He didn’t hear me as he shimmied his shoulders and stepped up onto the ladder.

What the hell was he doing here?

“He has earbuds in,” someone said.

I jumped. Someone was sitting on the couch, his face hidden behind a magazine.

I screamed.

And then Uncle Rob screamed and dropped the drill. He cursed as he pulled his earbuds out of his ears. “Shit, Scarlett. You scared me.” He laughed and picked up the power drill and screw. And then he proceeded to climb up the ladder and start drilling again.

Mr. Tanner lowered the magazine he’d been paging through. He looked at the wet clothes tucked under my arm. “Rough night?” he asked.

I stared at my parents’ friend in horror. Wait, my parents! I looked around, waiting for my parents to pop out of nowhere and yell at me. But unless they were hiding behind that couch... Wait. This room had been empty. Where had that couch come from?

“There,” Uncle Rob said and blew on the end of the power drill. He hopped off the ladder. “We still need a few more items. And maybe a fresh coat of paint. But it’s a work in progress. Why is your hair all wet?”

I opened my mouth and closed it again. “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

Mr. Tanner started whistling and looking through his magazine again.

“I asked Tanner for help,” Uncle Rob said. “He’s not very handy though.”

“I’m handy when no one is looking,” Mr. Tanner said as he kept flipping through the magazine.

What the heck did that mean?

“I know your Uncle Matt knows how to do all this stuff,” Uncle Rob said. “But I thought he might freak out about this. Since he has a son your age and all that.”

“Speaking of which,” said Mr. Tanner. “Is that Jacob’s jacket? Are the two of you dating?”

I held the jacket a little tighter. “I don’t really know. We’re going to homecoming together.”

Mr. Tanner looked very excited about that news.

Uncle Rob smiled. “You’re dating then.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Kid, he gave you his jacket and asked you to homecoming. Yes. You’re dating.”

I smiled. But then my smile immediately fell when Uncle Rob tossed his power drill into a toolkit. “I still don’t understand what’s happening.”

“You couldn’t have picked a better lad than my grandson,” Mr. Tanner said. “I knew this was going to happen. I predicted it when you were just kids.”

Had he? I smiled. Mr. Tanner wasn’t Jacob’s actual grandfather. But when Jacob had moved to New York City when he was little, he’d called Mr. Tanner Abuelo and it kind of just stuck. The two of them knew each other well. Mr. Tanner must have known about Jacob’s crush on me this whole time.