He was looking for me like I was looking for him.
“Thirteen, yeah?” he rasps.
My heart skips a beat and I nod. “Yes.”
And he’s sixteen.
He’s a sophomore and I’m not even in high school yet.
Maybe that’s why he thought that I was too young for him, and I bet he still thinks that.
I don’t like it though.
I do not like it one bit.
Tightening my fist in his shirt and digging my heel in his thigh, I say, “I… It’s not that young. I-I mean I’m not, I’ve never been, very young. It’s all the books I read. I’ve always been super worldly and mature because of it. And like, my teachers and all, they’ve always called me precocious and smart. I mean,” I blush, “I think we… Idon’tthink that there’s any reason why we can’t be friends. We —”
“There’s a reason.”
“What?”
I’m not sure what he meant just then. And unfortunately, I don’t get an explanation from him because we get interrupted again.
Just like last year.
By another voice.
“Jesus, there you are.”
My eyes swivel in the direction the voice had come from, thinking that this cannot be happening again. Another guardcannotbe coming to take him away.
But it’s not a guard.
It’s a boy.
More importantly, it’s a boy Reign’s age, I think.
He stands at a distance from us and his gaze — puzzled and confused — is pinned on me. Before he shifts his focus to Reign and then lower.
To my foot.
Which I realize is still on Reign’s thigh.
Blushing furiously, I take it off and jump apart from him.
“Did I interrupt something?” the guy asks.
“No,” I quickly reply even though the question was for Reign.
I’m not sure why I’m so flustered but I am. Maybe because heisinterrupting something and the urge to tell him off for that is so strong that I had to say no.
At my answer, the guy’s eyes come back to me and he tilts his head to the side slightly. As if trying to figure out what’s going on.
It makes me self-conscious enough that I tuck my hair behind my ear.
Noticing my action, the guy says, “Hey.”
“Hi,” I say politely.