Free Falling Fast by Sophie McKenzie Page B

was impossible. I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t watch him crooning over her any more.
    I walked out of the rehearsal room and went to the bathroom, where I took several deep breaths.
    I was just going to have to get my head around it. It wasn’t his fault. Or hers. There were kisses in the stage directions.
    I gritted my teeth. He had to ask me out. We had to have a chance to talk properly. To kiss. Maybe if we knew where we stood with each other, it wouldn’t be so hard to see him with
Emmi in the play.
    I looked into the mirror. Same old swamp-features: dull, mud-coloured hair, boring, ditchwater eyes. But there was something different about my face. God , I was positively glowing with
excitement at the thought of him. I blushed, realising how obvious it must look. Then I gritted my teeth again.
    I didn’t care if it was obvious. Flynn knew how I felt. He’d known at the party. And he liked me too. Didn’t he?
    The rehearsal ended soon after I got back. Flynn came over to me immediately. While everyone else filed out of the room he started chatting about the party, asking if I’d
got back all right. It was small talk, I quickly realised, designed to keep us where we were until the room emptied.
    At last Mr Nichols was bustling us out of the room. We followed him towards the door, waiting while he switched out the light. He ushered us towards the stairs, then hurried on ahead, distracted
by a squabble that had broken out near the bottom.
    As soon as he’d disappeared from view, Flynn grabbed my hand.
    Silently he pulled me back along the corridor to the rehearsal room. We slipped inside. It was dark, but not completely. Lights from the front of the school and the street beyond cast a yellowy
glow across the desks and the cracked lino floor. The whiteboard – lying propped up beside the door – shone like a mirror.
    We stood facing each other. Flynn’s eyes were pieces of gold, gleaming out of the shadowy lines of his face. My heart raced as he looked at me. And looked at me.
    It was incredibly sexy, and deeply, deeply unnerving.
    Go with it. Don’t say anything.
    Yeah, right.
    ‘Why can’t you do three rehearsals a week?’ I heard myself squeaking.
    ‘Interferes with my jobs,’ Flynn said softly. His eyes didn’t flicker away from mine. Not for a second.
    ‘What jobs?’ I said.
    ‘Organic vegetable deliveries two, sometimes three nights a week. Car washing on Saturdays until four, then clearing tables at a café in the evening,’ he said evenly.
‘Plus cleaning up at Goldbar’s on Sundays from ten till two.’
    He was still holding my gaze – a lion, getting ready to pounce.
    My whole body trembled.
    I couldn’t look away.
    ‘When d’you get time to do homework?’ I gasped.
    Shut up, River. Stop talking.
    ‘Sunday afternoons,’ he said. ‘And when I get home in the evening.’ He took a step towards me. I could almost feel the air between us compressing and crackling into a
zillion little sparks. ‘I don’t want to talk about homework,’ he whispered.
    I couldn’t say anything any more. All my words were lodged in my throat. I closed my eyes, feeling his head leaning down towards me, moving closer and closer.
    I gave myself up to the kiss. Soft and light and gentle. It melted through my body like butter.
    ‘FLYNN?’ Mr Nichols’ shout echoed down the corridor towards us. ‘RIVER?’
    I pulled away, turning wildly to face the door. I dimly registered that Flynn was still standing where he’d kissed me. He hadn’t reacted to Mr Nichols at all.
    The door flung open. Mr Nichols’ long, lean body was silhouetted against the bright corridor light behind him.
    He stared at us, his eyes widening. ‘What are . . . ? Get out here!’ he snapped.
    I scurried, red-faced, to the door. I could hear Mr Nichols talking in low, intense tones at Flynn to get a move on . I couldn’t hear what, if anything, Flynn said back.
    I ran on ahead, fled down the stairs and burst into the common room.