Lessons in Love (Flirt) (11 page)

I just stared at him for a second. Susannah’s advice was way too fresh in my head, confusing me. What was happening here? Was he asking me out? Or was this a just-friends thing? Or a just-friends thing that could turn into a date? Or—

“S-Saturday?” I said. “Um, I’m not sure. I have kickball practice that afternoon.”

“Kickball?” He looked surprised.

I nodded. “There’s this big rivalry between the high school and the college, and I’m on the high school team, and—”

I jumped as the bell jingled and Megan hurried in. She spotted Logan right away and made a beeline for us.

“Logan!” she exclaimed. “What are you doing here?” She shot me a slightly suspicious look. “Bailey? Is my special order ready yet?”

“I’ll go check.” Without another glance at Logan, I turned and rushed back to the kitchen. Susannah was just packing the cupcake into a tiny cardboard box. “Megan’s here,” I said.

“Here you go.” Susannah handed me the box.

“Can you take it out to her?” I asked. “Logan just came in.”

Susannah’s eyes lit up. “Really? Cool, I want to check this guy out. I didn’t pay much attention to him yesterday.”

“Wait.” I grabbed the box out of her hand. “Never mind, I’ll do it.” The last thing I needed was for Susannah to start talking me up to Logan in front of Megan.

She winked. “Suit yourself.”

I took a deep breath before I headed back out there. As I pushed through the swinging doors, I pasted a pleasant smile on my face. It wavered a little when I saw that Megan had her hand on Logan’s arm, and he was smiling at her. But I fought back the urge to turn around and run away.

“Here you go,” I told Megan, setting the cupcake box on the counter. “That’ll be, uh . . .” I stared at the cash register, suddenly unable to remember how much a single cupcake cost. Curse Methuselah and his old-fashioned ways, which required me to punch in actual numbers! Next chance I got, I was going to petition my family to put in a modern register, like the ones in the fast-food places where all you had to do was hit a key with a picture of a cupcake on it.

As I stared helplessly at the register’s keys, Uncle Rick wandered closer. “Forget that, Bailey. It’s on the house.” He winked at Megan. “Friends-and-family discount.”

“Thanks!” Megan beamed at Uncle Rick, then picked up the box and turned to Logan. “Ready to go?”

“Um, sure, I guess.” Logan turned to me. “See you in bio tomorrow, Bailey?”

“Right. See you,” I said, careful to keep that pleasant smile on my face until they were both out the door.

Chapter
Ten

W
hen I emerged from the
house on Tuesday morning, Simone was already at the bus stop. She leaned against the stop sign at the end of our block, her head bent over her phone as her thumbs flew over its tiny keyboard. She glanced up when I approached.

“You need to get together with Logan already, because Ling and Megan are driving me cray-cray,” she announced.

“Forget it. Not happening.” I dropped my backpack at my feet and stifled a yawn. I hadn’t slept well the night before—I’d kept waking up with vague memories of bizarre dreams. It was probably the full moon. I’d read an interesting abstract recently about a study in Europe showing some preliminary links between moon cycles and sleep patterns.

“No, seriously. Ling called me last night freaking out because Megan bought Logan a cupcake or something—”

“A custom welcome-to-town cupcake.” It wasn’t easy to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

“Whatever. Anyway, Megan just texted me.” She waved her phone for emphasis. “Now
she’s
freaking out because Ling keeps hinting around about some big plans she supposedly has with Logan this weekend.”

“Plans?” My mind immediately jumped to his animal-shelter invitation. “What plans?”

“How should I know?” Simone let out a loud snort. “If you ask me, Ling’s probably just trying to make Megan jealous.”

I wasn’t so sure. Why had I acted like such a weirdo the day before when Logan had mentioned hitting up the animal shelter? It wasn’t as if he’d asked me out on some romantic date. It could have been the perfect way to follow Susannah’s advice. Not to mention fun. And now Ling was probably going to have that fun instead of me. Not fair.

“Did you finish the social-studies homework?” I asked, hoping to change the subject. “The last two questions were kind of tricky.”

“Yeah, I did it.” Simone waved a hand to brush away the new topic. “But listen—you really need to jump in and save Logan from those two before it’s too late.”

“Give it up, Simone. No means no.”

She sighed. “I just don’t get you, Bailey. For the first time in, like, ever, you actually like a guy. And you’re too stubborn to admit it!”

“It’s not about admitting it. It’s about living in the real world, not some fantasy romance novel or something.” I heard the clank and wheeze of the bus coming around the corner. “Now can we please stop talking about this? If I wanted to spill my guts about this particular topic, I’d post it on Facebook.”

“Whatever.” Simone frowned at me, then turned away to watch the bus approach. “I guess there’s not much else to say about it anyway.”

Zoe and Taylor were at our usual meeting spot when Simone and I arrived at school. Zoe was trying to keep her geometry book spinning on one finger, while Taylor was leaning against the wall picking at her cuticles.

“Where are the others?” Simone asked.

Zoe stopped the book and started spinning it the other direction. “Ling dragged Logan off as soon as he turned up. Claimed she was dying to show him the view from the second-floor landing.”

“Yeah.” Taylor giggled. “When Megan got here and heard that, she stomped off to find them. She’s probably trying to push Ling out the window as we speak.”

“Oh, man.” Simone shook her head and shot me a dark look.

I pretended I didn’t notice. The last thing I wanted to do was set her off on another rant about me and Logan, especially in front of Taylor and Zoe.

Luckily, Matt and Darius arrived just then. That distracted Simone just long enough for me to mutter an excuse about needing something from my locker and rush off to hide until homeroom.

There was no art class on Tuesdays or Thursdays, so I didn’t see Logan until biology. When I walked into class, he was chatting with a couple of guys, but when he saw me sit down, he hurried over and slid into his own seat.

“Hey,” he said. “Sorry I had to take off so fast yesterday. Megan . . .” Seeming at a loss for words, he just shrugged.

“No problem, I don’t have much time to chat at work anyway.” I avoided meeting his gaze, instead focusing on unpacking my books.

“Aw, come on, really?” His tone was light and teasing. “I bet the owners might let you take a break sometimes if you ask them nicely.”

Why did he have to do that? Why did he have to talk to me in that maybe-we’re-friends, maybe-we’re-flirting kind of way? I wasn’t used to that sort of thing. It confused me, made me start to think (again) that maybe Simone was right about all this.

But I knew she wasn’t. Seeing Logan with Megan yesterday had driven that home. I’d been right to think Logan and I were better off being friends.

And it was just as well, really. Much less pressure that way. No need to adjust my life plans. All I had to do was focus on being friends with Logan—
just
friends—and ignore all that silly spark stuff until it went away.

Starting now.

I forced a smile. “Megan’s great, isn’t she?” I said. “She and I are really good friends.”

“Uh, sure, she’s nice. She thinks you’re great too.”

“Yeah. She’s not just a pretty face, either.” I put as much enthusiasm as I could into my words. “She’s got a beautiful singing voice, and a great sense of humor.”

Logan didn’t say anything. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him staring at me with a perplexed look on his face.

Just then Megan herself hurried in, followed a second later by Mr. Ba. The class quieted down immediately, all eyes focused on the stack of papers the teacher was holding.

“Oh, man!” Andy Menendez called out from the seat in front of Logan. “Don’t tell me we’re getting those tests back already? I was hoping to live a little longer before my parents kill me.”

Mr. Ba smiled. “No such respite for you, Mr. Menendez. My phylogenetics seminar was postponed, so I found myself with some extra time for grading last night.” He waved the papers. “Most of you did fine. Some of you did not. I won’t keep you in suspense.”

He started passing out the papers. After he dropped Andy’s test on his desk, the teacher paused and glanced at Logan. “Mr. Morse,” he said. “I nearly forgot about you. Can I trust you not to take a peek at your neighbors’ papers? I don’t want to have to make up an entirely new test for you next week.”

“Scout’s honor.” Logan raised his right hand in a loose salute. “I’m not a cheater.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” Mr. Ba winked at him as he stepped past his desk to mine. Shuffling through the papers in his hand, he pulled one out and dropped it in front of me. “Nice work, Bailey.”

“Thanks.” I beamed at the bright red A at the top of my paper, everything else momentarily forgotten.

I was still riding high on that A as I walked to lunch with my friends, though I was trying not to celebrate too obviously. Not that they’d flunked or anything, thank goodness. Simone had scored a B, which seemed to make her happy enough, and Taylor had been relieved to squeak by with a C-minus. I wasn’t sure what grade Megan had gotten yet, but since she’d stayed behind to discuss it with Mr. Ba instead of walking to lunch with us, I figured it couldn’t have been too good.

“Glad it’s finally lunchtime,” Logan commented as we walked. “I’m starved.”

Oh. Did I mention that Logan was one of the friends I was walking to lunch with? Somehow he’d just fallen into step with us, even waiting while Taylor stopped to grab her lunch out of her locker.

“Don’t you need to hit your locker, Bailey?” Logan asked as we turned toward the cafeteria.

“I didn’t have time to pack anything this morning,” I replied. “Guess I’m stuck with cafeteria slop today.”

“Really?” He smiled. “I pictured you bringing delicious gourmet sandwiches from your family’s place every day.”

“I know, right?” Simone linked her arm through mine. “I’ve been trying to convince her parents to start catering at school so we don’t keep getting poisoned by the mystery meat.”

Logan laughed. “Whoa, makes me wish I’d slapped together a PB and J myself this morning.”

“The food’s not that bad,” I assured him. “The ambulance only has to come a couple of times a month.”

That made everyone laugh. I grinned, still feeling a little giddy thanks to that A. “After you,” Logan said as we reached the cafeteria, standing back to let me go through the door first.

“What a gentleman,” Taylor said, sweeping past him as well. She shook her lunch bag. “See you guys at the table.”

It was too noisy to do much talking in the lunch line. When the three of us emerged holding our trays, Simone glanced at Logan. “You’re eating with us, right?” she said, her tone indicating it was a rhetorical question.

“Guys! Wait up!”

I turned and saw Ling hurrying toward us. She didn’t have a tray, just an apple and a carton of chocolate milk—her favorite. The girl was obsessed with chocolate to the point she claimed she’d go into a coma if she didn’t have some every day. (Not medically plausible, by the way.) Whenever she came to Eats, it was practically guaranteed that my dad would have to order more baking chocolate and cocoa powder from our supplier.