I know you were sad when she moved, but I was so relieved. It was way too awkward having to interact with her on a regular basis after that.

I also know it was cruel of me to force you to be her friend just so she would come stay the night at our house. I thought I learned my lesson and I never asked you to do it again.

Well, I didn’t learn my lesson. Today I’ve been wishing you were still here, purely for selfish reasons, because I would give anything for you to be friends with Sky. After running with her this morning, I can see clearly that she’s irritating and irrational and stubborn and gorgeous as hell and I want so bad to stop thinking about her, but I can’t. If you were here, I could ask you to be her friend so she would have a reason to come over to our house, even though we’re eighteen now and not fourteen. But I want an excuse to talk to her again. I want to give her one more chance to hear me out, but I don’t know how to go about doing that. I don’t want to do it at school and we aren’t running together anymore. Short of walking up to her house and knocking on her front door, I can’t figure out a way to get her to talk to me.

Wait. That’s actually not a bad idea.

Thanks, Les.

Chapter Thirteen

“We going out tonight?” I ask Daniel as we make our way toward the parking lot. We usually do something on Friday nights, but tonight I’m actually hoping he says no. I decided a few days ago that I wanted to go to Sky’s house tonight to try to talk to her. I don’t know if it’s a good idea, but I know if I don’t at least try, I’ll drive myself crazy wondering if it would have made a difference.

“Can’t,” Daniel says. “I’m taking Val out. We could do something tomorrow night, though. I’ll call you.”

I nod and he turns to head toward his car. I open my door, but pause when I see Sky’s car out of the corner of my eye. She’s leaning against it, talking to Grayson.

From the looks of it, they might be doing more than just talking.

I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that seeing his hands on her makes every muscle in my body clench tight. I prop my arm on my door and watch them for some stupid, self-torturous reason.

From here, she doesn’t look happy. She pushes him away from her and takes a step away from him. She’s watching him while he talks, then he moves in and wraps his arms around her again. I take a step away from my car, prepared to walk across the parking lot and pull his ignorant ass off her. She clearly doesn’t want him touching her, but I stop and take a step back when it looks like she relents and gives in to him. As soon as he leans in to kiss her, I have to look away.

It’s physically impossible to watch. I don’t understand her. I don’t understand what she sees in him and I really don’t understand why she can’t seem to stand me, when he’s the actual asshole.

Maybe I’m wrong about her. Maybe she really is just like everyone else. Maybe I’ve just been hoping she was different for my own sake.

Or maybe not.

I’m looking at them again, seeing her reaction to what he’s doing to her. His arms are still around her and it looks like he’s still kissing her neck or shoulder or wherever the fuck his mouth is. But I could have sworn she just rolled her eyes.

Now she’s looking at her watch, not responding to him at all. She drops her arm and rests her hands at her sides and she’s just standing there, looking more inconvenienced by him than interested.

I continue to watch them and continue to grow more and more confused by her lack of interest. Her expression is almost lifeless, until the second she locks eyes with mine. Her whole body tenses and her eyes grow wide. She immediately looks away and pushes Grayson off her. She turns her back to him and gets into her car. I’m too far away to hear what she says to him, but the fact that she’s driving away and he’s flipping her off with both hands tells me that whatever she said to him wasn’t at all what he wanted to hear.

I smile.

I’m still confused, I’m still angry, I’m still intrigued and I’m still planning on showing up on her doorstep tonight. Especially after witnessing whatever that was I just witnessed.

I ring the doorbell and wait.

I’m a ball of nerves right now, but only because I don’t have a clue how she’ll react to seeing me on her doorstep. I also don’t know what the hell I’m going to say to her once she does finally open the door.

I ring the doorbell again after waiting several moments. I’m sure I’m the last person she’ll expect to see here on a Friday night.

Shit. It’s Friday night. She’s probably not even home.

I hear footsteps making their way toward the door and it opens. She’s standing in front of me a frazzled mess. Her hair is loosely pulled back, but strands have fallen all around her face. She’s got white powder dusted across her nose and cheek and even has some in the loose strands of hair framing her face. She looks adorable. And shocked.

Several seconds pass with us just standing there and I realize that I should probably be the one speaking right now, since I’m the one who showed up at her house.

God, why does every single thing about her throw me off like this?

“Hey,” she says.

Her calm voice is like a breath of fresh air. She doesn’t seem pissed that I’m here unannounced. “Hi,” I say, returning her greeting.

Another round of awkward silence ensues and she tilts her head to the side. “Um . . .” She squints and crinkles up her nose and I can tell she’s not sure what to do or say next.

“You busy?” I ask her, knowing just by the disarray of her appearance that whatever she was doing, she was working hard at it.

She turns and glances back into her house, then faces me again. “Sort of.”

Sort of.

I take her reply for what it is. She’s obviously trying not to be rude, but I can see that this stupid idea of mine to just show up announced was just that . . . a stupid idea.

I glance at my car behind me, gauging how far the walk of shame I’m about to take will be. “Yeah,” I say, pointing over my shoulder at my car. “I guess I’ll . . . go.” I take a step down and begin to turn toward my car, wishing I was anywhere but in this awkward predicament.

“No,” she says quickly. She takes a step back and opens the door for me. “You can come in, but you might be put to work.”

Instant relief overcomes me and I nod, walking inside. A quick glance around the living room makes it appear that she might be the only one home right now. I hope she is, because it would make things a lot easier if it were just the two of us.

She walks around me and into the kitchen. She picks up a measuring cup and resumes whatever it was she was doing before I showed up on her doorstep. Her back is to me and she’s quiet. I slowly make my way into the kitchen and eye the baked goods lining her bar.

“You prepping for a bake sale?” I ask, making my way around the bar so that her back isn’t completely to me.

“My mom’s out of town for the weekend,” she says, glancing up at me. “She’s antisugar, so I kind of go crazy when she’s not here.”

Her mom’s out of town, so she bakes? I really can’t figure this girl out. I reach over to the plate of cookies between us on the bar and pick one up, looking to her for permission to try it.

“Help yourself,” she says. “But be warned, just because I like to bake doesn’t mean I’m good at it.” She refocuses her attention to the bowl in front of her.

“So you get the house to yourself and you spend Friday night baking? Typical teenager,” I tease. I take a bite of the cookie and ohmygod. She can bake. I like her even more.

“What can I say?” she says with a shrug. “I’m a rebel.”

I smile, then eye the plate of cookies again. There have to be a dozen there and I plan on eating at least half of them before she kicks me out of her house. I’m gonna need milk.

She’s still intensely focused on the bowl in front of her, so I take it upon myself to find my own glass. “Got any milk?” I ask, making my way to the refrigerator. She doesn’t answer my question, so I open the refrigerator and remove the milk, then pour myself a glass. I finish the rest of the cookie, then take a drink. I wince, because whatever the hell this is, it’s not real milk. Or it’s rotten. I glance at the label before shutting the refrigerator and see that it’s almond milk. I don’t want to be rude, so I take another drink and turn around.

She’s looking straight at me with an arched eyebrow. I smile. “You shouldn’t offer cookies without milk, you know. You’re a pretty pathetic hostess.” I swipe another cookie and take a seat at the bar.

She grins right before she turns around to face the counter again. “I try to save my hospitality for invited guests.”

I laugh. “Ouch.”

The sarcasm in her voice is nice, though, because it helps ease my tension. She powers on the mixer and keeps her focus on the bowl in front of her. I love that she hasn’t asked why I’m here. I know she’s wondering what I’m doing here, but I also know from previous interaction with her that she’s incredibly stubborn and more than likely won’t ask what I’m doing here, no matter how much she wants to know.

She turns off the mixer and pulls the mixing blades loose, then brings one to her mouth and licks it.

Holy shit.

I gulp.

“Want one?” she says, holding one up for me to take. “It’s German chocolate.”

“How hospitable of you.”

“Shut up and lick it or I’m keeping it for myself,” she says teasingly. She smiles and walks to the cabinet, then fills a glass with water. “You want some water or do you want to continue pretending you can stomach that vegan shit?”

I laugh, then immediately push my cup toward her. “I was trying to be nice, but I can’t take another sip of whatever the hell this is. Yes, water. Please.”

She laughs and fills my cup with water, then takes a seat across from me. She picks up a brownie and takes a bite, holding eye contact with me. She doesn’t speak but I know she’s curious why I’m here. The fact that she still hasn’t asked, though, makes me admire her stubbornness.

I know I should offer up my reason for showing up out of the blue, but I’m a little stubborn myself and feel like dragging this thing out with her a little longer. I’m kind of enjoying it.

We silently watch each other until she’s almost finished with her brownie. The way she’s semismiling at me while she eats is making my pulse race and if I don’t look away from her, I’m afraid I’ll blurt out everything I want to say to her all at once.

In order to avoid that, I stand up and walk into the living room to take a look around. I can’t watch her eat for another second and I need to refocus my attention on why I’m here, because I’m even starting to forget.

There are several pictures hanging on her walls, so I walk closer to them to take a look. There aren’t any pictures of her that are more than a few years old, but the ones where she’s younger than she is now are jarring to look at. She really does look just like Hope.