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I knew Natalie’s family was well-off—she drives a fucking Audi, for Christ’s sake—but her house is even larger than I imagined. Easily three times the size of mine. I park just outside the garage doors, glad it’s after dark and there’s a tall hedge bordering the edge of the property. The last thing I need is one of her neighbors spotting the Glenmont bumper sticker on my sedan.
I text her I’m here before climbing out of the car. She likes the message immediately.
The rapid pulse of my heart echoes in my ears as I walk over to the patio that juts off the back of her house. As a general rule, I don’t get nervous. I’m an over-preparer—when it comes to anything that matters to me. Up until now, that list started with football and ended with school. I work hard to succeed on the field and in the classroom. Those have been my priorities, and they’ve gone hand in hand. I needed good grades to get into Arlington, and I needed to do well in my classes to remain eligible to play. And when you’ve spent all your time training and studying, it’s pretty easy to tell yourself you did everything you could.
This anxiety is different. It’s the consuming flutter of a crush, coupled with knowledge of complications. Until Natalie, the times I talked with a girl—kissed her, touched her—felt like low stakes. If it happened, great. If it didn’t, so what? There was never anyone I was actively seeking out.
I drove toAlleghanyto see this girl. My presence here is an admittance she means something to me. In some ways, it’s convenient Natalie grew up with the same understanding I did. She gets the rivalry without me having to explain it.
But it also means she knows the significance of this.
I knock twice on the glass door, then shove my hands into the pocket of my hoodie. I’m looking into a kitchen as ostentatious as the exterior of the house. Expensive appliances and gleaming granite countertops.
Natalie appears a few seconds later. She’s changed out of the dress she was wearing at the coffee shop earlier. Now she’s wearing jean shorts and a tank top, her blonde hair loose.
I stare for a few seconds too long after she opens the door.
“You coming in?”
“Yeah.” I clear my throat but say nothing else as I step across the threshold into the kitchen. I glance around, noting the display of crystal and the artwork on the walls. “Nice place.”
“Uh-huh. My room is this way.”
I follow Natalie into a hallway and up a sweeping staircase. She turns to the left at the top of the stairs and walks halfway down the carpeted hall before pushing open the door.
I wait, but she gestures for me to walk inside first.
Her room is girly. Almost everything is pale pink and white—the canopy bed and the fluffy rug and the pillows. There’s a tall stack of books on her bedside table and a photo collage above the desk.
It smells good in here. Something light and floral and feminine. And like pizza, which I track to a box on her dresser.
Natalie walks past me. “Come on.”
There’s a set of French doors on the far wall. She flips a switch that lights up strings of twinkling lights, wrapped around the wrought-iron railing of a balcony. Then walks over to her dresser and grabs the pizza box along with a brown bag.
“Can you grab those?” She nods toward the stack of blankets on the bench at the bottom of her bed.
I walk over and pick them up before following her out onto the balcony. Watching as she spreads the blankets on the floor and opens the pizza box. The mouthwatering aroma of melted cheese, tomato, and oregano spreads. Natalie opens the paper bag next, revealing a few trays of sushi.
“You hungry?” she asks, sitting down on the blankets and opening the lid of one of the sushi containers.
“Yeah,” I answer, kicking off my sneakers and sitting down next to her. I heated up a frozen burrito around dinnertime, but that’s all I’ve had since lunch.
She nudges the pizza box toward me. “You like pizza?”
Since she’s only eating the sushi, I take that to mean she ordered the pizza for me. And that…that doesn’t seem meaningless. “Of course,” I answer.
I devour three slices in the time it takes for her to eat a few rolls of sushi. I’m on my fourth piece when she suddenly stands and walks back into her room. A few seconds later, she’s back, a bottle of tequila in hand.
Some mixture of apprehension and anticipation joins the pizza in my stomach.
Natalie sinks back down beside me and unscrews the lid. She holds my gaze as she takes a sip, her face screwing up as she swallows.
“You forgot the lime and salt.”
“I don’t need it.”
“What ifIwanted it?”
