Playing Hooky with the Hottie - Maggie Dallen Page 0,15

the beans.

They still didn’t know who I liked, but still.

Charlotte eyed me curiously as she nibbled on her sandwich. “Did your crush take notice?”

I glanced down at the comments. None from Justin, although Bobby had commented with flame emojis which I assumed meant ‘hot.’ I shrugged. “I'm not sure.”

“He will,” Emma said. “I mean, how could he not?”

“Avery’s gonna be so mad she missed this,” Max said.

“Where is she, anyway?” Lulu asked.

I answered because I’d seen her in health class just this morning. “I think she headed to the nurse’s office to try and get some sleep.”

The others all winced in sympathy. Poor Avery had taken the advice of these stupid magazines by concocting a bonding opportunity for her and her crush.

It...wasn’t going as planned. Poor thing was beyond exhausted taking care of a fake baby that refused to sleep through the night.

“I’ll give her the lowdown next time I see her,” Emma said. “It’ll cheer her up to hear about Hazel’s success with these ‘how to catch a crush’ strategies.”

“I wouldn’t deem it a success yet,” I said.

“Of course not,” Lulu added, grinning as she scrolled through some more photos that had popped up on Will’s account that he’d tagged me in. “You two are just getting started.”

I frowned. “Nope. That was a one-time deal.”

“But you’re off to such a good start,” Emma whined. “You are totally reinventing your image here. You can’t just pull the plug now.”

I sighed and turned back to my food. I wasn’t in the mood to argue.

I couldn’t pull the plug?

Watch me. I wasn’t sure how I felt about the pictures. I mean, a little vain part of me enjoyed it. It was the first time in my life I’d seen myself as beautiful and definitely the first time my classmates were seeing me that way.

But it also weirded me out because it felt fake. Like I was fooling people. I tried to remember what Lulu had said.

Something about gems…?

It wasn’t quite clicking with me the way it had the other day at the diner.

And looking at the pictures, knowing everyone else was looking at them too…

It had me smashing a baseball cap over my head and pulling it down low as I walked to my next class.

“Daly!” Justin’s familiar voice hit me right before a heavy arm draped over my shoulders.

I looked up to see him grinning down at me. That familiar nervous sensation made me slightly queasy.

“Looks like you had fun the other night,” he said. There was a knowing air about him that made his eyes dance with laughter, and his smile seem more like a smirk.

I ducked my head down again. Was he making fun of me?

“You should come hang out with us more often,” he said, giving my shoulders a little squeeze.

I nodded, temporarily mute. “Yeah. Maybe.”

I didn’t really want to, though.

He kept walking as I stopped to head into my class.

Did I have fun at the party? My mind thought back to those moments by the fire. The way Will had made me laugh. How for a little while I’d forgotten to feel awkward about being at a party or wonder what I was going to say to Justin.

For a little while there….yeah, I supposed I’d had fun.

I watched Justin walk away, already laughing with one of the other girls from my team. I knew better than to take what he’d just said too seriously.

But even so…

I felt a smile tugging at my lips as I headed toward my seat.

Maybe that magazine trick had worked after all.

6

Will

Was I jealous?

No. I didn’t do jealous.

Was I a stalker just because I’d spotted Hazel in the hallway and followed her?

Definitely not.

Just because I’d wanted a word with the girl didn’t make me weird.

This was what I was telling myself as I worked in my blackroom at school later that day. It was actually a walk-in closet off the main newsroom, but it worked for my purposes.

I stared down at a photo of Hazel that developed before my eyes. I knew I didn’t have to do it the old-school way, but there was something about the process that was… Magic.

I grinned down at the photo, remembering what she’d said earlier about me being magic. It wasn’t what she’d said, but how she’d said it. So earnest. So serious.

I’d spotted her walking in that cute little cap like some sort of actress trying to avoid the paparazzi and was just heading her way to tease her about it when he beat me to