Out of My League - Sarah Sutton Page 0,100

against his, but now stilled, eyes on me. Dad paused the movie, filling the air with silence.

“Is this Sophia Wallace?” The voice was light and feminine.

I pushed my glasses up my nose, wary. “This is she.”

Walsh’s lips twitched as he went back to tracing my leg.

“My name is Leanne Ferris,” she said. “I’m the editorial director at the Bayview Blade.”

The phone nearly tumbled from my grip as my fingers spasmed, and then I froze, still as a statue.

“Last night I was at Bayview High’s board meeting to report for the paper and I ran into a Mrs. Gao. She talked a lot about your writing skill and showed me your article about paper straws you wrote a few years back.” She paused. “It was very insightful and informative. I was hoping you’d allow us to run it in next week’s issue.”

My hand slapped over Walsh’s hand on my leg and I squeezed, nearly grinding his bones together. “R-Run my article in the Bayview Blade?”

“What?” Mom gasped, eyes wide.

“I understand that your journalism program at school was cut this school year,” she went on as if she couldn’t hear the building freak-out in my voice. “To apply for our senior internship, the school must have an active journalism department.”

Words, Sophia, spit them out. “Um, right.”

“I’d like to extend a direct internship at the Bayview Blade for you personally. That is, if you were thinking of applying.” I could hear her chuckle slightly over the phone. “With an article like that, Ms. Wallace, I’d be surprised if you didn’t.”

“You’re offering me an internship?” I repeated, unable to keep the mad grin from my face. She’d said Ms. Wallace. So professional and real. Am I dreaming? “At the Blade?”

She sounded amused. “Yes, I am.”

I blinked at the frozen image on the TV screen, my brain short-circuiting. Dad nodded his head eagerly at me, mouthing at me to answer her.

It wasn’t until Walsh squeezed my hand that I snapped back to reality, the words coming out in a rush. “I-I accept. Yes, I accept wholeheartedly.” I’m mere seconds from screaming. “Thank you so, so much, Ms. Ferris.”

“Swing by the office when you can and I’ll give you a tour,” she told me, and then added, “The Blade will be lucky to have you, Sophia.”

When she hung up, I held the phone to my ear still, savoring the moment. Savoring the feeling. The fire that was still in my veins, the elation that was consuming me. My body was hot, hot, hot, and everyone in the room was staring at me with wide, impatient eyes, sharing these emotions with me.

Walsh still gripped my hand, waiting for my reaction. “Let it out, Sophie,” he said with the biggest grin on his face. “Let it out.”

After trying so hard to hold it in, to hold all the excitement and energy back, I started to squeal. When the rest of them joined in on my cheering, it was a while before we stopped.

And I’d never felt so at home in my house, with Walsh’s arms around me, his lips against my temple, and my parents grinning from ear to ear. I’d never felt so loved.

Epilogue

The November breeze was comforting and cool, lingering on any skin I’d left exposed. I shivered a little, thinking about how Mom would say I should go inside before I caught a chill. But I didn’t want to. Not yet.

Mom hit her five-month mark yesterday in her pregnancy, her baby bump as round as a basketball. The argument nowadays was that a perfect bump meant it was a boy, but Dad was sticking with his hopes of another girl.

And they were getting excited—baby things littered the whole house, bassinets and toys and unisex clothes, since they were determined not to know until the baby was born. “It’ll be exciting,” Mom would say, trying to convince us. “It’ll make the day that much more special.”

If it were two against one, Dad and I totally would’ve won. But, of course, Walsh sided with Mom.

“It’s her decision,” Walsh said for the millionth time now, his breath warming the top of my head. His arms around me pulled me closer still, my back flush with his chest. “But, c’mon, Sophie, you have to admit that knowing takes some of the fun away.”

We were sitting out on the porch swing in front of my house, one Dad installed for Mom toward the end of summer. It was nice when the weather was still warm, but since it was now