Page 16 of Betting on You

Nooooooooooo.

My heart started racing and I wanted to disappear.

He scrambled off the Jumpoline, crossed the crater canyon, and bounced toward us. I managed to mumble something polite like, “Yes, um, it’s me. How are you?”

“Fine.” He did a little chin nod, his eyes on mine as if trying to see my thoughts. “You?”

I nodded and wondered if that smell—something clean and masculine—was coming from him. “Fine.”

Could this be any more awkward?

“I’m going to test out Universal Bounce.” Nekesa pointed to the purple section, the adult trampolines with a big bounce-up bar in the center. “I’ll be right back.”

And she just turned and bounced in the other direction, giving me absolutely no chance to stop her. I clenched my jaw and steeled myself for the impending barrage of the guy’s inflammatory rhetoric. I attempted diversion by starting with, “So you’re working here too, huh?”

His eyebrows scrunched together, like he was disappointed in me for stating the obvious, as he said, “Yep.”

Nowhe gave me a one-word answer? I would’ve killed for that on the flight from Alaska. I tried again as I realized I had no idea what his name was. “I’m Bailey, by the way.”

Can that be right?It seemed beyond strange that we hadn’t exchanged names before, but I couldn’t come up with a single, solitary guess of what his was. “Mr. Nothing” justfithim, but maybe that’s because it’s how I’d always referred to him.

Well, in my head. I’d never actually referred to him out loud at all.

“Charlie.”

Charlie.

Somehow it suited him.

I tried again for small talk because I just couldn’t handle the awkwardness. “So how’s the girlfriend? Are you still with prom girl?”

I saw his Adam’s apple bob around a big swallow, and his gazeshifted just past my shoulder, like something behind us was in need of his eyes. For a second I thought he wasn’t going to respond, but then he said, “No, we broke up.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.” I slowed my bounce and looked at his face, and for some reason it mattered that the sadness was still there. I couldfeelthe ache in his eyes; his melancholy was familiar, a friend we had in common. “I am really, really sorry, Charlie.”

His eyes came back to me as he shrugged and slowed as well. “What’re you gonna do, right? It had to end sometime. What about you? Are you still with Mr. Skintight Shirt?”

I pictured Zack’s hand on Kelsie’s lower back as she ordered coffee that morning, and my stomach got tight. I still couldn’t believe he shared grins and the sound of milk steaming withhernow. I was fine with him moving on, but why did our moments have to move with him? I sighed before sliding into aWho caresgrin and saying, “Nope—we broke up too.”

“Must be something going around, huh?” he said, and I could tell by the rigid set of his jaw that he wasoverthis mindless small talk that pressed on his wound.

“I guess,” I murmured, unsure of what else to say.

“You two aren’t jumping!” The DJ sounded like he was eating the microphone as he called out Charlie and me.

I rolled my eyes and Charlie kind of smirked, but we both started jumping again. He put his hands into the pockets of his flight suit and said, “And the parents? How’s the divorce thing going on your end?”

“My mother is seeing someone now, so that’s fun,” I said, unsurewhy I was actually answering his question. He was obnoxious Mr. Nothing, a stranger I didn’t know or particularly care for, yet I kept going. “And my dad seems to be losing his verve for buying expensive plane tickets, so God only knows when I’m going to visit him again.”

“Their dating is the worst, isn’t it?” He gave me another one of those looks that spoke volumes, like the one he’d given me for a split second on the plane three years ago, and he said, “My mom has a boyfriend who pretty much lives with us right now, and I can’t tell you how much I love it when he eats my Pop-Tarts. Like, just the sight of him at the table in the morning puts me in a murderous rage.”

I laughed at that, a genuine, feels-good-to-the-core laugh, because I felt seen. Someone, even if it was just Charlie from the plane, knew exactly how I felt. “For me it’s soda. He drinks gallons of regular Coke, but then I can’t—”

“You can’t make your halfsies,” he interrupted, his mouth turning up in a small smile.

A startled laugh escaped me. I was shocked that he would immediately remember the soda and get it. “Bingo.”

Also—wow—was that agenuinesmile?

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