Page 5 of Winging it with My Ex
Jett chimes in. “Well, do you go out there?”
I scoff. “Uh, no. I’m in charge. I don’t have time to paddle boat.”
Vivi nudges my arm. “I’ve got things covered if you want to have fun this year.”
Jett perks up. “Hey, we can lead by example. Maybe if they see us out there, they’ll want to join in, kind of like no one wants to dance until that first couple gets on the dance floor.”
Oh,absolutely not.“I’m sure someone else can?—”
“Chicken.” Jett bawks at me.
“Stop that!”
I hate that. Almost as much as I hate him. I’m not a chicken. “I just don’t want to paddle boat.”
He raises an eyebrow, smirking. “When did you get so stuffy?”
“I’m not stuffy.”
“You are,” Vivi says, entirely too quickly.
I gape at her. The sheer audacity that she would side with him. “Am not. I’m the queen of fun.”
“Fun-size candy bars maybe,” Vivi quips.
Jett squawks like a chicken again. “Come on Skates, show ‘em how it’s done.”
That nickname sends a four-alarm fire through my veins.
That’s how we officially met. The Bobcats were having a fan appreciation day. Everyone in the town was invited to skate. Maybe I was a little cocky. I’d been skating since I was a toddler, so I thought I’d show off. That I’d show ‘em how it’s done.
Oh, I showed ‘em. I hit the ice so hard Ibounced.I flat out ka-thunked. The humiliation as everyone—and I mean everyone—like synchronized swimmers, turned their heads to watch my humiliation unfold.
Ended up with a broken tailbone a month before my first year of high school. For the first eight weeks of my freshman year, I had to carry a donut cushion so my butt could heal.
Of course, by then it didn’t matter. I was already with Jett.
He was so sweet.
He was the first one on the ice to check on me. The first to offer a hand. And the first to ask me on a date.
Which I couldn’t go on—because I couldn’t sit.
So what did he do? He showed up at my house with a burger and a shake from the Ice-Ice Burger Barn. Said if we couldn’t go out, he’d bring the date to me. We talked, we laughed, we hung out—for four weeks straight, until school started.
That’s when he gave me the nickname “Skates.” He said we could either laugh about it or let it rule my entire freshman year—and I was way too cool to let it rule me. He made me face it with humor, not shame.
And from then on… he met me at my door every morning. Carried my books to class. Walked me to each one.
He did that every day for four years.
Because he loved me.
And I felt it. Deep in my bones. I never had to guess. He didn’t justsayit. Heshowedit.
I blink back tears.
“You okay, Skates?” he asks, softly.
