“No need to stand on my account.”
He’s dressed in a light blue button-down shirt and black dress pants, no tie. His hair is styled with the lightest touch of gel. He’s seriously leveled up from his typical sweatshirt-and-jeans combos.
He looks really cute.
“You look nice,” he says.
I don’t know if that’s a compliment or not. Nice is a terrible word. A non-word really.
“You too,” I say.
“Thanks.”
I sit down and take a sip from my bottle of water. Nice? Nash is being so weird. I’m not sure why. Ever since the night of the storm, Nash and I talk pretty much every day. But now we’re at a stupid high school dance and we can’t even say hello without fumbling.
“Are you going to dance?” he asks.
“Oh. I don’t.”
Nash raises his eyebrows. “Really? Me either.”
It’s almost as though Nash doesn’t want to be here just as much as me.
“Halle!”
Molly and Autumn appear from the crowd of dancers, faces shiny with sweat. Yet somehow, their makeup hasn’t moved. I need to learn what this magic is. Autumn looks amazing in her compromise dress, and Molly glows in gold.
“Come dance!” Molly says.
She grabs my hand and pulls me up so I’m standing.
“No, I don’t—”
“Tell me if you’re feeling anxious and we’ll disengage. Promise,” Molly says.
She takes me by one hand and Nash by the other. Nash just looks at me and I hope he can read my face, because it says, I am getting the hell out of here as soon as Molly lets go of my hand.
Molly pulls us toward the dancing, but we barely graze the perimeter of the sea of bodies. Everyone is jumping around to the music, hands in the air, singing along to the lyrics. Molly bops her head to the music and raises our hands in an attempt to make us dance with her. Nash moves his shoulders in the most awkward fashion. My feet stay planted firmly on the ground. I shift my weight as I count the beats of the music, making sure my heart isn’t beating faster.
Sawyer joins our awkward non-dance circle.
“Wow, you two are the life of the party,” Sawyer says to Nash and me.
I fold my arms over my chest. Nash flips Sawyer off.
But Sawyer just pulls Molly away from us and twirls her like a ballroom pro. Or at the very least, like he’s seen a few episodes of Dancing with the Stars. Molly laughs so loud amid the twirls. She lands in a dip just as the song’s final notes sing through the speakers.
They are kind of couple goals right now, and Sawyer is our savior for taking her attention away from us. High-energy pop transitions to a slow song, one of Ed Sheeran’s many ballads, and Nash and I make eye contact. He gestures toward the tables and I agree, grateful. We make our grand escape, with a pit stop at the drinks table.
“Boring,” Molly shouts, her arms draped around Sawyer’s neck.
Nash sighs. “She is too much sometimes.”
I sip on a Sprite. “She thinks she wants to see me dance,” I say. “I promise that’s something nobody needs to see.”
Nash laughs. “Hey, do you want to get out of here?”
“What?” I ask.
“Well, I don’t want to be here. You seem to be having second thoughts. Why are we here?”
“Second thoughts?” I say, feeling my face get hot. “This wasn’t my idea.”
“What?”
“Molly said …” My voice trails off because suddenly, it clicks. “Oh my God.”
It clicks for Nash too. “She told me—”
“—that I wanted to go with you?” I ask, eyebrows raised.
We have been totally, completely, duped by Molly Jacobson. This is all an elaborate setup orchestrated by Molly to—what, exactly? Help Nash realize whatever feelings he thinks he has for Kels can’t be real?
Kels. Thinking about her sends my thoughts spiraling and oh my God, the gym is too hot. My dress is too tight; the lace sleeves scratch against my skin. My hair is too curly; my lips are too red. Everything is too much. Too Kels.
Nash never wanted to go to the dance with me, Halle.
“Ugh. Molly.” Nash runs his hands through his hair. “Not that this is terrible or anything, I just don’t do dances.”
“Me either. Okay, yeah, let’s go,” I say.
I text Ollie that Nash and I are heading out and to text me if he needs a ride home.
Ollie
I’ll be fine. TELL HIM.
7:45 PM
I slip my phone into my purse and Nash and I exit out the back door before Molly notices we’re gone. We run to his Prius like this is a prison break, like we’re moments away from getting caught and dragged back into the hell that is a school-sponsored party.
In the car, I ask Nash where we’re going.
“It’s a surprise,” he says.
We drive to the tunes of our car karaoke choices and I have no idea where we’re going, but it’s okay if it means I’m no longer suffocating in a high school gymnasium.
* * *
An hour later, I’m sipping the best chai latte I’ve ever tasted.
Nash brings me to the Main Street Café, his favorite coffee shop in downtown Westport. It’s a fusion between coffee shop, bar, and live music. The bar stretches along the entirety of the back wall, displaying a variety of sandwich and pastry options. Dark wood tables fill the space, each with their own display of succulents as the centerpiece. Nash and I sit at one of these tables, with a perfect view of the corner stage. It’s open mic night, and on the stage currently is a woman with dyed red hair, singing what I am convinced is the entirety of Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill album.
I keep my hands wrapped around my mug, the heat warming my cold fingers.
“This is so good,” I say.
Nash sips on his flat white.
“Yeah, this place is great. I came here a lot during my ‘musician’ phase.”
“Oh? Tell me more,” I say. Kels knows nothing about a musician phase. Nothing.
Nash laughs. “Not much to tell. I’m a self-taught mediocre guitar player, and Kat, the manager, was nice enough to let me play at open mic, so I’d take the bus in on weekends when my parents thought I was getting lessons. I sing decent enough to offset my terrible guitar technique.”
I nod to the stage. “So you brought me here to show off your skills. I see.”
“No way. It was a dumb hobby,” Nash says, laughing.
“In fourth grade, I started a knitting club. Mind you—I only knew how to knit scarves out of fuzzy yarn. But I was committed. That’s a dumb hobby,” I say.
“It’s practical?”
“Twenty-five fuzzy scarves are not practical, they’re a problem. By the end of Gentrify, U.S., I had every doc kid knitting their own scarves.”
“You were quite the trendsetter.”
“Us doc kids had to stick together.” I nod.
“That must’ve been so cool,” Nash says. “Being on the road like that. Going place to place. I’m jealous.”
I shrug. “It’s cool. But it’s lonely, too, you know?”
Nash nods. “Yeah, my friend—Kels—it’s the same for her. She’s an army brat, but she says that too.”