“I forced a smile. It was the one I'd been practicing all morning. It felt tight at the edges and brittle everywhere in between.”

“I tilted my chin up a fraction. "You can't f-force me to stay here." I'd only agreed to come this far because I didn't want to stand out in the downpour, for one, and I had high hopes of finding a phone, for two. "That sounded more like a question than a statement," said Patch. "Then ans-s-swer it."His rogue smile crept out. "It's hard to concentrate on answers with you looking like that."I glanced down at Patch's black shirt, wet and clinging to my body. I brushed past him and shut the bathroom door between us.”

“Have you finished your column for tomorrow's headline?" It was Vee. She came up beside me, jotting notes on the notepad she carried everywhere. "I'm thinking of writing mine on the injustice of seating charts. I got paired with a girl who said she just finished lice treatment this morning.”

“I squinted at the cue ball, then at the triangle of balls farther down the table. “You’re a tiny bit off,” I said.I felt him smile. “How much you want to bet?”“Five dollars.”I felt him give a soft shake of his head. “Your jacket.”“You want my jacket?”“I want it off.”

“Being with you never felt wrong. It's the one thing I did right. You're the one thing I did right.”

“One more secret smile. One more shared laugh. One more electric kiss. Finding him was like finding someone I didn't know I was searching for.”

“Just then Patch ambled through the front door. I did a double take to make it was really him. I hadn't expected him to come. We'd never resolved our fight, and I'd pridefully refused to take the first step, forcing myself to lock my cell phone in a drawer every time I was tempted to call him and apologize, despite my increasing distress that he might never call either. My pride immediately turned to relief at the sight of him. I hated fighting. I hated not having him close. If he was ready to mend this, so was I.A smile flickered across my face at the sight of his costume; black jeans, black t-shirt, black face mask. The latter concealed all but his cool, assessing gaze."There's my date," I said. "Fashionably late.”