Most Likely (Most Likely #1) - Sarah Watson Page 0,25

minute, Ava’s eyes started to drift. “Nope,” Logan said. “Right here.” He made his fingers into a V and pointed them at his eyes.

Ava hated this. She didn’t blame Mrs. Simon for making them both stay after school. She knew her portrait of Logan was subpar. She’d rushed through it, just wanting it to be done.

“This is weird,” Ava said.

“I know.”

Ava had expected Mrs. Simon to give them both extra instruction on how to properly shade a nose or paint the lines of a neck. She did not expect her to ask them to stare into each other’s eyes for an uninterrupted fifteen minutes.

Logan scratched an itch on his arm. “How long do you think it’s been?”

Ava had set a timer on her phone, but she couldn’t look at it without breaking eye contact. “No idea.”

“Oh, wait,” Logan said. “If you move your head slightly to the left, I think I can see the clock behind you.”

Ava tilted her head without moving her eyes, and Logan groaned. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Three minutes,” he said. “It’s been three minutes.”

Ava wanted to crawl out of her skin. Another minute or so passed. The silence was almost as awful as the staring. Logan must have felt it too because he said, “Let’s ask each other questions or something.”

“Okay. What’s your favorite color?”

“Gray.”

“Gray? Gray?”

“Yes. Gray. You have a problem with gray?”

“It’s not a color.”

Logan somehow managed to roll his eyes without looking away. “Fine. Will you accept blue?”

“Sure. Now ask me something.”

“Why do you hate me so much?”

She didn’t say anything.

“Come on,” he said. “That’s my question. You have to answer.”

“Fine. Because you’re annoying.”

It wasn’t a lie. It just wasn’t the whole truth.

“Whatever. Your turn.”

“Favorite food?” she asked.

“My dad’s baked ziti. Patented Diffenderfer family recipe. Your questions are terrible. Ask me something real.”

“It’s your turn,” Ava said.

Logan took a second to think. “Okay. I’ve got one. Who is the woman in the picture? The one in your painting?” He angled his head slightly toward her self-portrait.

“Well, it’s called a self-portrait because—”

“I know it’s you. I mean the woman in the background.”

Ava hesitated.

“Or we can just ask each other dumb questions all day,” Logan said. “Whatever.”

“It’s my mom. Not my adoptive mom. My birth mom.”

“Oh.”

“I don’t know what she looks like. I assume she has brown hair and brown eyes, and probably looks somewhat like me. But I don’t really know. That’s why I kept it fuzzy.”

“That’s… really cool,” he said. “Are you going to submit that one to RISD?”

“It’s my turn to ask a question.”

She thought for a second, and Logan sighed. “My favorite sport is running. My favorite book is Catcher in the Rye. My favorite band is Amen Dunes. My favorite—”

“Why did you drop AP Physics?”

Logan shut his mouth.

“Why?” she asked. “I want to know.”

His eyes were locked on hers when he answered. “Because I had a panic attack.”

She blinked. “Oh,” she said. “I didn’t—”

“It’s fine. I mean, it’s not fine that it happened. But it did. My mom was there and she freaked. She wanted me to see a shrink but… no way.”

It took all of Ava’s strength not to look down at her feet.

“So she said if I wouldn’t see a shrink, I had to lighten my schedule. Art was the only first-period elective left with room. I didn’t do it to torture you, even though you seem to think so.”

“Why didn’t you want to see a… shrink?”

Ava hated the word “shrink.” It made her feel tiny and broken. Like she wasn’t normal.

“You already got your question,” Logan said. “It’s my turn.”

She prepared herself for what was coming next. “Okay.”

“What’s your favorite color?” he asked.

She was mad at him for copping out. It felt like a letdown. Like all the air had left the room. They asked each other a few more questions after that. Mostly insignificant ones. And then they went back to silently staring. It felt less intense in some ways and more intense in others. As she looked into his eyes, she also noticed his other features. She could see all the things she’d gotten wrong in her painting. His ears did stick out, but not in a way that made him look ridiculous. They made him look boyish. Like he was still figuring out how to grow into himself. She could see that his smile was slightly crooked, and she could tell that it was because there was a hint of something else behind it. Not sadness. But not exactly happiness either. Her portrait had only revealed