“Jordan just offered his hands as a sacrifice to the centerpieces.” Ji sucks air between her teeth and shakes her hand before wiping hot glue from her finger. “That one’s going to blister,” she says with her finger in her mouth.
“On second thought.” I put down the Styrofoam ball and pretend to leave the table.
But Ji grabs the back of my T-shirt and yanks me back to my seat. “Sit. Stay.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I grab a fake flower and clip the tiny rosebud from its stem before gluing it onto my sphere.
Paige clears a spot next to me and starts snipping the rosebuds for us to glue to the Styrofoam. “That was really nice of Mrs. Delgado to invite all of us to the Gala.”
Ji shrugs. “Well, it’s a community event to raise funds for the all-abilities playground in Pine Lakes, and she’d love to seethe ‘young people’ play a more active role in the community—her words, not mine. But she also has high expectations for the dance floor as it’s the centerpiece of the room, and she knows we’re more prone to ‘groove and move.’ Again, her words.”
“Ah, well, I’ll bring my groove then,” I say.
“Not too much groove.” Ji eyes me.
“You’re the only person I know who can get kicked out of senior Homecoming for being… how did the principal describe it?” Ji purses her lips in thought. “‘Too enthusiastic’ during the Cha-Cha Slide.”
“Hey, Principal Henderson was not knocking my moves when I became the school mascot junior year after the original mascot broke his leg. She gave me a standing ovation when I tried out. She loves me.”
“She loved that you made her pep rallies bearable again.” Paige snorts and slaps her leg. “Get it? Morebearable? Our mascot was the grizzly bear.”
Ji shakes her head.
“You’re such a nerd.” I chuckle and tap Paige’s foot beneath the table with my own. Paige tries to kick me back, but I dodge her just in time. I give her a victorious smile, but her face scrunches with this look of adorable determination.
Before she can retaliate, I clamp her lower leg between both of mine so her foot is locked in place. Paige thins her lips to stop the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth and plucks a flower stem from the table as if nothing out of the ordinary is happening, but all the while, below the surface, she yanks and wriggles her foot like a worm that's about to be fish bait.
She does this without success until she brings in her other leg for reinforcement. All-out war erupts beneath the table, and neither of us will relent.
I try my best to glue a flower and am pretty confident I’ll go down as the first man in history to win a foot battle whilecrafting, but then Paige’s legs go slack. She holds a rosebud in front of her, paying it extra attention before she cuts it from the stem.
Her sudden stillness makes me hyper-fixate on the leg sandwiched between mine. I take several measured breaths to slow my spiking heart rate. We may be playing a harmless game, but the feel of her smooth, slender calves against mine doesn’t seem harmless. Paige must sense my complete and total distraction because she slips her foot from my hold, and just like that, the game is over.
I can feel more than see the smirk on her face. But I can’t bring myself to look at her.
“Paige?” Ian peeks into the kitchen.
“Oh hey.” Paige smiles back at Ian. “You ready to play that Spanish song for me?”
Ian stands a little taller. His eyes are solely for Paige, and I can’t blame him. If she was mine, I don’t know if I would ever look away.
Paige snips one last flower then leans over to me and whispers, “Loser,” before giving me a dimpled smile and hopping to her feet, following Ian into the living room. She sends me one last look of triumph before disappearing.
I know she’s teasing me about the game, but watching her walk away with Ian, I know that’s exactly what I am. I am losing. Losing the best friendship I’ve ever had. Losing the girl I love.
Losing Paige.
I turn to Paige’s empty spot to collect the flowers she snipped and try to forget that Ian is singing sweet nothings to Paige in the other room.
Ji stays unusually quiet, and when I look up, she’s eyeing me skeptically.
“Can you pass me another glue stick?” I ask, uncomfortable under her stare.
Ji raises an eyebrow. “Are you going to foot wrestle me for it, too?”
So maybe Paige and I weren’t as covert as I thought. I chuckle nervously. But it’s not the fact that Ji saw what we were doing that makes me nervous but rather how Ji is now looking at me like I’m the x component of a math equation.
“I make it a rule not to foot-wrestle a woman in heels,” I tell her. “I’d rather keep my metatarsals in place.”
