Free The Boyfriend App by [email protected] Page A

sweat and man-cologne: like if you combined how Brad Pitt would smell in Babel and Meet Joe Black . I tried to get my breathing under control as he unloaded a chemistry textbook. His bicep flexed as he opened the book and I tried not to watch.
    “I don’t understand ionic bonds,” he said, his voice gruff. He wouldn’t look at me. He just stared at the textbook.
    Please, God, let my voice work .
    “Well,” I started. One word went okay. Now I needed to string together a few at a time. “Ionic bonds are formed between two chemicals with oppositely charged ions.” Success . “So, like, take table salt.”
    “Sodium and chloride,” Xander said.
    “Exactly. Sodium and chloride are all the way at opposite sides of the periodic table. But opposites attract.” I couldn’t help myself. It had to be said. “In chemistry. And sometimes in real life.”
    One hundred thirty-two more days. Why not?
    Xander looked up. I got lost in those almond-colored eyes. Shades of green came to life now that the sun was streaming into the cafeteria. A little like almonds covered in mold, but not in a bad way.
    I dropped my glance back to the periodic table. “An ionic bond is considered a bond where the ionic character is greater than the covalent character.”
    “I get it,” Xander said quickly.
    He did?
    Xander ran a hand through his buzzed blond hair. “Audrey, listen. About the other day, with Blake. I should have—” But right then his lacrosse cocaptain, Woody Ames, rounded the corner drenched in sweat. He slammed another guy with his lacrosse stick, making me glad to be a girl. “Like I said, I think I got it,” Xander said suddenly. “The opposites attract thing.” He stuffed his textbook into a black EMS backpack. I didn’t want him to leave. I wanted to know what he was going to say.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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    chapter eight
    “I f this date goes well, you’re going to need it,” Lindsay said an hour later when she took @TheBoyfriendApp live on Twitter. We were in my bedroom, eating Twizzlers. “And are you ever going to take down that kitten poster?”
    We’d already dissected Xander’s weird half sentence, which Lindsay couldn’t interpret either. Mindy and Lindsay thought Xander was hotter than hot. Still, I never told them what happened freshman year with him. I didn’t know how to put it into words. Nothing had even happened . It just felt like it had—to me, at least.
    Besides, not telling them meant we were all on the same Xander-level. Easier to obsess over him that way. Easier to distract Mindy and Lindsay from my other feelings, which was crucial to my survival.
    One hundred thirty-two more days.
    Lindsay and I argued over the wording of my Twitter bio (I wanted: Audrey McCarthy’s Public Mobile Application Contest Entry. Lindsay wanted: Make Love on your buyPhone ) until we finally compromised on: Find Love with Audrey McCarthy’s Debut Mobile Application: The Boyfriend App! We entered a URL linking my entry on Public’s website for download.
    Lindsay wouldn’t talk about what happened at lunch between her and Nigit. “Only time will tell if your app is legit,” she said instead, dismissing me with a wave.
    She took off to get ready at her house and I stared at Hector the Computer. Something felt off during Xander’s tutoring session. It was like he didn’t really need tutoring.
    My fingers itched to hack and figure it out. There’s a known flaw in Harrison’s website code involving the login authentication, which I could exploit, thereby able to dump the database and search Xander’s first-semester chemistry scores to find out what was really going on. Whether he was faking it.
    I know how bad that sounds. But I didn’t buy that Xander didn’t get ionic bonds. When I’d said table salt , he’d jumped right in with sodium and chloride .
    And I remembered him being smart freshman