“I think I might’ve gotten myself into hot water. He’s so zero to a hundred.” I slice through butter, crumbling it with my flour and salt to make a batch of pastry dough. By the time I’ve baked through my feelings, I’ll have enough for a full on bake sale. Maybe French club can host a fundraiser this week. “I mean, I’m crazy to agree to this whacky boyfriend and girlfriend thing with Connor, right?”
Maisy loses her balance and tumbles out of the handstand. “What!”
“Uh—”
Shit. I got wrapped up in talking while I was baking on autopilot. The plan was to tell her about the mistaken number debacle and keep Connor’s name out of it.
Maisy freaks out, kicking her limbs in the air in a goofy dance. “Thea Kennedy has a boyfriend! What! And it’s Connor fucking Bishop!”
She devolves into squealing while I shush her, frantically trying to muffle the volume on the iPad before Mom overhears from the other room where she’s watching a docuseries on a big cat zookeeper.
“Shh, jesus!” I make a pained face as I flail my butter and flour covered hands around the iPad. “Oh my god, I’m going to end you! Please be quiet!”
“Okay.” Maisy sits up, leaning toward her phone. “But for real?”
Blushing, I say, “Well, yes and no? It’s not real. We’re pretending. His idea.”
“Tell me everything, girl!”
I laugh and wipe loose curls back from my forehead with my forearm, hesitating to figure out what to say.
Because that’s the thing—I can’t tell her everything. This is only the second time, ever, I’ve wanted to hide anything from her. She’s my best friend and we’ve never held back from each other. We’ve pretty much been synced up on the same monthly cycle, both getting our first periods within days of each other the second summer at camp. Good times.
Despite our open friendship and deep connection, the only other time I’ve kept something from her was when I had my online boyfriend. I was vague on the details, calling Henry a pen pal instead.
Checking around the corner to make sure Mom is still absorbed in her show, I keep my voice low. “So, he asked—well, no. He’s Connor,” I start, laughing nervously. “He
demanded I pose as his girlfriend because he doesn’t date and doesn’t want a real one, but he’s got my pictures so what am I supposed to do? It’s not like I knew I was texting those photos to him. Now he says I’m his until graduation.”
“What? Why?”
“Right?” I shake my head. “It doesn’t make any sense. I told him to pick someone else, but he, uh…was really convincing.”
I suck on my lips, ignoring the tendril of heat when I think about how close I was to kissing him.
Maisy squints at me, her face filling more of the frame as she scoots across her floor. “You know his reputation, don’t you?”
Sighing, I nod. “Yeah. Anyway, he wouldn’t tell me when I asked for details. It kind of made me mad.”
As I add cold water and mix the ingredients into a sticky dough, my anger grows. I frown when I look down and find I’ve taken it out on my dough. I pat it in penance.
“Sorry,” I murmur.
“Are you talking to the food again?” Maisy snorts. “Goob.”
“That’s not what you say when I feed you my rustic tartlets.”
Maisy moans and rolls onto her back, folding her hands over her stomach with a blissful expression. “They’re so good. Screw school. We’ll run away together, head for Venice Beach. You’ll open up a trendy bakery, and I’ll teach yoga. We’ll live in a really shitty one-room apartment, but it’ll be close to the ocean, so who cares? It’ll be glorious.”
My breath puffs out on a laugh at her elaborate fantasies of leaving Ridgeview in the dust. “Yeah, I’ll make you some soon.”
“Goddess.” Maisy blows a kiss at the screen. She pops up on her elbows. “Ugh. Mom’s calling. I’ve got to go.”
I grimace in sympathy. Both of our mothers are a lot to handle. “Good luck, girl.”
After she ends the video call, my thoughts turn as I roll out and turn my pastry dough. A new sense of purpose fills me. I’m determined to get to the bottom of why Connor is so adamant he needs me by his side.
Fifteen