I shake my head.
“I asked to borrow his copy and I was about six chapters in when I went storming downstairs and handed it back to him, saying, ‘Every time I think it can’t possibly get worse, it does.’ My dad was so patient, though. He told me to stick with it, so I did, and it really is one of the best books I’ve ever read. Where are you in that chapter? I wonder if you’ve gotten to my favorite line?”
Jesus. She has a favorite line, and I can’t follow the audio because the guy’s voice puts me to sleep. If I needed a reminder of why my crush on her is doomed, this is it.
She’s flipping through the pages, her finger tracing over the words. “I found it!”
“Read it to me,” I say, tilting my head back on the comfy cushion. I don’t care if she reads the line or the chapter or the whole freaking book. Watching Josie lose her mind over a sentence some guy wrote in a book is somehow way hotter than thinking about the girl who was copping a feel on the dance floor at the LAX house party.
Her voice washes over me and just the sound of it calms my rough edges. I relax, but I don’t feel at all like sleeping. The more Josie reads, the more lost I get lost in the story. So lost, in fact, that I bolt upright when she reads the end of chapter fifteen.
“Shut the fuck up.They’re brothers?”
Josie looks up at me with the prettiest smile on her face. “It’s a total shock, right?”
I nod, ready for her to keep going. If Anton turns Vasily away now, I’ll never fucking forgive him.
Josie turns the page to keep reading, but there’s a loud beep over the intercom and then we hear an automated voice announce, “The library is closing in five minutes. I repeat, Friedman Library will close at midnight.”
The magic of the moment starts to melt away as we walk downstairs and Josie reshelves the book.
After taking Josie back to her dorm, I head back to my house alone. Some of the guys are playing a video game, so I toss them a wave and make my way upstairs. I shower, brush my teeth, strip, and crawl into bed.
And then I grab my earbuds and find the chapter where we left off. This guy’s nasally voice is killing me, but it’ll have to do.
17
Van
Tutoring’s going okay tonight. Josie’s actually making eye contact with me since we read together in the library last week, so that’s a plus.
The timer on her phone dings and she looks up from her computer screen. I catch a glimpse of it and it's one of those puzzle games where you have so many tries to guess the right word. Everybody loves that game, but it's my personal version of hell.
"Time's up," Josie says as I turn my computer her way. She skims over my paragraph and I know it's rough, even if GrammarPro did all the heavy lifting to make it recognizable.
"It's a good start," she tells me, like that's some sort of compliment. To me, it sounds more like a death sentence—a certainty that I'm not done, and I have to keep working on it. "We can work on revising it Thursday, ok?"
"Sure," I tell her, though I'd rather do just about anything else.
The baseball team chooses this exact moment to troop through the room. Jesus. These guys are always here. They must have the highest GPA of any team on campus.
“Van! Dude, you comin’ out tonight?” Lanza yells across the room.
Ok, maybe not the highest…
I shake my head and turn my attention to Josie.
She busies herself with putting her laptop in her bag and the look on her face damn near kills me. I don't want to go out tonight. I want to stay in—with Josie.
But that's not happening.
Still, I do the least I can.
Maybe I'm an idiot (it's a well-established fact, really), but the thought of Josie spending her birthday alone makes me sad.
I reach into the front pouch of my backpack and take out the paper bag. It's not full of crumbs, so that's a good sign.
Sliding the bag across the table, I bump her hand with the edge. She looks up at me, then down at the bag.
