In that moment, I know Afton’s right. Shit. Nick likes me. As in, he’s interested in me, romantically speaking. I can tell by the way his walk changes, shoulders straightening, more self-conscious, like he’s deliberately trying to be smooth. He brushes his hair to one side and tucks it behind his ear. He smiles. Shit shit. He thinks I’m interested in him, too. I’d assumed he was simply being friendly. I wasn’t paying attention. But now I see, in that flash of insight you have sometimes, that all this time he’s been flirting with me, in his nerd way. Because he likes me.

“Aw, he’s cute,” says Afton archly. “Like a little puppy.”

I turn to her. “If you could refrain from speaking to me for the rest of the day, that’d be swell, thanks.”

Her eyes narrow. “Fine.”

“Fine,” I agree. Another F-word.

She stalks off. Probably to go find poor unsuspecting Michael.

Nick is almost upon me. Ten more steps, and he’ll be here, wagging his tail.

But instead of greeting him, instead of being nice the way he is nice, I decide I have enough to deal with. I don’t even really know Nick, and I’ve had enough drama with boys this week, thanks.

I don’t need a puppy.

So I turn my back on him. And I walk the other way.

Chapter 19

19

The first major crush I ever had, a couple years before Leo came along in the art gallery that fateful day last year, was literally the boy next door. His name was Darius, some wise Bible name, which suited him because Darius was quiet. Like me, I thought. I’d see him bringing in groceries with his mother, her monologuing, him following behind her silently, back and forth to the car. I’d see him mowing the lawn. Putting up Christmas lights. Taking out the trash. I’d watch him walking to the bus stop (to a different school than mine, since mine was all girls), and while the other boys would be laughing and teasing each other and trying to act cool, Darius would just be cool by default. When he did speak, the other kids listened. I liked the sound of his voice, too, the low, gentle timbre of it, although I never caught what he said. I was never close enough to hear.

I started drawing him. His face. Ears. Hands. The way a long-sleeved tee draped across his shoulders. The shoes he wore. I’d always made quick sketches of people, but I did so many of Darius that year that Pop finally noticed. “Is that the boy next door?” he asked one morning at the breakfast table, leaning over my sketchbook, and I blushed so hard I could have passed out, and Pop said, “Oh. So that’s how it is.”

That’s so how it was.