But instead of returning my smile, he stared through me like he didn’t even know me.
“Sometimes a feeling is all we humans have to go on.”
—Captain Kirk
CHAPTER TWO
After homeroom, Jaz and I split off until lunchtime. She was on the arts track while my schedule was loaded with honors courses. “Don’t stress,” Jaz said before she bolted for the arts studio. “I’m sure you’ll be sitting in his lap at lunch.”
The rest of the morning passed in a blur. Instead of taking copious notes as I usually did in my morning classes, I replayed Jake’s cold stare over and over in my mind.
When I emerged into the sunny courtyard, my stomach twisted as I caught sight of Jake eating lunch at the surfer table. Somehow I’d pictured a different scenario these past few weeks, imagining him inviting me to join his posse or maybe bringing a few of his friends to join Jaz and me at our table.
Clearly too many saccharine Disney movies had corrupted my sense of reality. Paul’s son Toff sat at the surfer table, too. He caught my eye and grinned. I forced a smile but kept walking, joining Jaz and a few of her grungy arts pals.
The artists tolerated me even though I couldn’t draw a stick figure, mainly because they thought my mom was cool and they liked to hang out in our store. Listening to them argue about where to scrounge the best driftwood and scrap metal for sculptures was a distraction from Jake flirting with the blond dreadhead from this morning.
Since I’d lost my appetite, I pushed my sandwich away. A guy I knew only as Picasso, whose outfit teetered between uber-goth and beachy grunge, snatched it up. “Thanks,” he grunted.
Jaz stopped eating her yogurt to glare at me. “Don’t do this.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Don’t turn into a pathetic, starving rejection zombie.”
I sighed in frustration. “Don’t hold back, Jaz. It’s not like I need your support right now.”
She leaned across the table. “Of course I support you. It’s him I’m mad at. I just don’t think you should give him the satisfaction of getting all mopey. He’s got one shot at making me not hate him,” she said. “If he doesn’t come over here in the next five minutes—”
“If who doesn’t come over? What’s up?” Amy turned away from the driftwood argument and focused on us, twirling a long red curl around her finger. Amy floated through school like a dreamy lovechild of Ghandi and Oprah, steering clear of gossip and drama.
She hung out at my mom’s store, too, reading, knitting, and sketching, and she helped me run the Lonely Hearts romance book club. But she didn’t know about my secret hook-ups with Jake. I’d been waiting for some sort of public acknowledgment from him before telling her.
Jaz cut her a knowing look. “Jake the Snake.”
Amy glanced between us, sizing everything up instantly. “Oh no,” she whispered. “You hooked up with him?”
Jaz nodded, her handmade feather earrings bouncing for emphasis.
“Not totally. I mean,” I dropped my voice to a whisper, “it was just um, kissing and uh…” I shrugged, embarrassed.
Amy sighed, reaching for her bag of yarn and needles. She always said knitting was her stress relief. “That sucks. I mean, he’s a totally hot hookup, but not exactly into commitment.”
“Right?” Jaz narrowed her eyes.
I shot her an annoyed look. “Weren’t you the one telling me to chase him down this morning?”
Jaz sighed, dropping her indignant posturing. “I’m sorry, Viv. I was hoping…considering how much time you two spent together…I thought this time might be different for him.”
Jake’s deep laugh caught our attention and we all turned, just in time to see him pull the blonde dreadhead into his arms and feed her a grape.
With his tongue.
Amy made a sympathetic cooing sound and handed me a bag of chips. “You should eat. He’s not worth losing your appetite over.”
Horrified, I felt tears prick the corners of my eyes. I was the star of my own breakup drama, only the other half of the breakup didn’t even notice.
I wanted to ask how I could possibly eat when the guy I thought I’d loved for years had steamrolled my heart, lit it on fire, then scattered its ashes to the sea. But instead I stuffed Amy’s chips in my mouth, not even tasting them.
...
Jaz stayed after school to talk to one of her art teachers, so I left without her. I’d just strapped on my helmet when Jake the Snake sauntered over to me, splintering off from his surfer pack to acknowledge my existence.
“Hey, Viv.” He stopped next to my bike, his eyes roaming everywhere but my face.
I glanced over his shoulder and saw the dreadhead watching us curiously. Don’t worry, I wanted to say, he’s obviously moved on.
I hated confronting people, but maybe now was a good time to give it a try. “Do I know you?” I was shocked at the tiny bit of snark that made it past the gatekeeper of my thoughts, even as my heart raced and my hands shook.
“Hey.” He raised his eyes to mine, scowling. “That’s harsh.”
I looked away from his beautiful, traitorous eyes and wound my bike lock around the handlebars, fantasizing that I was winding it around his neck instead. “Whatever, Jake.”
He didn’t say anything. Was this a lame attempt to apologize? Did he think if he stood there looking guilty I’d send him away with a few confession prayers and complete absolution? I pretended Jaz was there, poking me in the back to make sure I stood up for myself.
“M-my definition of harsh,” I said, frustrated with how squeaky my voice sounded, “is ignoring the person you’ve been hooking up with.” I glanced at him and saw his eyes widen in surprise. He definitely hadn’t expected this. I pictured Jaz high-fiving me. “Also, engaging in obnoxious PDA with s-someone else…” I felt tears threaten but refused to let them fall. “In front of me was…” I sucked in a deep breath. “Not okay. At all.”
Jaz would be so proud.
His faded camo Vans kicked at the ground, then he stared up at the sky and sighed, clearly frustrated. “Look,” he said, “hanging out with you was…just something I did because I was bored and it was summer. I figured you knew it didn’t actually mean anything. And summer’s over now, so…” He shrugged and pinned me with a cold stare.
My body flushed with anger and mortification. I was a summer fling? We were an ancient 1950s movie where perky couples played on the beach, captured forever in freeze-frame, but discontinued once the lights came back on?
He glanced at his surfer posse, and I suddenly knew why he’d done this. Because I was still Chunky Monkey—nerdy bookstore Viv—and he wasn’t about to be seen with me in the light of day.
My whole body trembled. Must not cry. I took a breath, then the words tumbled out, almost like Jaz was telling me what to say. “So I’m not cool enough for you to hang out with in public, right? It was okay to use me at night over the summer when no one was around but now…” I gestured toward his friends. Toff watched us, frowning.
Jake’s jaw tightened. “I didn’t use you.”
I swallowed my tears. I could not give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he’d hurt me. “Then what do you call it, Jake? I’m not some library book you can borrow for two weeks, then return and forget about.”
He smirked at me. “You’re weird, Viv. But you were…available. And like I said, I was bored.” He narrowed those icy blue eyes I used to dream about. “Besides,” he said, “we didn’t really do much. Nothing for you to get all territorial about like you freaking own me.”
Territorial? I squeezed my eyes shut, picturing all the ways I could kill him. Sometimes I was more like my murder-plotting mom than I realized. I opened my eyes and met his hard stare, forcing a sickly sweet smile. “This has been… enlightening, Jake. For both of us.”
He took a step back, half-turning toward his posse. “Whatever, Viv. I just wanted to, you know…”
I crossed my arms, waiting, but he didn’t f
inish his thought, so I had to do it for him. “You wanted to let me know—officially—that we’re done. So I wouldn’t embarrass you by talking to you or making actual eye contact.” I hoped he didn’t hear the quiver in my voice. I needed to bolt before he saw me cry.
He rolled his eyes and shrugged. “Like I said, we hardly even did anything.” His words cut like a knife as he drove home the message: I really had been a throwaway distraction. The worst part was that I knew he was right. If it had been anyone but me or anyone but him, I would’ve seen it coming a mile away.
But stupid me had believed all that kissing meant something. Since I’d crushed on Jake since kindergarten, I’d wanted so badly to believe he cared about me. My emotions had betrayed me, overpowering any logic, and because of it, I’d gotten burned.
Jake the Snake had just proven how he’d earned his nickname. It wasn’t only because he was a snake who stole waves from other surfers. He stole hearts, too, and crushed the life out of them.
Swallowing over the lump in my throat, I took off on my bike, pedaling as fast as I could. No one chased after me or called my name. Tears blurred my vision as I rode. I took the fast way home, riding up Main Street instead of the meandering beach path, anxious to hide out in my bedroom until I could get myself under control.
I dreaded telling Jaz because I knew she’d say “I told you so.” She’d warned me when I’d called her after our first bonfire hookup. “I know you think you love him, Viv, but you don’t even know him. Just because he’s cute—”
“Hot,” I’d interrupted. “Gorgeous. Amazing.”
“Do you hear yourself? You, who’s always ranting about how sick you are of guys only liking girls for their looks? You’re doing the same thing with him. You know his reputation.”
I’d ignored her like I’d ignored the mental warning bells the few times I’d asked Jake to meet me for lunch and he’d bailed on me. I hadn’t wanted to consider the possibility that he was using me or didn’t want to be seen with me in public because how could such an externally gorgeous person not be just as amazing on the inside? I knew the world didn’t work that way, but I wanted it to.
Right now, I felt as if the universe was punishing me for my own hypocrisy and stupidity. And I felt like I deserved it.
...
Mom’s bookstore had a prime location, smack in the middle of Shady Cove’s quaint Main Street dotted with funky stores and one-of-a-kind restaurants operating out of pastel-colored buildings that resembled life-sized dollhouses. Benches made from repurposed surfboards dotted the street, flanked by faded whiskey barrels overflowing with cascading rainbows of flowers.
We lived behind the bookstore in a house that looked a lot like our store, only smaller. Our faded blue home, surrounded by an overgrown garden of wildflowers and untended vegetables, beckoned me like a comfortable old blanket.
I started up the deck stairs to the kitchen door, but I froze when I remembered Mom wanted me at the store after school today to meet the computer genius she’d hired to automate our system.
The last thing I wanted to do was meet with some McNerd and explain our index card system to him. I pictured a skinny old guy with thick glasses and a stained Star Wars T-shirt rolling his eyes at the old school way Mom and I kept records.
Hiddles the angry feline met me at the top of the deck. He rolled on his back, squinting his eyes in the sun, which was quickly disappearing behind the usual afternoon fog rolling in off the water. When I leaned down to rub his stomach he batted a paw at my hand, claws out.
“I’d like to claw somebody, too, Hiddles. But I’m a pacifist.” In the kitchen, I grabbed a bottle of pomegranate juice, then hurried upstairs to take off my stupid hooker librarian outfit.
I hated that I’d spent so much time primping this morning for such a jerk. I shimmied out of my tight jeans and tugged on leggings, then unearthed a faded Cal sweatshirt. I felt safe in these clothes, hiding my body from anyone else who thought they could use me and discard me like an empty candy wrapper. My eyes pricked with tears again, and I sank to the floor, hugging my knees to my chest.
I would not, could not, let this devastate me. You’re stronger than that, Viv. You’re a smart, funny, enlightened feminist. Who happens to love romance novels. Who should know better than to let her hormones have any say in decisions about secret beach hook-ups. Even if the kissing was amazing.
Hormones shouldn’t even get a seat on the brain council, but mine had staged a coup this summer, taking over all rational thought and sending me straight into Jake’s muscled, traitorous arms. Everyone said that guys were the ones controlled by their hormones, but girls weren’t immune to their scary power. I’d just learned that the hard way.
My cell pinged, jarring me out of my self-pity trip.
“Need you at the shop. Bring cookies pls.”
I leaned against my bed and closed my eyes. I’d have to postpone my breakup detox for later, when I could call Jaz. If I called her.
In the kitchen, I grabbed a package of Paul Newman’s do-gooder fake Oreos, pausing to glance in the mirrored key holder. My eyes had the telltale just cried her eyes out red glow. The waterproof mascara I’d put on this morning was a perfect example of false advertising. My curly hair was a tangled mess from the bike ride home. Lovely.
Not like it mattered. I knew the regular customers and didn’t care what the coder might think of me. The only potential issue was Mom, who’d zero in on my post-crying appearance and demand to know what happened. But, of course, I couldn’t tell her because she didn’t know about Jake.
Hey Viv, clue numero uno that maybe the whole Jake thing was a bad idea: hiding it from Mom. Thank you, non-hormone-influenced brain. I grabbed a paper towel, dampened it under the kitchen faucet, and scrubbed off the mascara stains. Not much of an improvement, but it would have to do.
I entered the store through the back door, buying a few extra minutes before facing Mom. Her laughter rang out from the front of the shop, answered by a deeper laugh. Oh, no. Was the McNerd flirting with her? Gross. I took a deep breath and navigated the stacks of books in our screened-in back porch store room, passed through the tiny store kitchen, and emerged into the main store.
Years ago, Mom had remodeled, tearing down the inside walls to create an open, high-ceilinged space full of bookshelves and a few cozy reading nooks tucked into the corners. Framed photos of Mom’s favorite mystery authors dotted the walls, along with framed READ posters from the ALA. Though I didn’t stalk them the way Jaz did, who didn’t love pictures of sexy actors holding books? Nathan Fillion’s poster had a place of honor by the mystery section because Mom loved Castle and I loved Firefly.
A u-shaped counter hid our battered desk piled high with index card boxes and paperwork. We used an old cash register that required me to make change in my head, and one of those ancient credit card slider gadgets that still used carbon paper. Tourists thought we were intentionally quaint, but the truth was Mom didn’t have time to bring the store into the twenty-first century. Much as she loved the store, she loved writing her books even more, so when push came to shove, automating got shoved right out the door. Until today, apparently.
I approached Mom and the McNerd, who sat at the desk behind the counter, laughing together. Great. How was I going to fake enthusiasm when my heart was broken?
Mom glanced up. “Vivvy! There you are. I wondered what—” She paused, and I knew her Mom-scanner was assessing my bedraggled, post-breakup appearance. “What happened?” Her voice sharpened with worry. I glanced away from her, only to look right at the McNerd, who’d raised his head when Mom greeted me.
Shockingly, he wasn’t an old, skinny guy in a stained Star Wars shirt. He was, in fact, a young, buffed guy in a clean Star Trek shirt. Big difference. His short dark hair stuck up randomly, and I wondered if it was an actual style or if it was nerd hair, like he couldn’t be bothered with combing it. Nerd-hot expert Jaz might know.
I absorbed the full impact of his broad shoulders, hi
s sexy mouth curving in a tentative smile, his steady green-eyed gaze behind the glasses, and tanned and chiseled features. This guy was definitely packing a lot of cute underneath deceptively dorky wrapping.
He adjusted his glasses on his nose, his gaze moving from Mom to me and back to Mom. Hmm…glasses. A frisson of recognition ran through me.
Oh no. The guy from school who’d heard not one but two embarrassing Jake-related tongue discussions. Was today the day all my bad karma got rolled into a giant ball and dropped on my head?
“What is it, Viv?” Mom asked, reading my face like an FBI investigator.
“Nothing,” I mumbled. “But I have a lot of homework so I can’t stay long.” I could only put off my meltdown for so long.
Mom frowned. “But I need you to show Dallas our system.” She shot him an embarrassed smile. “Such as it is.”
He shrugged. “I can come back another day if today doesn’t work.”
His voice was much deeper and sexier than the nerd voices on TV.
“But I know your schedule’s busy,” Mom protested, shooting me a death glare.
“Yeah, but I’m flexible.” He glanced at me and his lips quirked. And I knew—absolutely knew—he was remembering the overheard conversations about morning tongue action. Blood rushed to my cheeks.
Mom sighed and rustled papers on the desk. “Well, I don’t know, Dallas. I hate to inconven—”
“It’s fine,” I interrupted. I would not be shamed into making the precious McNerd rework his busy schedule. Somehow I’d have to postpone my meltdown until later. I held up the box of cookies.
“Are these for you?” I looked into Dallas’s shockingly green eyes assessing me from behind the black frames. His eyes locked with mine a few seconds longer than necessary, then he focused on the box.
“I won’t say no to cookies.” He grinned and held out his hand. I transferred the package to him, careful to avoid extraneous skin contact.
Mom jumped up from her chair. “I need to get back to my research.” She glanced at us. “Do you know how many drugstore items can be used to poison someone? You’d be surprised.”
The Replacement Crush Page 2