Page 41 of Where the Little Birds Go (Little Bird Duet 1)

“Right?” My voice is tiny.

He swipes a palm across his face. “My bet is that he asked because he wants you there cheering him on. He never asks me if I’m going.”

“Yeah, but you…” Never go.

He nods slowly. “Exactly. He’s willing to get you to go because he wants to impress you. I don’t get hounded because he doesn’t want to get in my pants.”

My lips part. “Wow. Crude, much?”

“It’s true.”

“He doesn’t like me.”

“He does, Little Bird.”

We start walking again, and I soak up the information that he’s dealing me. I mean, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if Zach had a crush on me. Just … foreign. Despite the embarrassment of acknowledging that I have zero experience with guys, I don’t want to think I’m totally clueless.

But the more I think, the more I realize that’s exactly what I am. Zach never goes to the library because it’s the last place he’s interested in. There are two different computer labs he could have used to play computer games in, yet he came to the smallest lab the library has set up for typing classes after school.

“Huh,” I mutter, earning me a look from the corner of Corbin’s eye.

We remain silent the rest of the day.

My eyes go to the script in front of me.

“You’re kidding, right?”

He grumbles as I make myself comfortable on the edge of his bed. Fred is purring beside me, nuzzled up with one of Corbin’s hoodie drawstrings next to him. I scratch his head and coo at him while Corbin settles in his computer chair across from me.

“This is for a dating app.” I giggle, flipping through the few pages in front of me. “I don’t get why you’re even auditioning.”

His sigh is heavy. “Daniel told me it’d be a good idea to keep my options open at first. If the other audition doesn’t work out…”

“Hey, I get it.” I give him a reassuring smile and hold up the script. “It just seems weird that you’d want to do this kind of thing. Can’t he find other auditions for movies or something?”

“He said he would when I’m eighteen.”

“That sounds promising.”

“It’s also forever away.”

I deadpan. “You’ll be eighteen in July. That’s not even seven months from now. Plus, you mentioned anything helps with your portfolio, right?”

He just shrugs.

“If you get this part, everyone will want to use this dating app,” I inform him confidently.

It’s really no wonder his coach thinks he’d be perfect for it. He’s young, but doesn’t look like a teenager, and he’s attractive. Hot, even, not that I’d tell him.

One of his brows goes up. “Yeah?”

I pet Fred some more. “Don’t act like you don’t know you’re attractive. It’s the eyes.”

The two silver orbs light up.

I shake my head and lift the script. “You ready to go through this?” My eyes catch on the movie script next to him on the desk. “What if you end up getting both? Could you do the commercial too? You know, get the credit for it or whatever?”

He toys with the paper on his lap. “It’d depend on what the contract says. Some people don’t like you working on more than one project at a time.”

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