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“I said, stay out—”
“She’s fantastic, actually. Dominated on a travel league in elementary school,” Ali said. But he was staring at me with a puzzled look instead of talking straight to Aria.
“Hasn’t picked up a ball since,” Mali added, the tone of her voice lowering, saddening.
Aria’s brows crinkled, as if she wanted to say something about it, but before she did, my phone buzzed in my hand.
I looked down at it, suppressing a grin when I saw it was Charlie again. But this time, he wasn’t sending a meme or a video. He asked a simple question.
Charlie:What are you doing right now?
If he had been almost anyone else, I would have said the truth. I would have told him to come hang out with us.
But he wasn’t anyone else. He was a secret. A lie by omission to my friends.
I could trust Ali and Malia. Even if I hid this whole thing with Charlie from them, they would forgive me. They were like that—forgiving. Though it had taken a while for Ali to forgive me after what I did to him and Aria, he was still there. He would understand.
But Aria… Charlie couldn’t come over while she was here. She was part of the popular girls’ club, whatever that was now that the Queens of Fairview had basically disbanded. They thrived on gossip, regarding the Fairy Godmother as their Bible of sorts.
I couldn’t let Aria know. Not unless I wanted to be on the Fairy Godmother front pages again. I tried my hardest to stay as far away from there as possible.
What I wanted to do was hop up and head for the door. But that would look suspicious. They were already all onto me about having a crush, thanks to Malia planting that thought in their minds.
I had to distract them. I had to make a diversion of some sorts.
But I was fresh out of ideas.
“So, the bonfire. Any Fairview freaks daring to show their faces?” That was the wrong thing to say with Aria in attendance. “Not that… I meant… well, you’re not… oh, you know what I meant. Wrong choice of words, sorry.”
Ali looked ready to fight me until the last word came out of my mouth. I didn’t apologize often, but I did when I was mistaken. Even though Aria fit into the Fairview freak category, being a Fairview princess herself, I still shouldn’t have said it out loud.
Aria was nice. But I didn’t trust her any more than I did any other Fairview kid.
Except Charlie, that was. It was then that I realized how much I trusted him. I didn’t know why, but it felt like he had earned it recently.
I looked back down at my phone while Ali and Malia sorted out details about the bonfire.
Me:At a friend’s, just hanging out.
Charlie:I have an idea for our next date.
Me:Aren’t you sick of dates by now?
Charlie:Never. Mom always taught me that you should never stop dating those you love.
I paused, my fingers hovering over the phone screen. Did he say…? Did he mean…?
No. He didn’t love me. It was only a phrase. Something his mom told him. Another reminder that love was real and whatever.
He wasn’t in love with me.
I wasn’t in love with him.
We were having a good time hanging out. That’s all it was. Spending time with a new friend.
Wasn’t it?
Chapter 22
