I bite my lip nervously. Because it doesn’t matter how many times I cycled through the things I wanted to say. Now that I’m here, my brain is blank.
“Say what you have to say, Ellis,” Jake says, finally hitting the button on the side of his phone and setting it on the ground beside him.
“I don’t know what to say,” I blurt. “Other than I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for exactly?” He sighs.
“Cooper and I should have told you we liked each other.”
“No. As one of my best friends,Coopershould have told me he was into you. You didn’t owe me anything. You’re just some girl passing through here,” he says, shrugging.
Ouch.
“Maybe. But I still consider us friends,” I say.
He scoffs. “Yeah, well, you did make it clear we were going to homecoming asfriendswhen you agreed to go with me. I guess I was just an idiot for thinking we might become more eventually.”
“I’m sorry. I never meant to lead you on.”
He shakes his head. “That’s the thing. You didn’t. I thought a lot about it last night, and it’s hard to be mad at you because you didn’t do anything. You never said you liked me. You never did anything to give me the impression you ever would. It was just irrational hope, I guess.” He finally turns to me. “But you didn’t have to say yes to the Pumpkin Prom.”
“I wanted to say yes,” I tell him. It’s half true. If I couldn’t go with Cooper, I did want to go with Jake—as a friend I have a lot of fun with.
“Ellis, you like someone else. I’m not going to hold you to going with me.”
“I’m not bailing on you again, Jake,” I say. “You’re not an obligation to me.”
“Yeah, I know. But Ilike you. And it’s okay that you don’t like me back, but spending the night at prom with someone who’d rather be there with someone else doesn’t sound all that fun, to be honest.”
I nod. “Okay,” I whisper.
Jake rests his elbows on his knees. “How long have you two…”
“We haven’t,” I say quickly. “I met Cooper when I visited one summer in middle school. We became really close friends and then had a falling out. Then I—”
Jake’s posture stiffens. “Wait.You’rethe girl?”
“Huh?”
Jake digs his palms into his eyes. “No fucking way.”
“What’s happening right now?”
“Unbelievable.” Jake shakes his head and looks at me. “I moved here freshman year. Cooper and I were nothing alike, but he was nice and befriended me, introduced me to everyone. But all heevertalked about was this girl he’d spent the summer with. It was so annoying,” he laughs. “But then he got all quiet and sad because she stopped texting him. I wassoglad when he started dating Chloe because I really thought it’d pull him out of his slump. But it didn’t. Only time did.”
I turn and look at my feet, ashamed that I was such an asshole.
“Why wouldn’t he tell me you were the girl?” Jake asks.
“Because you liked me. He was afraid of upsetting you. Of ruining your friendship.”
“But if he’d told me from the get-go…”
“Things between us were rocky and complicated. He wasn’t trying to keep anything from you. He wanted you to be happy.” I meet Jake’s icy blue eyes. “We never intended to fall for each other.”
“You say that, but there was never any other choice for Cooper.” Jake’s gaze travels to the Caffeinated Cat. “This is really messed up.”
“Yeah.” I pull my scarf tighter. “Do you hate me?”
