Page 32 of Wish For Me

CHAPTER8

Leif

ONE YEAR LATER

Noelle squints at me. “You okay?”

I rub my sweat-slicked palms on my jeans. “Who me?”

She laughs. “Yes you. Unless there’s a Christmas ghost around here I can’t see?”

“Ghosts feel like they might be less scary right now.” I don’t take my eyes off the red door we’re waiting next to. It’s festooned with paper reindeer and tinsel.

Screams echo from the other side of it.

“You sure you’re okay, Leif? You look kind of sweaty.”

“It’s warm in here, that’s all.” I rub my forearm over my brow and then tug at the neck of my sweater. It’s ridiculous, but I’m more nervous about this than telling Noelle my big news this year. And I’ve got Big News.

“You’re going to do great.”

“Easy for you to say. You’ve acted on stage in front of thousands of people.”

Noelle smiles and wraps her arm around me from the side, giving my shoulder a squeeze. It instantly calms me. Except suddenly I’m aware of the soft press of the side of her breast against my arm, and the scent of vanilla coming from her hair. My nerves jolt for an entirely different reason.

Friends. We’re just friends now.

I kept telling myself I could do the friend thing. All year I told myself I could. I had to, if I wanted to keep her in my life. But on the way over, Noelle had talked about her play with her hands gesticulating wildly as she drove. “I’m not the headliner, but the director of that other production says I could be in a year or two. Supposedly he’s a tyrant, but hesmiledat me, Leif! I wonder if maybe he could be a mentor down the road…”

She’d looked so beautiful with her cheeks flushed, smile wide, and eyes sparkling, I’d wished for the briefest moment that I’d told her to pull over. Because all I wanted to do was take her face in my hands and kiss the shit out of her.

I could still remember how she tasted.

Instead I’d agreed with her that it was incredible, and offered her a high five—a fuckinghigh five—like we were bros.

Then she’d pulled into the Quince Valley Elementary School parking lot and rubbed her hands together like some evil movie villain.

And I’d panicked.

“It’s not that I don’t like kids,” I say now. “I do. I just feel a lot of pressure with those bright, impressionable minds. And a whole classroom of them?”

Noelle tips her head against my shoulder, rubbing my arm. “They’re going to love you, Leif. A real live astronaut. Maybe. One day.”

Luckily—or unluckily—the red door swings open then, and Cora Galloway—a retirement-aged woman with kind eyes and a long blond-gray braid coiled on the back of her head—beckons us in with a warm smile. “I amsoglad you two are here!” She exclaims. To Noelle, she says, “Like I said to your mom, I’d ask my daughter to help, but she’s expecting any day now.”

Coming up with strictly platonic hangout ideas for this year was harder than I thought it would be. My best suggestion had been volunteering up at the Rolling Hills ranch where I knew they were always looking for volunteers to shovel out the barn. “There are chickens there, aren’t there?” Noelle had said, genuine worry in her voice while we hashed it out over her parents’ landline, the only time we ever talked on the phone. On purpose.

Noelle had won out by saying she had a surprise idea that was better than shoveling shit in proximity to birds. I couldn’t see what would be worse than that so I agreed to let her keep it a surprise. Now I deeply regretted that decision.

“We’re thrilled to be here,” Noelle gushes. “Right, Leif?”

Fresh sweat slicks my temples as we follow Mrs. Galloway into the big, colorful room, where we’re suddenly under the scrutiny of approximately forty-eight eyeballs. “Thrilled!” I croak.

“Children!” Mrs. Galloway says. “Everyone give a warm Division 12 welcome to our very special cookie helpers, Leif and Noelle!”

Twenty-four children cheer exuberantly. A couple even stand up and clap. I’m so shocked by the enthusiasm, I can’t help but smile.

My shoulders even loosen a little. “I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a standing ovation before.”

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