“I don’tknowany.” He gritted his teeth, glancing around nervously like he was about to get caught doing something wrong.
“Then read a book,” I said.
“Please.” Brooks took a step closer, and I stared at him. He was really, truly anxious about something. “I need to get my grade up. Bad. And, I need to have better than a C average to get on the baseball team.”
“Please tell me you’re not failing Lit,” I replied.
He paled. “I’m not—Well, close. My grades back home weren’t great, and I was bringing them up until my parents decided to move in the middle of the school year. I’m barely at a C, and English is my worst subject. If I drop any lower, I’m screwed.”
“So don’t drop lower. Anne and Gilbert,” I suggested the romantic couple ofAnne of Green Gables.“Or, Katniss and Peeta.” Gosh, I lovedThe Hunger Games.“Bella Swan and Edward Cullen?” I could tell by the look on his face that none of these fictional couples were resonating with him. “Ok, what about Westley and Buttercup?” Everyone knewThe Princess Bride.
“I don’t know them.” He thought about it for a second, then shook his head. “Please, let’s just do us.”
“What?” I drew back in shock because he’d suggested such a thing, and also because he didn’t know who Westley and Buttercup were. Yesterday, I would have sworn it was me who had lost my mind. Now, I felt like I’d put my common sense back on just to see Brooks throw his away.
He was desperate. “I don’t have time to study a fictional couple. I need to practice. I have tryouts. I need to make the team, not study people who never existed.”
Brooks wasn’t wrong. I, of all girls, knew that baseball tryouts were coming up soon, and they were terribly important. Especially for a new guy like Brooks trying to make it on the team.
“Listen,” he tried again. “You created a fake boyfriend so you could just read and get people off your back about dating. I need a fake girlfriend so I can make up this entire project and focus on what’s important. Ifwe’refake, then we can put anything into the project, and it’ll be accurate, right? So, there’s hardly any work involved. Just dating each other for the rest of the school year and making stuff up. I can focus on baseball. You can focus on books. It’s a win-win.”
“It’s only extra credit. Just don’t do it,” I argued.
“But Ineedthe extra credit.” He argued back.
“So—” I could offer to do the whole project myself. I mean, really. I knew enough fictional couples that I could get both of us the extra credit without Brooks lifting a finger to help. But then—
Darn, if he didn’t have a look on his face that was so cute and needy, and everything inside of me wanted to rescue him. I hated myself as I nodded in agreement. “Okay. Okay, fine.” Dad was gonna kill me.
I melted as Brooks gave me the most brilliant smile I’d ever seen.
That.
Right there.
That was my problem.
And it was the minute I realized I was in deep trouble.
I didn’twantto break up with Brooks Mason.
This was not going to end well.
Chapter 10
Brooks
I panicked. I mean, guys have the right to do that now and then, and today, I cashed in. What can I say? I want to play baseball, not analyze the love life of Romeo and Juliet. But I hadn’t thought about her dad—or dinner—or her Aunt Elle.
The front door of the Walterses’ home jerked open when I arrived, and sure enough, there was Mr. Walters. I could read his face. He was just—scary, man, he was scary.
“Mr. Mason,” he greeted. Calling me that made me feel like I was about to be led into an interrogation room and have my teeth pulled one at a time.
“Hello, Mr. Walters,” I said.
He let me step inside. Normally, I’d say that was a good thing, but when he closed the door behind me, I considered screaming and running out of the house like a baby.
“So you’re dating my daughter?”
