Page 48 of Apparently, I’m Torture

This was supposed to be about helping her. She was in trouble, she asked for help, I offered. That was all this was supposed to be. Why couldn’t I control myself and focus for more than a minute?

“Hey, can you grab a muffin?” Tristan repeated.

“Uh, oh yeah. Sorry.”

He eyed me, handed me my coffee and said, “Come on, Shawn, you’re not going to be much help to Lilly tonight if you can’t get your head on straight.”

Wasn’t that the truth.

Now

Chapter 19

Lilly

Wednesday Afternoon

Verra Convention Center

“Butterflies can taste with their feet,” I laughed, lowering my hand as I watched Shawn fight a smile.

We were in the meeting room, having our weekly staff update. Three weeks in, halfway done with the fundraiser, and I’d finally gotten a handle on things.

Thanks to Stacey, my tutor problems were sorted. Mrs Hernandez was actually, get this, happy to have Kya tutoring her daughter. I mean, it wasn’t great that when I showed up to Mrs Hernandez’s apartment to introduce the two, Jessica opened the door and eyed us both with a look that said are you kidding me?

That girl did not want to spend a chunk of her life studying, let alone studying at a prestigious school. But my hands were tied. As much as I loved my students, I could only influence their lives so much. It wasn’t my place to pull her mom aside and tell her to get her head out of her ass so she could finally listen to her daughter.

Besides, my job was hanging by a thread, and now it wasn’t. I was killing it at the fundraiser, nailing my merch-tasks, and was almost done with Trevor’s module. Everything was coming up Lilly.

And this truce between Shawn and I was actually pretty fun.

I had this theory that people were able to change a lot of small things about themselves. They could spread their roots as they learned and grew. Kind of like a tree. Our leaves could change color, wilt and grow again, just like our habits, likes, dislikes and tolerances.

But some things never changed, and those things made up the beefy, barky trunk of who we were.

Like me. I would never stop loving animated movies. I would always lean heavily on music to soothe my ruffled feathers. I would always dance like no one was watching. And I would always, always be the kind of person who tried their best to help others.

How was this relevant to my truce with Shawn?

Well, back when we worked together, he was the goofiest, funniest guy I’d ever met. Forget his incredible smile and his rock-hard abs. Forget his towering height and his effortlessly perfect hair.

His sense of humor? That was rooted in who he was. That was the part of him that had spread branches.

He was also smart, reliable and logical, and of course those were important barky bits of him too. But ever since our truce started, he was showing me small snippets of his old self, his old humor, and I was relishing it.

“Well, that is news, I guess. Thank you… Miss Fares?” He had to bite his bottom lip to stop himself from laughing, and there was a ripple of satisfaction as I leaned back in my chair with a big, ridiculous smile on my face.

From the corner of my eye, I noticed Stacey’s clenched jaw, and figured, judging by the pensive way she stared down at her notes, that she still wasn’t happy with me. I wasn’t sure why. She was the one who got to go home with him every night. Not me. It wasn’t like I was trying to seduce my old workmate with random facts here. I mean, could that even work? Probably not.

“So, if there are no further issues, or pieces of news to share, I’d say we’re on track. Well done everyone. This fundraiser is well on its way to success.”

A handful of teachers started clapping, and Mia and I stared at them with tilted heads. This was the first meeting I’d been to, so I wondered if they usually did that. Then Mia shared a sidelong glance with me and started clapping too, so I… joined in. Well, by then I guess it was weird not to.

An uncontrollable-but-short burst of laughter shook Shawn’s shoulders, and I giggled as he locked eyes with me. I just knew he wanted to tell me how ridiculous this was. That teachers clapped anytime he said something. That he was the great Shawn Jackson, and that teachers revered him everywhere he went.

Chairs groaned as people stood, and I stood too as I dragged a pink cake box toward myself.

“Guys, before we all go, is it okay if I steal a bit of your time?” I asked.