Craig. It was good to have someone else feeling the heat for once. I got a little ginger ale on my leg. It was a small price to pay, considering Craigâs fresh white tee was now an array of wet, patchy fruit juice colors.
I bent down to wipe off my leg. I overheard a girl from my gym class talking to another girl. âYeah, sheâs outside with him now. Theyâve been gone for like twenty minutes,â she said.
âOh, there he is. Do you think they, you know?â the other girl asked.
âWhatever happened to saving something for prom night?â the girl from gym class said. Apparently the girl from gym class was ticked off. I waited to see if the two girls were going to walk away so I could see who they were talking about. About sixty seconds passed before I realized that I didnât have all day. So I decided to show my face. They took one look at me and cleared out. If I wouldâve known that, I wouldâve saved myself a wasted minute.
Just then, I started to feel the burn of my three-inch stilettos. What I wouldâve given for a pair of sneakers.
âI didnât know youâd be here,â Jason said.
âMaybe you should pretend Iâm not,â I said. What if they were talking about â¦? âJason! Donât grab me like that.â I couldnât even complete a thought with this guy around. He leaned in close to me from behind with his arm around my neck. It was much less of a grab and much more of a hold that he had on me. It had been so long I couldnât tell the difference.
âLet me know when we get to checkmate,â he whispered in my ear.
I took a deep breath and began to cough. I removed his arm from my neck. There was no telling where it had been. âTry again when you donât reek of fragrance.â
I only knew one girl who bathed in Undercover Starlet ⢠fragrance as if it were lotion for a dry skin problem. How dare he think he could play me that? âI actually started to believe that â¦â I laughed uneasily. âGive my regards to Carolina. No hard feelings. Iâll consider this thing a cameo.â I shrugged it off and walked away.
âNia,â he called out under his breath.
I pretended I didnât hear him. My body must have agreed with me too, because all of a sudden I found myself bouncing to the beat of the new song âCameo.â The DJ must have been reading my mind.
He tapped me from behind. I was walking upstairs to retreat to the bathroom to do the usualâevery party, I did the same thing. I spent ten minutes in the bathroom, looking at myself in the mirror and wondering why I was even at the party. I guess I could face him first, no?
âSeems theyâre playing our song,â I said.
âWhat? Why do you say that?â
âWeâre not really meant to be. I think youâve found yourself a girlfriend,â I said.
âYou think too much. She asked me to help her with her car. It wouldnât start or something.â
âHer car? Right! Did you give her a tune-up? I bet you checked under the hood.â Was I really pretending to be jealous of Carolina?
âOkay. She kissed me, but I told her I was talking to someone.â He said that last part under his breath.
âWe donât have to talk about this. You could have any girl here. So, this is my shadow leaving the place.â I walked away from him, knowing he was probably telling the truth. I turned to him andsang, âI guess you understand why we canât be. Thought it over and this is what came to me. Youâre my cameo lover. No need for another.â I blew him a kiss.
A few minutes later, my out-of-use cell phone had received its first text message all day. I opened the message: âGame on. Your cameo lover.â
I checked the sender, and it was private. This was the second private message I had gotten this week. I didnât even have Jasonâs number saved. I was