I glance at Sawyer in the passenger seat beside me. He’s moving his head to the music as well, his crazy curls bobbing as he taps his fingers on his knee. His foot is resting onmy dashboard, his clown feet shoved into a pair of high-top Converse. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him in any other shoes. If we’re not on the court, he’s wearing his Converse. He has a variety of pairs in every color of the rainbow, and they’re all beat-up, scuffed, and well-loved.
I glance at his curls again. He put blond highlights in them at the beginning of the summer—went for a frosted-tip look—which we hassled the shit out of him for. Charli laughed and said he should have gone for red, and then we could have called him Sideshow Bob. Hilarious.
Checking the rearview mirror, I glimpse Charli’s animated face as she says something to make Nix laugh. With the music playing, I’m only picking up snippets of their conversation. All I know for sure is that they basically haven’t stopped talking since they got into the back seat of my ride.
I’m still trying to decide how I feel about Charli’s little friend. She’s seriously the size of a peanut compared to the rest of us. Everything about her is petite, from her little pixie nose to her tiny fingers. She’s got short hair to match the rest of her body. When I was loading up the car and she came to stand next to me, she only just reached my shoulder. Teeny-tiny.
But she’s got a personality the size of the freaking Burj Khalifa. I sometimes wonder if she puts on that feisty front to make up for the fact that she’s little, especially when she hangs out in a land of giants. I mean, Charli’s short compared to all of us, but she still towers over Nix. But Pixie Girl’s got bite. There’s enough pit bull in her to scare off a WWE wrestler, I swear.
I’m not gonna go messing with that.
Although… when she was helping me load up the car before we left, I definitely felt something spark between us. Not to sound like a sappy teenage girl or anything, but our hands brushed at one point, and I swear I felt it all the way to my core.
I glanced at her, and she shot me a quick look before turning her back to reach for the next bag. It gave me a chance to check out her ass in those cut-off jean shorts, and damn… that girl is sporting a cute little heinie. My palm could easily cover one whole cheek, and do you think I’ve been able to stop thinking about that?
Nope.
And shit.
It’s fucking annoying.
I should really steer clear of the little pit bull. She’s got bite, and I’m not about to put myself in harm’s way.
But… there’s something about her feisty spirit and hot little body that I am finding irresistible.
Checking the road again, I glide the car up the hill before glancing in the rearview mirror once more. Nix catches me looking, her bright eyes sparking as her lips twitch into a little smirk.
“Can I help you with something?”She doesn’t say it out loud, but I can hear her thinking it.
Her gaze is filled with challenge, like she’s daring me to take her on.
I look back to the road, my own lips twitching. Should I do it? This weekend could be fucking amazing.
Or a disaster! Don’t go there, man.
Sensing my best friend’s stare, I glance at him, and he snickers as soon as our eyes connect.
Okay, so he knows what I’m thinking.
He always does.
We’ve been friends since kindergarten.
And when I say friends, I really mean brothers. We connected on our first day and have been inseparable since. He lived next door to me growing up, and I’m pretty sure he spent more time at our place than his.
Sometimes, we’d even wake up in the morning and find him asleep on the floor in between my bed and Charli’s.
He hates it when his parents fight. Couldn’t handle it when he was little, so he’d run to our place.
At one point, his parents split up for a while, and things were way calmer. We didn’t find him in between our beds anymore, but he’d still come over every morning and then be at our place after school. When his parents got back together again, it wasn’t so bad… but an explosion would still happen every now and again. Even after we moved farther away, Sawyer would show up on his bike, climbing through my bedroom window and making himself comfy. Charli moved out of my room when she was like twelve, but Mom kept a spare bed in there for Sawyer.
I’m pretty sure my parents figured they have three kids, and it doesn’t bother them one bit. They adore Sawyer. Hell, we all do.
He’s just one of those guys who’s easy to like.
We’ve never had a fight. Sawyer justwill notget mad. He’s an easygoing guy who can laugh off any angst. The only time I ever saw him lose his shit was in middle school when Ricky Steinbeck shoved Macy Hopman into the pool. She couldn’t swim and started panicking. One of the teachers jumped in to get her, and Sawyer went after Ricky like he was an assigned target. Gave the kid a bloody nose and was nearly expelled from school over that one. Thankfully, Sawyer’s dad managed to talk the principal around, but it was touch and go there for a minute. He got suspended for a week and grounded, so I wasn’t allowed to see him. Charli and I hated every second of it, but after his release, he came over and told us why he couldn’t handle seeing Macy nearly drown.
Shit.
