Be the Girl

And I head for Emmett’s room.

It’s across the hall from Cassie’s and slightly bigger, with slanted ceilings like mine and a window that overlooks the street. There’s no built-in bookshelves or reading nook, though. As bubblegum pink and girly as Cassie’s room is currently, Emmett’s room is shades of navy blue and burgundy, and hockey everything.

“Wow.” My eyes roll over the hockey sticks mounted to the wall with brackets, countless medals dangling from the ends.

And in the center of it all is Emmett, his long body looking especially good in jeans and a faded T-shirt, sprawled out on the navy-blue patterned rug, his back propped against his bed frame, his laptop open on his legs.

His feet bare.

“Hey, have you looked over McNair’s expectations yet?” He’s frowning at his computer.

“I scanned it.” I set my backpack on the floor and kneel beside him. Sitting next to him for an hour each day has helped me learn to control my breathing, but where there was once mind-blanking nervousness, now there is wild excitement. Equally distracting.

He runs his index finger across his screen, open to the Social Studies 12 portal page. “It says here minimum seven minutes, maximum twelve minutes, and we’ll be penalized for going outside of that.”

“I guess that means we have to rehearse the slides.”

“Yeah. And they have to be in PowerPoint, with a maximum of twenty-five words per slide, and a maximum of ten slides in total. So, basically, she doesn’t want us reading off slides to the class.”

“Those are always the worst presentations to sit through, anyway.”

He snorts. “Right? Still, this is going to take planning.”

“But we’re allowed to have talk sheets to guide us.”

“Thank God.” He frowns as he continues reading.

Meanwhile, my eyes involuntarily veer to his feet, to his toes that are long and touched with dark wisps of hair at the knuckles. His nails are neatly trimmed. All in all, they’re not awful.

“Why are you glaring at my feet like that?” Emmett asks suddenly.

“What? I’m not,” I deny, feeling my cheeks flush.

“Liar.” He laughs. “You were looking at them like you want to cut them off at the ankle and throw them in a Dumpster.”

I cringe at the visual.

“They’re clean. I did shower after practice.” He’s staring at me, waiting for an explanation, amusement dancing in his eyes.

“I hate feet,” I finally confess.

“What?” His thick, dark-brown eyebrows pop. “You hate feet. How can you hate feet? They’re feet! They help you run those cross-country races!”

“I’m not arguing that they’re useful. But they’re ugly.”

“You’re saying that my feet are ugly.”

“No, yours are … not bad.” Because I doubt there’s an ugly inch on your entire body.

He pauses. “What about your feet? Are they ugly?”

I shrug.

His full lips twist in thought. “Only one way to find out.” Setting his laptop aside, he leans over to seize one of my legs, his firm grip wrapping around my ankle.

I shriek as he effortlessly drags me closer to him, using his free hand to slip off my ankle sock.

“Wow. Look at this hideous thing! I can’t believe you leave the house with these!” he teases, inspecting my toes, painted with a sparkly blue nail polish.

“Shut up!” I laugh, tugging on my leg, trying to free myself. It’s in vain; he’s too strong.

“Seriously though, they’re freakishly small. How do you run so fast with these tiny things?” He drags his finger over my insole, making me jolt. “Freakishly small, ticklish feet, huh?”

Oh God. “No!” I cackle as his fingertips dance over the bottom of my foot, torn between mortification and exhilaration, knowing that within moments my face will turn an unsightly mottled pink as it did when my dad would pin me down and tickle me, years ago.

“Hey! What are you guys doing?” Cassie steps in, her eyes flashing back and forth, grinning at us.

Emmett releases his grip of my leg. “Nothing. Aria was showing me her ugly feet and she’s right. They’re horrible.”

Cassie pauses, as if weighing that. “You’re joking.”

Emmett sighs. “Yes, I’m joking. Aria has cute feet. Mine are ugly. What’s up, Cassie? We’re working on a project.”

“About ugly feet?”

“No. Aren’t you supposed to be helping Mom?” I hear the forced patience in his tone.

Cassie holds up an orange flyer. “It’s the Fall Fair this weekend.”

“Right.” Emmett’s smile wavers. Is he thinking about Holly right now?

“Can we go?”

“Oh, so now you’re talking to me again?” He gives Cassie a knowing look.

“Can we go?” she repeats, and I can’t tell if she’s ignoring him or if she’s missed his point altogether.

“I don’t know. I’ll have to see my hockey game schedule.”

“You don’t have a hockey game on Friday. Mom said. So we can go on Friday night. AJ can come. And Zach, too.”

“We’ll see. I have to talk to him.”

“Okay.” She pauses, stares at him. “Can you call him now?”

“No, Cassie! Right now, AJ and I are working on a project for school. I’ll call him tonight. But I need you to let us work on our project for now. Go and help Mom set the table or something. Come on, Cass …”

She finally relents, slowly easing her way down the stairs, one cautious step at a time.

Emmett groans, his head falling back to show off the jagged point of his throat. “And now I feel guilty.”

“Why?”

“Because she just wants to be included, and now she thinks we’re excluding her from something fun. She doesn’t have any real concept of this.” He casts a hand at the laptop. “Most of her work is in class.”

“We can call her back and let her listen to how boring this is,” I offer.

He rubs his hands over his face and then grabs his phone. “Lemme text Zach. See if he’s around for Friday.”

“She likes him, huh?”

“Yeah. Pretty sure she has a crush on him.”

“Really?” I’m struggling to picture Cassie fawning over a boy—like I am over her brother at this very moment. “She can’t even handle watching people kiss in movies.”

“You should see the way she blushes sometimes when he teases her.” A small smirk touches his lips as his fingers fly over his keypad. He sends the text. “Zach’s great with her. His mom works with special needs kids and he has a cousin with autism so he gets it.” His phone chirps with a response. “Cool. He’s in.”

“That’ll make her really happy.”

“Yeah … it’s kind of lame but we go every year. They have the usual carnival rides.” He chuckles. “And they have this haunted house that Cass was begging to go in for years so I finally took her last year and she lost her mind. They had to turn the lights on and guide us out through the emergency exit. I thought my mom was going to kill me.”

“Is it scary?”

“Not for me or you.” He shrugs. “She mostly goes to play the games. Every year she spots one stuffed animal that she has to win and then spends all her money trying.”

“You don’t win it for her?” I can’t help the accusation in my tone. I’m surprised.

“I used to, but we’re trying to help her boost her confidence, which means not doing everything for her. Plus, she’s not five anymore. She has to learn that things won’t always get handed to her.” He shakes his head. “Of course, she comes home from the fair in tears without a toy, and I feel like a jerk.” He pauses. “You’re gonna come, right? Friday night?”

“Yeah, sure. After the mini-meet.” I keep my voice nonchalant.

Meanwhile, my heart is racing.





13





Dear Julia,