Page 52 of Fostering Chemistry
I was pretty sure I was headed south as I broke into a run. "You mean behind the building, right? The opposite side of the main entrance?"
"Yeah, but we're in the woods back here. It’s like a labyrinth."
"I'm coming," I said, jogging.
Tori was up ahead and still frantically talking on her phone, but she seemed as lost as I was. I resumed zigzagging, but this timeinstead of looking at the ground, I was scanning for Diego. The tall trees blocked the sunlight and I was afraid I'd miss him in his dark clothes.
"Where are they?" Tori said, sounding a little desperate.
"I'm just rounding the corner by the amphitheater,” I said hastily to Diego. “Just tell me which way to go from there.”
“When the sidewalk splits, go right.”
“What sidewalk?” I spun in a circle but didn’t see him anywhere. He was right, it was like a labyrinth back here.
Diego swore, and then the line went dead. Puzzled, I stared at the phone, about to hit the button to call him back.
But then I heard it—a loud whistle, the kind that referees use. I took off in the direction of the sound, running as fast as I could. It was far easier to home in on that sound than to follow hurried instructions, as Tori was still trying to do.
And then I saw him up ahead, the silver whistle in his mouth. He dropped it and crouched down by the sign, his phone already out.
"Hurry, Mia!" Maybe he hadn’t been at the start, but now he was in it to win it.
"Over here!" I heard Jayden calling and could tell he had spotted Tori.
"I'm coming!" she cried.
"Hurry!" Diego said again.
And then I reached him, dropping to my knees and skidding the last few feet. I almost passed up the sign, but he caught me with one arm around my waist.
Just as he had when I fell out of the tree, he effortlessly lifted me, setting me down on his knee. We both leaned our heads toward the sign with our names on it, and he snapped the picture.
I grabbed his phone and uploaded it. And we waited, with me still balanced on his thigh.
We stared at his phone expectantly. Then his phone vibrated from an incoming text.
"Did we do it?" he asked, as I breathlessly swiped open the text.
And there it was, both our names, saying the scavenger hunt had been won.
"We did!" I shouted and threw my arms around his neck.
I caught him by surprise, and he tumbled backward. I landed on top of him, one hand on his chest, the other on the grass beside his bicep.
He laughed as he looked up at me, and I did too, grateful that I hadn't accidentally kneed him in the balls or something.
His whistle lay across his chest, and I grasped it, tugging lightly on the cord. “Good thinking.”
We stayed like that for a long moment, my hair hanging down, nearly touching his face. It reminded me when Aaron had hovered over me on my bed, after we’d flipped the mattress.
I needed to get up off of him, but for some reason, I didn’t move. “I keep falling on you.”
“Can’t really say that I mind catching you.” He stopped, his dark eyes and gleaming. “And I can’t help it if women fall hard for me.”
He smirked up at me, and I couldn’t stop staring at his lips. “That’s not the same thing,” I protested. Though not very strongly.
“I know, but—” That’s all he got out, because the next moment, we heard people run up, and Tori said, “Congratulations.”
