it anyway.
A moment later, the parking lot attendant parks his golf cart beside my car, gets out, and knocks on the window. He’s stone-faced and regal, his graying hair gelled back and his shirt pressed beneath his too-loose football jacket.
“Miss Thorne,” he greets me as I slowly roll down the window. “You’re a little late.”
I give him an innocent smile and present him with the day-old breakfast bagel. “Umm, hungry?”
He shakes his head.
Ruh-roh.
“Break for it!” Annie roars, shoving open the passenger-side door. I quickly grab my bookbag, phone, and science notebook, which were strewn on the floorboard, and go scurrying over the middle console and out of the passenger door with her. Quinn vaults out of the back seat, and we haul ass across the parking lot before the attendant can get back into his golf cart and come after us. We don’t slow down until we’re through the breezeway and into the school.
I lead the charge, and turn the corner into C Hall when—
I collide with a brick wall.
Quinn and Annie catch me before I bite the dust, but the contents of my arms go everywhere. My science notebook, with all of its loose pages, poofs into the air.
“Watch where you’re—Rosie!” Garrett calls my name, surprised to see me.
The worst person I could run into right now.
“Sorry, Garrett, can’t stay and chat,” I reply, gathering up my science notes with the help of Annie and Quinn, and I hurry by him before he can stop me. I’m not all that worried about the parking lot attendant writing me up for being late, but Mrs. Angora in homeroom?
She has a penchant for making tardy students suffer.
Luckily, she’s lenient today and lets Annie and me sneak in about five minutes late, before the morning news begins. Quinn’s homeroom is one class down, but their teacher doesn’t care how late they are, which is lucky. We can’t afford to have Quinn ejected from the running this late in the game. The morning announcements ramble off the student festivities for Homecoming week—spirit days, the colors we’re supposed to wear to the game on Friday, the ticket price for the dance on Saturday, and worst of all, the people leading Homecoming King and Queen.
“For Homecoming Queen, it’s a tight race between Myrella Johnson and Ava Singh, but as for Homecoming King, Garrett Taylor is winning by at least thirty votes. You can vote every day during lunch in the cafeteria, and don’t forget to dress in school colors this week. Go Wildcats!” the news anchor says, signing off.
Great. Of course Garrett is officially winning.
It isn’t until halfway through second period that I realize I don’t have my phone. I must’ve left it in the car, though I could swear I grabbed it. I was in a hurry, though. Ugh, great. Today is already shaping up to be one hell of a terrible Monday, because after second period I find out why Garrett was out of class this morning, too.
He was hanging up a poster for Homecoming in the common room of the high school. A ten-foot-tall poster that says VOTE GARRETT TAYLOR AS YOUR KING! It towers over the entire student body every time class changes. You can’t miss it, and I certainly don’t.
My doom now looms over me as the bell rings every hour.
* * *
—
AS LUNCH WRAPS up, I steel my courage and walk up to the table selling Homecoming dance tickets. They’re beginning to pack up, locking the money box, when they see me standing at the other side of the table.
“Oh, sorry,” Savannah, the school president, replies. “Rosie, right? Did you want one?”
“Two, actually.”
“I think Garrett already got yours,” says the other student.
“Probably not,” I reply, and repeat, handing them a twenty-dollar bill out of my back pocket, “Two, please.”
They exchange a look, but then the president shrugs and accepts my cash, and hands me two golden tickets. They have roses on them. Of course they do. The theme for this year’s Homecoming is “Garden of Memories.”
Then why do I feel like I already want to forget the whole thing?
* * *
—
SO, I TAKE IT BACK—there is at least one thing more embarrassing than a ten-foot-tall poster of Garrett Taylor and realizing that you wake up to the smoldering looks of one Vance Reigns every morning combined: it’s going to a boy’s house after realizing that you might have a very small, unsubstantial, incredibly overcomable, crush on him.
The boy in question is sitting at the counter, eating an