What You Always Wanted (22 page)

I stop straightening a row of chairs and blink, my head cocked to the side as I try to figure out if I heard her right. “Uh, no. I don't think so.”

“I need M&M's.”

“I suppose you also want me to pick out all the blue ones, or something ridiculous?”

She puts her hands on her hips. “Like I want you touching anything I'm going to eat.”

I flash her my teeth in a sarcastic smile and blink a few more times, with no intention of hunting down candy just for her. I may be in charge of the greenroom tonight as part of my extra credit, but I'm not a personal assistant to a movie star.

Mrs. Morales's voice calls out from the room entrance. “I'm about to let our audience take their seats. Rica, get back behind that door, and everyone else, get where you're supposed to be, please. Show starts in fifteen minutes.”

Rica disappears and I head for the last row reserved for students in theatre classes and claim a seat beside a younger girl I don't know. We smile at each other, but I'm saved from having to start a conversation when Brian plops into the empty aisle seat on my other side and hands me one of the programs we just spent the last hour folding and stapling together.

“I know what you're thinking,” I tell him.

“Yeah?” He unzips his navy hooded sweatshirt. “You're thinking about how annoying it is that when it's cold outside it's hot inside?”

“Well, now I am, but no.” I point to the cast list on the program.

“Could have been us.” He reaches toward me like he's about to pat my leg or something, then changes his mind.

“Should have been.” I twist in my seat and wait until his eyes find mine. “Have I apologized recently? Because I'm so, so, so sorry. We had it, and I ruined it.”

“Don't beat yourself up over it for my sake. I think Ryan would have gotten the part anyway. He's really good.”

“You're better at the funny,” I offer quietly, so no one overhears.

He looks away from me but smiles, biting a fingernail. “Did you watch any of their rehearsals?”

“No,” I huff. “I don't even want to watch it now, but whatever.”

“Just focus on Ryan. We're here for him, not her.”

I sigh, crossing my arms. “I know, I know.”

“And I brought him flowers for the curtain call,” he says with a laugh. “Some really girly-looking pink and white ones.”

“Oh, that's great!” I smile. “I should have gotten some for Sarah for directing.”

“We can divide them up if you want.”

“Are you sure?” I ask, and he nods. “Where are they?”

Brian looks around on the floor. “Shoot. Left 'em in my car.” He stands and tugs his sweatshirt around him. “Be right back.”

I thumb through the cream-colored pages of the program without really reading the ads, but my heart flutters when I spot a half-page promo for
Crazy for You
at the playhouse next month. I want to shout to everyone taking their seats around me that I'll actually be in that one. And maybe someone will bring
me
flowers.

“You look jealous,” says a familiar voice.

Jesse's standing over me, dressed in a green shirt with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, as usual, and thumbs hooked on the pockets of his distressed jeans. His dark hair spikes up every which way, and I wonder if he spent half an hour getting it to look that perfect or if he just ran a hand through it.

“I'm not jealous, I'm . . . disappointed. In myself.” The program falls out of my hands and flutters to the floor, where I leave it. “And I'd rather not be here,” I mutter.

“Me neither.” Jesse sits next to me, settling in like he's planning to stay there for the whole performance.

“Brian was sitting there,” I say.

“You want me to move?” He faces me as the houselights cut off, daring me to answer with that smug smile of his.

My mind takes me back to that dream where I was dancing with Gene and suddenly he turned into Jesse, and I'm thankful I'm sitting down. And I'm glad it's Jesse next to me and not Brian.

I shake my head. “So why are you here? I thought this wasn't your thing . . . anymore.”

“Mom likes the support, or whatever.”

“That sounds so sincere.” I snort.

“Hey, I came, didn't I?”

Brian reappears as the music intro plays through the speakers, a mass of assorted flowers in hand. He looks from me to Jesse with his mouth hitched to the side, one of his cheeks puckering.

“That's my seat,” Brian says.

“I told him that,” I'm quick to say, so he doesn't think I had anything to do with it.

Jesse shrugs.

“Come on, man,” Brian says, clearly annoyed. “Just go sit somewhere else.”

“Nah, I'm good.” Jesse rests a boot over the opposite knee. “If you wanted to sit by her so bad, you shouldn't have gotten up.”

“Whoa,” I say, turning to Jesse in surprise. “I'm flattered to be worth your time.”

“Shut up,” he fires back through a laugh.

Brian throws me one last glance for help, but all I can do is mirror his puckered expression, secretly thrilled two guys are practically fighting over who gets to sit next to me. He gives up and sidesteps past us to the end of the row, and Jesse crosses his arms and sinks deeper into his chair, satisfied.

“What are you doing tomorrow?” Jesse asks as the music plays on but the actual show has yet to start.

“I don't know,” I answer, staring at a girl's wavy hair in front of me. “It's Saturday, so probably sleeping in. Why?”

“Feel like a bonus practice session?”

My eyes widen. “For realsies?”

His body shakes once as he swallows a laugh. “Yeah. For
realsies
. I'm free in the afternoon if you are.”

I look at him and he's making this face I've never seen on him, eyes soft and almost . . . hopeful? Maybe he misses dancing more than he let on.

I can work with that.

“Sure. Tomorrow.”

The stage lights brighten, and Rica once again bursts through the door to the living room of the tiny one-bedroom apartment, humming a melody, filling an empty paint bucket with invisible water for a bouquet of flowers.

I lean toward Jesse to comment on the set and our shoulders press together. He tilts his head down to hear me, and I find myself staring at his ear, my thoughts gone. His ear, of all things. We all have them, they're nothing special. I move even closer, hoping that if I lose focus on it, I'll remember what I was going to say, but I still haven't said a word and he turns
to look at me without warning. Our cheeks brush against each other, and we pull away slowly. A tremor shoots down my spine to my toes.

Don't look at his lips, don't look at his lips. Look at his eyes . . .
which are looking at my lips.

No.

I redirect my attention to the play and do my best to keep it there, laughing at all the right places—at Ryan's lines more so than Rica's—and occasionally glancing at Jesse for reactions, which he doesn't have many of. At intermission, Brian switches seats with the girl on my right, and I notice that every time I chat quietly with him about how weird it is to see Ryan in a suit, or laugh with Brian at the way Rica keeps drawling out “Paul” like “Pawl,” Jesse gets fidgety. He uncrosses or crosses his arms, stretches out his legs, or rests his elbows on his knees to support his head in his hands.

“You look bored out of your mind,” I whisper to Jesse.

He leans in close so no one else can hear, almost turning his head to the back wall. “Why did you bring me here? Next time, I'll decide what we do with our Friday night. The lead actress is awful.”

He's lying—she's sickly talented—but I fight a smile and whisper, “Positively ghastly.”

“You and your silly words. Do I need to open my dictionary app again?”

He reaches for his pocket as if to take out his phone, but I clutch his wrist.

“If you mess with your phone in the middle of this play I will smack you.”

“Promise?” Twisting his arm over, he slides his hand into mine and gives it a quick squeeze.

I'm paralyzed with fear that he thinks I was trying to hold his hand, and that he won't let go. That he
will
let go.

Ugh, why is that kiss still haunting me?

His mouth is at my ear in an instant. “Do you want to get out of here?”

“Is something going on with y'all?” Brian asks in my other ear.

“No!” I whisper a little too loudly, making the girl in front of me shoot me a look. I steal my hand back and hide both of them in the big front pocket of my sweater.

Jesse stands, and I realize he doesn't know Brian said anything, or that it was him I was answering. That my mind was determining if I'd still get my extra credit if I left now.

“Your loss.” Jesse leans down to add, “See you tomorrow.”

He slips behind our row of seats. And maybe it's just from his body as he sneaks past, but I feel something brush against my hair, and I find myself hoping he touched it on purpose.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Me:
Why is kissing so awesome?

Sarah:
Did u kiss someone else? WHOOOO?

Me:
No.

Sarah:
Oh, ur still living off Jesse's kiss?

Me:
It's all I have. But what has been sampled cannot be unsampled.

Sarah:
LOL thought u weren't counting it???

Me:
Ugh. I lied.

Me:
WHY WAS IT SO AWESOME?

“No texting in the car,” Jesse says, bopping the underside of my arm so my phone flies out of my hand and flops onto the floorboard.

“Rude!” I laugh and bend as far as I can, but it's closer to Jesse than it is to me. “And that only applies to the driver.”

He turns into the parking lot of the playhouse.

“Maybe I should make you drive,” he says. “Then I'll sit in the passenger seat and text away. See how it makes
you
feel.”

“How should it make me feel?” I glance at him while undoing my seat belt, ready to make a dive for my phone.

But then he says, “Ignored.”

I blink, waiting for him to laugh, which he doesn't. Confusion swirls with fear that he's going to see my last text to Sarah.

“My most humble apologies,” I say, with exaggerated formality. “If you want to talk, talk. I'm sitting right here next to you just like I do every day.”

He shuts off the ignition and stares at the dash. “Forget it,” he finally says.

My phone chirps and I can see that the entire text conversation with Sarah is still open, the screen as bright as the surface of the sun. I hold my breath.
Don't look. Don't look.

In slow motion, his arm extends, his hand opens, and he reaches for my phone near his feet. It's probable my brain will explode from the telepathy I'm screaming at him not to look. But if I verbalize it, he'll definitely loo—

He looks. His lips purse like he's organizing his thoughts. Another alert dings and I snatch it from him without warning, terrified to see the new message I know he saw:

Sarah:
Maybe Jesse will kiss u again. R u w/ him now?

The endless possibilities of everything he could say hang in the silence between us, and I prepare myself for the onslaught
of comments confirming I just successfully inflated his already giant head. Somehow he keeps himself from saying anything at all. There's no way he could be mad. We didn't text anything even remotely offensive.

Unless he's completely repelled by the idea of kissing me again. Maybe I really was awful compared to the other girls.

Oh, no. That's it.

I'm a repellent.

Without replying to Sarah, I turn off my phone and stow it in my backpack, which I sling over a shoulder as I slide out of the truck. Jesse's already at the front door, one arm raised high to hold it open for me. I duck underneath and into the musty cool air as Jesse's cell phone rings. Instead of the basic ringtone, the ominous two-note riff from
Jaws
breaks the silence of the hallway. Instinctively, I glance around us with a watchful eye as if there could really be a shark or something else sinister lurking about.