He picked me up at seven and seemed almost nervous, making awkward conversation and insisting on paying for dinner.

“Everything okay?” I asked. It’d been so easy to talk to him the night of Summer’s party only a week ago.

“Of course,” he said. “Why? Are you not having a good time?”

“No, that’s not it,” I said as I watched him from across the table of the sushi restaurant he’d picked. He wanted to impress me, I realized. The nervousness, the insistence on paying. It was endearing, how much he wanted me to like him. When I reached for his hand, he looked startled for a moment before he relaxed into a smile.

I looked right at him. “We don’t have to do this—the dinner and a movie thing. I don’t care what we do, I just want to spend time with you,” I said. The night was mine to give away and I wanted to give it to him.

For a moment, he looked caught off guard, then he smiled, eyes shy. “Okay.”

“Tell me something true,” I said softly.

Playing with my hand, intertwining our fingers together and letting go, he considered what to say. “I used to be a nationally ranked swimmer.”

“Really?” I asked, impressed.

Jack nodded. “I think I still hold the under-eighteen national record for the two-hundred-meter butterfly.”

“Wow,” I said. “I can’t believe I asked you if you could swim the night we met.”

He laughed. “It’s okay, you were just worried about my safety.”

“Of course.” I smiled. “So, are you captain of the Riverside swim team?”

“Um, I was. But I quit the team even before I took this year off.” Then he quickly changed the subject, turning the attention back onto me: “Tell me something true.”

I didn’t know what to say for a long time. My life was boring—nothing had happened to me yet. The misfit child in a family of overachievers, I was the definition of unremarkable. I wasn’t like Elise, charming and funny. Electric.

“I really want to meet Lola,” I said, which was both something true and something that deflected attention.

Jack’s smile lit up the entire restaurant. “Okay.” We skipped the movie and went to Jack’s house to pick her up. “I’m staying with my cousin Evan right now. It’s a long story,” he said. “Wait here.” He disappeared into the house and came out with Lola a couple minutes later.

“Whoa,” he said when she jumped on me.

“It’s okay.” I bent over to greet her, rubbing her head and neck, scratching behind her ears.

“She likes you,” Jack said. “And Lola is a good judge of character.” I laughed as she licked my arm.

Jack packed a thermos of coffee and we walked a mile to a dog park. With the sky almost dark, we had the whole place to ourselves. Jack held my hand and tossed an old tennis ball for Lola until she tired herself out. Eventually she settled down in the grass near where Jack and I sat sharing one of the old wooden benches.