“Fine.” I stare at the back of his head, at the swirling cowlick that never seems to leave his shaggy hair, even when it’s now down to his shoulders. I think about the row of medicine and Mom’s pointed look. “Hey, Mase, you’re okay, right?”
“What?” he asks, glancing over his shoulder. I tap the center of my chest, not wanting to linger on the possibility that he may not be but needing to know. “Yeah, I’m good.”
I release my breath, relieved. “Good.” I haul myself off his bed and give his shoulder a push as I pass. “Have fun with your raiding and traipsing through your make-believe forest.”
“When have I ever traipsed through anything?”
“And cut your hair.”
“I like it long,” he fires back. I walk through his door with a smile and head to my room, pulling my phone from my hoodie pocket to check my text thread with Jules. No new messages.
With a heavy sigh, I turn on the TV and mindlessly flip through the channels while I wait for the game to start.
“Do you want to order a pizza, or does your face hurt too much?” Mason calls out.
I move my jaw back and forth, determining that it feels good enough for an extra-large cheese with pepperoni and bacon. “Only if you order it,” I yell back.
“I can’t. I’m traipsing.”
I chuckle and open the app for Pizzano’s. I add a large pizza, half with my toppings and half with mushrooms and green peppers for Mason. I’m just about to check out when a message from Jules pops up.
Tyler is going to dinner with his grandparents. Want to hang out earlier? Maybe watch the Reds play? I can come to you?
The thought of watching the Reds play with Jules seems to shake some of the tiredness that continues to cling to me. The highlight of last night was spending time with her. I missed the way she laughs and the way she uses touch to convey her affection and how she smells like something pretty and floral. I missed the way she holds eye contact and sneezes in threes and plays with her necklace when she’s nervous.
I missedher.
Want pizza?I text back.
Obviously.
I smirk and adjust the order to include a small margherita. “Get decent, Mason, Jules is coming over,” I yell and toss my phone on my bed. Tyler’s loss is my gain.
The Reds lose, but it’s fine because watching them lose with Jules makes it a little less crappy. And once we’ve demolished our pizzas, we lie on our stomachs on my bed with my laptop between us. Her feet nudge mine as she kicks them back and forth, and I kick her back in an aggressive game of footsie. The whole thing is familiar. Like there wasn’t a twelve-month pause in our routine.
After going through a bunch of pictures of Europe on my phone and insisting for probably the billionth time that, no, my friends in France didn’t replace her as my favorite, we decide to watch something mindless.
We forgo a movie in exchange for some cheesy teenage series that Jules sheepishly admits wanting to see. I’m fine watching whatever, but I can’t help but think that all these high school shows are the same. Some douchebag jock manages to fall for the less popular but way more interesting nerdy type girl. And for whatever reason, she likes him back. So of course, by the end of season one, they finally manage to overcome some social obstacle and end up together.
I make a disgusted sound as he shoves his tongue down her throat after miraculously winning the homecoming football game in the middle of a torrential downpour in a stunning come-from-behind victory. Like winning the game makes up for all the other crappy shit he did to her.
Jules must have the same disdain because she makes a similar sound of distaste. “Ew, why? He was such a jerk.”
“A total tool,” I agree.
“But still,” she says wistfully when he asks her to dance right there on the fifty yardline postgame, “there’s just something about kissing and dancing in the rain that’s so unbelievably romantic.”
I scrunch my nose. All I see is a sweaty, soaking wet dickwad, who probably smells like a wet dog, trying to swallow a cute girl’s face. “You thinkthat’sromantic?”
She tilts her head to the side as if examining the scene. “I mean…kinda? Not the mud and sweat, but you know, the sentiment.”
I give her a look. “Did Taylor Swift tell you it was romantic?”
She bursts into laughter. “Maybe.” A buzz from her phone snags her attention. I can tell it’s from Tyler by the goofy expression on her face.
“Is Tyler romantic?” The question spills out before I can stop it.
She and Tyler started dating right before the summer I left. She had been crushing on him most of junior year when he finally managed the courage to ask her out a couple weeks before school let out. He isn’t like her past boyfriends, ones who were fine but didn’t treat her the way she deserved. No, Tyler actually puts in the effort. Goes out of his way for her and makes her happy. It’s cute, if not a little nauseating. Seems like not much has changed.
