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Why was she being punished? What had she ever done to deserve this?
“Would you mind taking a look at it for me? And maybe giving me some notes? Just on the science part. What do you say?”
Shit. Was there any way to get out of this without being rude? “I don’t really know anything about writing movies,” she hedged. “Isn’t there someone in your program…?”
He shook his head. “You don’t need to know anything about screenwriting, I’ve got that covered. But the only person I know with any science under their belt is my buddy Greg, who was pre-med for a semester before he switched to English. He’s shit with physics though, and I need someone who knows about things like gravity and propulsion and asteroids. That’s you, right?”
Esther swallowed. “Um…” She felt her phone vibrate in her bag—thank god, an interruption. “Sorry,” she muttered. “I just need to check…”
It was a text from Jinny: Stuart’s begging me to take him back. Tell me not to get back together with him.
“One sec,” Esther said to Jonathan, mashing her thumbs against the screen as she typed her reply.
DO NOT GET BACK TOGETHER WITH CHEATING JERKFACE STU.
“Everything okay?” Jonathan asked.
“Yeah. Just trying to avert a catastrophe.” Esther looked up from her phone, into Jonathan’s eyes.
His soulful eyes.
Jinny thought he was cute. Jinny liked him.
If he asked her out, she’d say yes. And if she went out with him, maybe she’d forget about Stuart. She’d remember there were other men in the world, and she didn’t have to settle for one who was an asshole.
Jonathan was awkward and a little irritating, sure, but he actually seemed pretty nice. She’d never seen him say or do anything purposefully unkind, and he didn’t have the social skills to be manipulative. A lot of his mansplaining seemed to be his clumsy way of trying to be helpful, which could be considered sort of sweet from a certain perspective. He was the kind of guy who helped old ladies with gardening. How bad could he be?
“So, about my script…” Jonathan said, rubbing the back of his neck.
“I’ll do it if you do something for me,” Esther told him.
His eyebrows scrunched together. “Okaaay. What?”
“You have to ask my friend Jinny out.”
His mouth opened and then closed again. His eyebrows had joined into a solid stripe, like a dark, furry caterpillar. “Um…”
“You don’t have a girlfriend, do you?”
“No, but—”
“Jinny’s really nice and totally normal and beautiful.” This was all true. Socially awkward writer boy would be lucky to go out with someone as great as Jinny. And it would do Jinny good to date a guy as nice as Jonathan seemed to be.
He looked skeptical. “Then why does she need you to get dates for her?”
“Because she just broke up with a jerk and I’m afraid she’s going to take him back.”
“Isn’t that her choice to make?”
A noble sentiment, but this was a desperate situation that called for desperate measures. “I’m not trying to take away her choice. I’m trying to give her another choice. To show her there are other guys out there who like her, and she doesn’t have to date a creep.” Esther narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re not a creep, are you?”
“No!” he said, then frowned like he wasn’t sure. “I mean, I don’t think so?”
She pointed a warning finger at him. “I know where you live, remember, so if you hurt her—”
He held up his hands, palms out. There were black ink stains all over his fingers. “I haven’t agreed to go out with her yet. I don’t even know who she is.”
“She’s the one who’s always hanging around the pool with me. You saw her last weekend, remember?”
