“I’ll be there.”
“Have a good lesson. I’ll talk to you later.”
When I hang up with Micah, I scream, jumping up and down, and then I remember I’m supposed to meet Ford after he gets done with practice, and now I’m going to have to cancel. I fall onto my bed and cover my head with my pillow, screaming in frustration. No! I promised Ford, and I’m done waiting. I’ll just go over there after my lesson, even if it means getting home late. I’ll deal with the consequences later.
“Clark!” Leah waves her hands at me as I weave through the school parking lot. I stop waiting for her to catch up.
“Hey, what’s up?” I ask.
“How was the booster dinner last night?”
“Ugh—it was awful. The things they auctioned off were amazing, but that was the only highlight.”
Leah’s eyes widen with surprise. “Really? I’d think fawning over your guy would’ve been the highlight.”
“It might have been if I’d seen him more than a couple of times. They made the football players serve dinner and then clean everything up. He got banished to the kitchens for most of the night.”
“The boosters always raise lots of money, but their functions are boring unless you’re thirty-something.”
“So true. Hey, do you remember I need to leave early today?” I ask.
“Yeah, you have dance class on Thursdays.”
“Yes, except I need to leave a little after four today. I have a onetime lesson that my dance instructor set up for me. Normally, I’ll only need to leave the last fifteen minutes of class, but today is a little different.”
“No problem. It’s going to be a light practice today. We don’t have anything new we need to work on until next week.”
I sigh with relief. “Thanks for helping me out. I hope it doesn’t cause a problem with the other girls.”
“Are you kidding? We all love having you on the team.” Leah wraps her arm around mine as we walk into the school.
“Awe, thanks.” I lean my head on her shoulder.
“Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you if you’ve ever looked at that fan website for Ford?”
“Oh, my gosh. No! I completely forgot about it.”
“That’s what I thought. You should look at it. Do you still have Audrey’s login info?”
“Yeah, I think so. She texted it to me,” I say.
“Okay, if you need my information, just let me know.”
“I will, thanks.”
“Have a good morning. I’ll see you at lunch.” Leah squeezes my arm, letting go.
“Bye.” I wave, watching her walk down the hall.
Ford is leaning against his locker when I turn down B hall. I reach out, rubbing my hand along his arm. “Good morning, Stud. Did you recover from your night of servitude?”
“It was good. I enjoyed helping, but I didn’t get home until after ten. I stayed up readingWuthering Heightsfor our upcoming test and then forgot about our chemistry assignment. I didn’t get to bed until two.”
“Is that why you canceled running this morning?” I ask, opening my locker.
“Yeah, I needed some extra sleep. We’ll run today in PE.”
“Sounds good.” I smile, putting my books away. I shut my locker and lean against it, looking up at Ford.
