Page 53 of Heartthrobs Don't Date Wallflowers
“I’m really okay,” I said. “Trust me, I’ll be fine on the bus and?—”
“Please,” he said. The word was so quiet, so earnest, that it made my heart melt a little. Because how could I say no when he was looking at me like a cute puppy?
Suddenly, for a moment, my heart fluttered. And I understood why fans felt the way they did. Why they could look at this boy on stage or in a video and think,I am in love with him. Poppy told me pretty much every fan had a favorite member of the band, and Zach was up there in terms of popularity. Of course, none of them were hurting too badly in that department since they were still the most famous boyband in the world, but I suppose there must be losers even in a group of winners.
But Zach wasn’t a loser, not by a long shot.
“Okay,” I said finally. “I mean, if you’re sure it wouldn’t be a problem.”
As I settled into the passenger seat, the scent of leather and something distinctly Zach filled the air, smelling just like his clothes yesterday.
Seriously, when had I memorized the scent of him without realizing?
Zach slid into the driver’s seat next to me, his movements smooth and casual, like this was just another day, nothing unusual about it. I, on the other hand, was hyper-aware of every little thing—how close we were sitting, how quiet it suddenly felt in the car. Was it just me, or was the silence getting louder?
Zach put the car in gear, and we pulled away from the curb. I glanced out the window, watching the familiar houses of our street blur past, but my mind kept bouncing between the fact that I was in Zach’s car and the weird little flutter of nerves that came with being this close to him. Was this normal? Did girls usually get rides from their neighbor-slash-boyband-member-slash-guy-who-almost-broke-their-fingers?
“You don’t talk much,” I said when the silence becameunbearable.
“Neither do you.”
“Yeah butIdon’t regularly perform to thousands of people. It’s a different standard for how shy I am.”
“Guess I save all my talking for the stage,” he said. “It’s exhausting, you know. One wrong word, and I could crush a thousand teenage hearts.”
“Oh, the weight you carry,” I teased. “So that’s why you’re quiet? Self-preservation?”
“Something like that. Or maybe I just prefer listening.”
“To what?”
He mumbled something that sounded distinctly liketo you. But that would have been ridiculous.
As we neared the school, I realized I had no clue what the next move was here. Was I supposed to just say thanks and dash the second we parked? Or would he expect, like, post-ride small talk? Was there some unspoken ride-share etiquette that I didn’t know about it?
Zach must’ve noticed my total deer-in-the-headlights panic, because he broke the silence. “You’re really quiet. Something wrong?”
I blinked, totally caught. “What? No, I’m fine. Just, uh…thinking.”
“About?”
“How you… I mean…” My brain was blank. “Do you usually give your neighbors rides to school?”
Nice one, Ivy. Truly groundbreaking conversation skills.
Zach hesitated then eventually admitted, “Not really. You’re the first.”
“Oh.”
We pulled into the school parking lot, and Zach smoothly parked right up front like he had his own reserved spot. I reached for the door handle, trying to play it off like this was no big deal at all, like my heart hadn’t just done a triple backflip. But before I could escape, he spoke up again.
“Hey,” he said, his voice softer this time. I turned, and he was giving me that same serious look from yesterday, the one that made my brain short-circuit. “You don’t have to take the bus or walk if you don’t want to. I meant what I said last night—I can give you a ride whenever you want.”
My heart went full-on acrobat mode, but I tried to keep my cool. “You don’t have to do that. I’m fine taking the bus.”
“I know,” he said, his gaze steady. “But I want to.”
Oh.
