Page 39 of The Do-Over Girl

He looks and frowns slightly. “Remind you of anyone?”

I laugh. “I hope not, but maybe.” They do look blindly smitten with each other, and that feeling rolls through me like I’ve caught the feelings from just observing them. Then Nash leans in, and my heart starts that familiar race again like he shot a starting gun, like every time he touches me and that electric frisson of connection shoots through me, I can’t help my visceral response, as if my body never forgot. It was that well-trained.

“They still have a long way to go to have what we had.” His words cut through me because it’s the truth and because they speak of the past as if it’s irretrievable, as if all is lost and we stupidly threw it away.

“We were so stupid.”

He tenses and frowns at me. “Right—”

“No, I don’t mean it like that.” Before I can explain myself, I struggle because my heart is in my throat, threatening to strangle me for admitting what I feel, fear rising everywhere.

And then the moment is lost because Mia sees us, and she comes over with Dylan, followed by their friends because they’re like magnets, leading people without effort.

“Miss Austin. Coach.” Dylan nods at us.

“You look so beautiful, Miss Austin. I knew you’d have something special to wear. You’re always so stylish.

“She always was,” Nash says. My eyes pop at his mentioning the past in front of the students. It’s been almost an unspoken rule that we wouldn’t go there, that we wouldn’t raise their awareness about our past or their curiosity.

But I can see now by the looks in all their eyes that that was a foolish ambition because they’re all looking at us—and a half dozen kids are surrounding us—like we’re a fascinating mystery to be solved.

I don’t blame them. I’m mystified by us as a couple, too.

Sondra speaks up. “We saw the yearbook for the year you two graduated. You were like the It couple.”

“Kind of like Mia and Dylan,” Nash says, shocking me. My temperature shoots to the moon, and I simultaneously freeze up like his admission short-circuited me. All eyes are on us, and I don’t remember the last time I felt so vulnerable—unless you count that night seventeen years ago. Not even Brad firing me after I broke off our engagement comes close to this heart-palpitating feeling.

Poise, where are you? You’re not a teenager, Kali. You’re an adult, so act like one.

“Every couple in high school looks like…” I trail off because I can’t say what I’m thinking, that they look smitten. It would embarrass the heck out of Mia and Dylan. “Like they’re happy and carefree,” I finally finish my thought. Mia nods.

But Sondra persists. “What happened to you two?”

Mia tries to shush her. “It’s none of our business, Sondra. Leave them alone.” She gives me an apologetic look, but I see the curiosity in her eyes. Dylan and the others are curious, too. Concern creases his brow like he’s worried the same thing could happen to him and Mia.

Then I turn to Nash, who’s studying me, waiting for my answer, a very calm look on his face like he’s ready for anything. Too bad I’m not ready to spill my guts about the most traumatic event of my life—except for my mother’s death—to a crowd of impressionable teens, who I’ll need to face in the classroom every day with some authority and just the right amount of distance and caring. Shit.

The DJ starts the music up again, bless his soul for eternity because it’s loud and apparently popular, judging from the squeals of delight and the immediate rush back to the dance floor. Mia leads Dylan into a dance with her smile, and the others follow.

Nash leans into me. “Saved by the dance. How ironic.”

I elbow him lightly in the ribs. “It saved you, too.” And I wonder how he can live so dangerously in some moments, take emotional chances like that, and then be so afraid underneath it all of the one thing I always needed from him most—commitment. He never committed to anything except loving me. And I was young and happy to share his carefree love because we only wanted each other, and I thought it would always be that way.

Even despite my mom whispering in my ear that I needed to get a ring from him before he went away to play college hockey. She always said anything could happen after that.

And she would’ve known because that’s what happened to her. A fleeting summer romance with a visitor to Andrews Point gave her the greatest gift of her life—and the most tragic—me. That’s what she always told me. I suppose it was tragic because she never heard from that boy again. He disappeared, never to return, and she never found him.

She always figured he knew about me and wanted no part of a family at eighteen years old.

Nash elbows me back. “The only thing that needs saving around here is Andrews Point Academy. Remember that.”

Before I have a chance to ask him what he means, because it sounds like he thinks we should keep our minds on business, or maybe it’s something else like I should stop worrying, there’s a minor scuffle between a couple of boys.

“Excuse me,” he says. “Duty calls.” He pushes through the gathering crowd of onlookers and grabs the larger guy by the scruff of the neck, then proceeds to not only break up the fight and calm the boys, but he also entertains the crowd of onlookers because they’re now laughing.

I head for the ladies’ room.

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