My back pocket vibrates, and when I check my phone, I find a text from Bryce.
BRYCE: babe im outside where u at?
Just as I’m about to type a response, I collide with a pastel ball of dough. My whole body bounces back as my phone slips out of my hands and slides across the floor.
“Oh my goodness!” squeaks a voice.
I glance up to see Millie Michalchuk, someone I am very much aware of. To be honest, you can’t miss the girl. Freshman year she was crowned the Nottest of Them Allaccording to the Hottest and Nottest List. Luckily for Millie, her name only popped up on the list one year. I believe this year the honor went to Hannah Perez.
I groan. “That phone better not be broken.”
“Oh gosh, I hope not,” she says as she retrieves the phone from the floor. “Shipshape!”
I hold out my hand. “Lucky you.”
She grins. “You’re right about that!” The phone vibrates in her hand as she gives it back to me. “Sorry,” she says. “I was just in here to give your mom the morning announcements to proofread for tomorrow, but I guess I missed her, huh?”
I shrug. “Yeah, I don’t really keep up with her schedule.” Lie. She’s gone to pick up Kyla and take her to dance class. I glance down at my phone to see another message from Bryce. “Right, well, I gotta go.”
Millie steps forward, blocking my path as if she didn’t even hear me. “What a beautiful necklace,” she says, lightly touching my thirteenth-birthday gift from my dad.
The gold circle pendant with an engravedChangs from a thin gold chain. It’s something I only take off for dance competitions. Besides the tiny diamond studs Bryce gave me for Christmas, it’s the only piece of real jewelry I own. I clear my throat. “Uh, thanks.”
“Tell your mom I stopped by?”
I squeeze past her. “I’ll try to remember.”
Millie just makes me uncomfortable. It hasn’t always been that way. Before the pageant last fall, she was justsome random fat girl who always kept to herself and who... okay, yes, me and my friends sometimes made fun of. At least not to her face. At the pageant, especially during the swimwear component... I don’t know. It was just, like, hard to look at her. It wasn’t like when I’d made dumb jokes about her in the past. This time I just wanted to cover her up and save her the embarrassment. Except Millie didn’t seem embarrassed. Anyway, I guess the judges pitied her, too, because in the end, she got runner-up.
I shoot off a reply to let Bryce know I’m on my way. I sigh with momentary relief.
I love Bryce. Between my mom, my stepdad, my little sister, and sometimes Claudia, my house is constantly in motion. And there’s my dad, too, and all my worries about him ever finding someone and my abuela getting older. Then the never-ending Shamrock drama.
But Bryce. I never have to worry about Bryce. We’ve been together since freshman year. Bryce is The One. We’ve had our hiccups, but what long-term couple hasn’t?
As I push through the doors leading into the parking lot, I find Bryce leaning against his sparkling cobalt-blue Dodge Charger with shiny new dealer plates. Despite what everyone might think, I’m not a materialistic person, but I’ve got to admit: there’s something hot about having a boyfriend with a flashy car. And Bryce has a new car every few months—a perk of his dad being none other than Clay Dooley, owner of not one but four local dealerships. CloverCity doesn’t even have a damn Target, but we have almost as many car dealerships as we do gas stations. Anyway, with the last name Dooley, he’s Clover City royalty. If he’s a prince, I’m his princess.
He greets me with a kiss—an open-mouth kiss for everyone to see. His hands grip either side of my waist, and he literally sweeps me off my feet.
We can’t keep our hands off each other. I know it can be obnoxious and over the top. But I spend my entire day 100 percent in control of my life. When I’m with Bryce, the buzzing in my brain eases and I can operate on autopilot.
He twists his hand into my ponytail and tugs playfully. “I missed you today.”
“Well,” I tell him, “you’ve got me for two whole hours before my family gets home.”
“Say no more,” he says, and smacks my ass.
I yelp, trying to force a giggle. I might be down for public displays of affection, but that’s not exactly my flavor. Whatever. It’s not a big enough deal for me to make a thing of it. And I’ll totally get him back tomorrow and embarrass him in front of his friends with some sappy-ass baby talk or something.
“Hey,” he says as we’re getting into the car. “There’s Ellen.”
My gaze scans the parking lot, and there she is. For a brief moment, regret pokes at the pit of my stomach. “Gimme a sec,” I tell him.
Ellen was my sad attempt at branching out for more female friends while Bryce was busy with football season.She was in the pageant and we worked together at Sweet 16. She’s the kind of girl everyone wants to be friends with. I am so not that girl. But I am the girl who gets what she wants, and I wanted El to be my friend.
But the pageant ended. I didn’t win—even though Bryce’s dad, who served as a judge, swore I had his vote. I thought for sure I’d at least get runner-up like Claudia had a few years ago. And then a couple weeks later, Ellen left Sweet 16 for a higher-paying job at Cinful Rolls, the cinnamon-bun stand in the food court. So I decided that I don’t need friends. I don’t even have time for them, honestly. But something about Ellen still makes me feel like a failure, and that really pisses me off.
“El-bell!” I call, but she doesn’t flinch. She probably can’t hear me over the engine. “El! Ellen!”
