Free Rush by Eve Silver Page B

“Right.”
    “He’s got that whole dark-eyed, I’m-a-loner-even-in-a-crowd, just-try-and-get-my-attention thing going on,” she says with a sigh. “It’s hot.”
    “So maybe you should call him.”
    She taps her finger against her chin, genuinely considering it. An expression I can’t read flits across her features, sort of regretful, sort of sad. Then she shakes her head. “No, you should. I saw the way he looked at you yesterday, right after he almost got killed running in front of that truck to save you. And you’re obviously losing sleep over him. You should call. Just to see if he’s feeling okay after yesterday, you know?” She grins. “It’s the perfect excuse.”
    I stare at her. I don’t remember Luka looking at me with any emotion other than panic when he was trying to tell me not to talk about the game. And I didn’t lose sleep over him. The only person dancing through my nightmares along with me was Jackson.
    Nightmares , not dreams. I’ve never dreamed about a guy, not the way Carly means. But if I were going to, I suppose it would be someone more like Luka than Jackson, someone who didn’t boss me around and answer in riddles. Someone who didn’t make every cell in my body edgy and nervous.
    “I don’t have Luka’s cell number,” I mumble around a mouthful of Pop-Tart.
    “What about his landline? That ought to be listed.”
    I shake my head. “I checked last night—”
    “Oh-ho! So you did try to call him.”
    I ignore her blatant glee, refusing to feed the beast. “I didn’t try to call him. I tried to find his number. There’s a difference. Anyway, I couldn’t find it. He and his dad just moved back recently. So maybe it isn’t listed yet, or maybe they didn’t bother with a landline.”
    “And he’s not online?”
    “Not that I could find. Maybe social media isn’t his thing.”
    “Then you two definitely ought to be dating.” Carly smirks at me. I have a page. Doesn’t everyone? The difference is, I’ve updated mine maybe three times in the past three weeks while everyone else updates theirs at least three times an hour.
    I ignore the bait and keep my tone casual. “Who’s talking about dating? All I did was try to find his number.”
    “You should have called the specialist.” Carly whips out her phone. “Give me a few seconds.”
    It doesn’t actually take seconds, but close enough. Ten texts, three calls, and five minutes later, Carly has Luka’s cell number. Between her and Dee and Sarah, they can pretty much ferret out anything.
    “Thanks.” I stare at the number Carly jotted down. She stares at me expectantly.
    “I, um, have to think about what I want to say.” I hedge. I don’t want to call Luka right now, not with Carly here listening to every word. The things I want to ask him demand privacy.
    “You are not getting off that easy.” Carly waggles her index finger at me.
    “Fine, I’ll send a text.” I keep it innocuous—just asking if he’s okay—because Carly insists on checking it over. Once it’s sent, she breaks into a grin, throws her arms around me, and holds on tight.
    “I’m so glad you’re finally feeling better,” she whispers.
    Her words stop me cold. She thinks I’m crushing on Luka. She thinks I’m going to be able to laugh without trying again. She thinks I’ll be back to the way I was before. I feel sick because she couldn’t be further from the truth and because I can’t tell her that. I can’t tell her anything. If Luka’s right, her life might depend on my silence. All I can do is hug her back.
    Carly fishes the remote from between the couch cushions and we sprawl out under the ancient afghan my mom knit when she was pregnant with me. While we watch TV, I text people back, directing them to Carly’s page, where she’s posted her eyewitness account of what went down.
    An hour and a couple of cartoons later, I head to the bathroom to text Luka again. This time my message is a bit more insistent. An hour later,