Page 86 of Scoring Lessons

“Because you just showed me what your hand-eye coordination is like, and I’d like to keep my money.”

He grinned, like I’d said exactly what he’d been waiting for. I swore his ego held no bounds. “Who knew you get scared so easily?”

“I’m practical.”

“Olivia.” He set the ball down and turned to face me fully, arms crossed, a serious expression that didn’t fit his personality at all. “Stop being a chicken shit.”

“Fine,” I groaned, because apparently I had no self-preservation instincts left.

His grin widened. I picked up a ball and told myself I was going to win.

Less than twenty minutes later, I’d racked up a loss.

I came closer than I expected, actually, close enough that Wesley stopped smirking halfway through and started watching my lane with something that looked almost like genuine concern for his ten dollars. But in the end, his score edged mine out by forty points, and he collected his earnings with a smug grin across his face that made my eye twitch.

“What prize would you like?” the girl who was running the Skee-Ball booth asked Wesley, flirtation lacing her tone.

The way she acted, with the light in her voice and fluttering her eyelashes like a damsel in distress, annoyed me like no other.

But I had no right to stake my claim on Wesley. Even if we were doing extracurricular activities together, we were nothing but friends at best.

“That one.” He pointed to a small teddy bear that had a pair of headphones. It was the cutest thing ever.

She handed it to him with a too bright for my liking smile, but Wesley was none the wiser as he turned and tried to hand it to me.

I looked at it, then at him. “It’s yours. You won it, fair and square. Along with my poor ten bucks.”

His eyes rolled. “Just take it. I chose it specifically for you.”

I thinned my lips to keep my stupid smile in check as I grabbed it. I accidentally pressed its stomach, and a classic ’80s rock song started playing.

Wesley draped an arm over my shoulder as we started walking. “Would you look at that? It even sings one of your favorite songs.”

I absentmindedly hugged the plushie against my chest as I looked up at him.

Even with the chatter and loud music around us, it wasn’t enough for me to look away. He didn’t dare to do so either. It was just us, stuck in time.

I couldn’t even lie—my mind was reeling.

What was this?

What were we doing?

Worst of all, how was this going to end up?

TWENTY-TWO

WESLEY

WOULDN’T YOU LIKE TO REMEMBER THIS NIGHT?

“Wesley, open your eyes.”

“Nope. I don’t particularly feel like puking today.”

“But it’s beautiful up here!” She pushed my shoulder playfully, and my hands automatically reached for something to hold on to. “You’re missing it.”

I let out a slow exhale and cranked one eye open. The Ferris wheel wasn’t moving that quickly, and I made Olivia promise not to shake the pod—which, when she shot me a diabolical grin right as we stepped onto this death trap, I still wasn’t sure if she was going to do it or not—but my brain and its fear of heights didn’t give much of a fuck about logic. The chances of me falling off this Ferris wheel were slim, but not zero. And that was a higher number than I was comfortable with.