“I also want you to help me with my speech. I can contain multitudes. A plethora of motives.”
“Aplethora,huh?” Jesse plucks the pen from my grip and flips it between his fingers. “Cuddling with your thesaurus again?”
My entire search history contains the phrase “synonym for—,” but I scowl at Jesse anyway. “Are you calling me dumb?”
“No.” He tucks the pen back into my hairband, and I momentarily freeze as his jacket brushes my arm, the heat of his body radiating across the diminishing space between us. “I’m calling you a maniac.”
“The auditions are in a little over a week. I haven’t even started practicing my delivery yet,” I despair.
Jesse fixes himself into the path I’ve been pacing, leaving me no choice but to look up from the draft of my speech. His brows appear an inch away from disappearing into his hairline. “Sorry, did I hallucinate the conversation where you said that you were attacked less than twenty-four hours ago?”
“It wasn’t technically an attack.” The worst damage was to my sleep, which eluded me all night. Oh, and the utter destruction of my favorite pair of shoes, thanks to the mud in the duck pond.
Two new pages had appeared in my mother’s journal, but they were useless. Just more random times and dates. At least it had confirmed Jesse’s theory about the shadows somehow being connected to the journal. “Besides, I can’t ask the graduation committee to give me an extension onaccount of my curse. Life goes on. I’m not losing any more of my senior year to this.”
“Right, right. Can’t lose your senior year, but you’re just fine with losing your life.”
I turn to leave. I’ve had my dose of browbeating for the next century thanks to Alex and the others. Jesse can mock me all he wants—I’m just not sticking around to catch the live act.
“Wait!” Jesse cuts in front of me, sending stones skidding into my ankles. “I’m not saying you shouldn’t go on with your life. Just prioritize. This thing … Mansour, do you understand how much power it takes to do what it did at the drive-in theater? And this is the warm-up. If you don’t focus, you’re gonna have to read your speech from six feet under.”
A few days ago, a line like that would’ve had me in tears. Now, I glare at Jesse, lips pursed.
“Alright.” I tuck my paper and pen beneath one of the tracks. “Teach me to defend myself.”
Jesse shrugs off his jacket and tosses it carelessly to the side. A long-sleeve thermal covers his arms, catching on the waistband of his jeans. “Put your dukes up, Sour Patch.”
We circle each other. The wind ruffles Jesse’s hair.
Compelled to break the rising tension, I ask, “Do you usually fight girls at creepy abandoned train tracks?”
“Nah, I’m a creepy warehouse sort of guy.” Jesse crooks his fingers. “Swing at me.”
I jab halfheartedly in his direction. He knocks my arm away with a flick. “Mansour.”
“I’m trying.” I jab again. The opportunity to pry into Jesse’s life is much more compelling than hitting him. For now, anyway. “Seriously, though, Jesse. Where do you go to have fun? I’ve never seen youhanging out anywhere. Not at the drive-in or Don’s Donuts or any of the festivals.”
Jesse moves in a swift strike, wrapping an arm around my waist and cutting my feet out from under me. I shriek as I careen backward, grabbing handfuls of his thermal. His arm tightens, keeping my back from hitting the rocks. “Definitely not Don’s Donuts,” he says, his face heart-stoppingly close to mine. My breath stutters. Every thought in my head temporarily offloads to make room for just one.
He’s so ridiculously pretty.
I smack at his chest until he straightens, setting me back on my feet.
“It’s not going to work,” I huff, dusting off my blouse. I’m wearing black leggings under white shorts and a pink peplum blouse. An outfit more fitting for a trip to the mall than a haunted train track.
“What?”
“You’re trying to piss me off so I won’t ask questions. It’s your pattern.”
Jesse blinks, nonplussed. I punch his shoulder. “Point.”
“Point,” he concedes. He lifts a brow, an action of his I’ve come to associate with the need to proceed with extreme caution. All of Jesse’s limited range of emotion is contained in that arched brow. “Paying attention to my patterns, are you?”
“You might be out of practice, but there’s this social phenomenon where you notice things about people you spend time around.” I extract a strand of hair from my mouth, keeping a close eye on Jesse’s hips. It might bruise his ego to hear it, but sparring isn’t much different than dancing. The body always has a tell, and Jesse’s lies in his sharp, narrow hips.
“Oh yeah?” Rocks crunch under Jesse’s boots. The energy between us shifts, so subtly it takes me a full minute to notice. “Or are you collecting gossip on the school freak to carry back to your friends?”
I frown, lowering my fists. “Of course not.” I kick a pebble at his shin.“Besides, if I was going to gossip about you, I’d start with your abysmal taste in T-shirts.”
