike.”
He grinned. “I get a few spares sometimes too.”
He gave me some tips after that, and I managed to get a few more pins each turn.
When we finished, his score was 256. Mine was 67.
“Not bad,” he said, looking at the numbers flashing on the computer screen. Then his grin turned teasing. “I’m sure you did better than a couple of those guys down at the last lane.”
Since there was a kid’s party at the last lane complete with balloons, a dad dressed like a clown, and bumpers blocking the gutters, that wasn’t much of a compliment. “Thanks a lot.”
“I’m serious—you did well. But I wish you’d knock down two more pins.”
“Why?” I said, looking again at my score of 67. Then I knew. “Don’t say it,” I said, turning to him.
Seeing the glint in his eye, I tried to cover his mouth, but he grabbed my hands and, in a move too fast for me to follow, twisted them behind me, trapping me against his chest.
The sudden closeness and being pressed against the hard wall of his chest knocked all other thoughts out of my mind.
But it left him free to say, “69 is my favorite number.”
“You and every other guy,” I muttered. Being this close to him was having an effect on me. His eyes met mine, then dropped to my lips. Then he dipped his head to my ear, his nose nuzzling against my hair. God, it was like he was a whole new person today. Maybe he’d really needed to tell someone about his childhood. I was honored he’d chosen me.
I stilled as he leaned in close, every cell in my body quivering in anticipation. “Behave yourself. There are children watching,” he whispered.
I laughed, trying to jerk out of his grasp, but he was stronger than I’d thought, and I couldn’t get free until he let me—which was both annoying and arousing.
After we finished the second game, we waited outside on a bench, sipping sodas.
Thanks to Cody, I was learning that it wasn’t necessary to fill every moment with conversation. Yes, sometimes I wanted to talk to him, but other times I was content to sit in silence next to him. This was one of the latter times. Plus, after the bowling alley noise, the relative quiet of the parking lot was refreshing.
Eventually, he got a text. “They’re on their way back.”
“Yeah? Want to tell me where they’ve been?”
“How would I know?” he said, striving to look innocent.
Despite the fact that he had the face of an angel—or at least a fallen one—he couldn’t quite pull off the innocent act.
“You know. You just won’t tell me.”
“Interesting theory,” he said. “We should test it in chem lab sometime.”
I rolled my eyes and went back to alternating between glaring at him when he was looking my way and checking him out when he wasn’t.
