Free Lindsay's Surprise Crush by Angela Darling Page B

when he got out of the shower, and forgot about it the rest of the day. But she could definitely tell—he had actually parted his hair, sort of. He looked amazing. Great. He was all dolled up to see Cassidy.
    She was suddenly aware of how awful she must look, with her hair in a sloppy ponytail, in her old sweatshirt and jeans. It just hadn’t occurred to her that she’d run into anyone she knew.
    â€œHey, Boy!” said Molly, staring up at Nick. “Are you Lih-zy’s boyfwend?”
    Lindsay cringed. “No, he’s just my friend,” she said to Molly.
    â€œCan you be the horsie?” demanded Kyle, who was four. He was pointing up at Nick.
    Nick grinned and got down on all fours, allowing Kyleto climb onto his back. For the next half an hour, Lindsay was able to sit back on the couch and relax, watching Nick horseplay with the kids. He let them jump on him, hang from him, ride on him. He taught them card tricks. He showed them how he could stand on his head, and of course they all had to try, with varying degrees of success.
    Finally, to settle them down, Lindsay put in a DVD for them. As the kids sat on the floor in front of the TV, entranced, she and Nick had a chance to sit down side-by-side on the comfy old couch.
    Lindsay could feel the tension in the air between them, like a live electric wire she dared not touch. She was dying to ask him what he had thought of her presentation, and what gossip everyone was saying about her, and who was going to be at the party. But she couldn’t summon the nerve. Maybe she didn’t really want to know.
    â€œI haven’t heard you play piano in ages,” said Nick, breaking the silence. “You’re really good, Linz. You should play in the orchestra or for one of the shows or something.”
    Lindsay flushed. “Thanks. But you know I hate playing in front of people. Plus I don’t really broadcast it much around school. It’s not exactly cool to brag about being able to play Chopin.”
    Nick shrugged. “I think it’s really cool. And who cares?”
    Lindsay nodded. She was remembering, in a big rush, why she liked Nick so much. He really didn’t care if things were cool or not. They sat and watched a scene on the kids’ DVD, showing two dogs in love with each other, sharing a plate of spaghetti by the light of a romantic moon. It was just a silly cartoon, but Lindsay felt her cheeks grow red watching it with Nick.
    â€œSo I guess you’ll be heading off to your party, huh?” said Lindsay finally.
    â€œI guess.”
    â€œWhy did you even come here?” she asked suddenly. The question came out like more of an accusation, even though Lindsay hadn’t meant it to.
    â€œBecause I, well, I felt like it,” he said, a little defensively.
    â€œDoes everyone in the whole school hate me?” she asked in a tiny voice.
    He looked at her, baffled. “What are you talking about?”
    Did he really not know? “Well, for starters, I didn’t even get invited to the party tonight.”
    He rolled his eyes. “It’s a soccer team party, Linz,” he said patiently. “You don’t play soccer, remember?”
    â€œYeah, well, that’s not what I heard. I heard that it’s way more than a soccer party and that Cassidy invited all the cool kids and I know she’s intentionally excluding me because she doesn’t like me and—”
    â€œLindsay, where are you getting all this bogus information?” asked Nick, looking genuinely perplexed. “Cassidy is not excluding you. She likes you.”
    Once again, Lindsay could feel her temper getting the better of her, and her words spilled out without her feeling like she could control what she was saying. “Oh, yeah, right, as if,” she retorted. “She is so stuck-up and mean and you know she was going around spreading rumors about me and—”
    â€œHey,” he said. His face