Page 8 of The Surprise
Beth cringes a bit, shoving her face right next to my shoulder, and reaching as well as she can, but as she stretches, she bumps me hard, and I shove Izzy, unintentionally, but she falls forward, knocking me forward, right into Beth.
I would totally have smashed her flat, but years of push-ups finally pay off. I manage to hit the floor with the heels of my hands, hovering over Beth by a mere inch. Her eyes are on mine, her breath short and shallow. She licks her lips, and my eyes drop to her mouth.
“Whoa,” Izzy says in my ear. “I had no idea you were so strong. Can you do a push-up with me on your back?”
All my excitement, all my glee at how impressive I look, deflates. It’s hardly like a moment from a movie, where the guy and the girl lock eyes and feel a zing.
I have a twelve-year-old, pain-in-the-neck sister on my back, and there’s another one staring at me with a look of triumph. But when I look down at Beth, she’s wide-eyed and I can feel her breath on my face.
I forget all about the girls and their drama. This is awesome.
3
Beth
I’ve been asked out three times in my life.
The first time, it was the guy who used to bite everyone in kindergarten. He stopped biting people, thankfully, but his face was always covered with acne. We had both just turned fifteen, and he and I bumped into each other in the lunch line.
“Wanna go see a movie some time?” He had mumbled the words while looking down, his skin flushing even redder than usual.
“Huh?” I had asked.
“Never mind,” he had mumbled, just before sprinting toward the other end of the lunch room.
It had taken me about ten seconds to review the interaction in my mind and realize that he’d asked me out.
The second time, I had just come out of the girls’ bathroom—also at school—and a bunch of people were laughing. This time, the guy asking was pretty cute.
Only, I’m a fairly tall girl.
And this guy was a solid four inches shorter than me.
“Hey, Beth.” He had shoved his hands in his pockets and forced a pained smile. “I hear you’re not dating anyone. Wanna change that?”
I wasn’t sure what to say. Was he asking me on a date? Or to be his girlfriend? He was in my math class, my history class, and my computer class, and I’d never even had a conversation about anything other than the pencil sharpener in the eight years I’d known Rylan.
“Why aren’t you answering? What’s wrong with me?” he had asked. “You think you can do better?”
I shook my head.
“You’re a ho anyway.”
“I like hoes,” I muttered. “They keep me from crouching over when I’m working in the garden.”
The crowd of boys had burst out laughing.
Rylan never met my eyes again, but I’m pretty sure he tripped me a week later in PE.
The third time was a year ago, and it wasn’t at school. I’d gone back to Seattle to visit my grandparents, and they’d had some friends over. Their friends had their grandson with them, and he was two years older than me.
Jackson.
He was tall. He had dark, dark brown hair and bright green eyes. He had walked onto the back porch and gestured for me to follow him. It was such a smooth, confident move that I went without even thinking about it.
“You’re better looking than I thought you’d be,” he had said.
I frowned at that. He thought I’d be ugly?
