Page 118 of Rule 2: Never Join a Christmas Dating Show
The cameras move toward Flora and Willow.
“You can act excited,” Ella says.
“This is so cool!” Flora says immediately, clasping her hands together.
“Yes. It will be intriguing to see where Luke experienced his youth,” Willow says, and though clapping isn’t something she does, the tips of her lips do swerve upward.
“You have a very special tour guide,” Sebastian says, his voice clear and unstrained, even though my heart drops.
I’m sure I know who my very special tour guide is.
One of the crew members gestures around the corner, then Bryce strides toward us. He’s wearing a suit and tie, which is weird, but I guess that’s proper attire for important assistant principals.
He flashes his flashy smile. “Welcome to Ashcove High!”
The women applaud, not needing to be prompted by Ella this time. Bryce was always great with women.
“I’m Luke’s brother Bryce,” he says, and though there’s nothing special about his words at all, he’s totally relaxed, charisma oozing from him.
Even Clark nods approvingly out of view of the camera, as if contemplating whether an assistant principal would be a good future Mr. Right candidate and wondering why he picked the wooden pro athlete.
“You look awfully similar,” Flora says.
“Oh, yeah?” Clark’s eyes dance. “I think my hands are bigger.”
He holds them up, and both women giggle.
I frown. My hands are perfectly large, thank you very much. Smallness in any department is apparently not a Hawthorne trait. Except potentially smallness of brain, but there’s no way to measure that. Maybe a brain scan could tell.
I glance at Willow, wondering whether she might know about brain scans and brain sizes.
“Perfect!” Ella says. “Did you get that longing look Luke sent Willow? He’s clearly jealous of his brother’s conversation with Willow.”
Willow and Flora send me confused looks, and I try not to look at Sebastian. I want to tell everyone that’s wrong, that I’m not jealous of Bryce and Willow, that Willow, while awesome, does not occupy my thoughts.
But I’m not supposed to say those things, and it would probably be ungentlemanly if I did, so instead an awkward silence stretches before us.
Finally, Bryce grins. “Poor little bro. All the girls getting taken away from him.”
“Well, shall we begin?” Ella asks with the forced cheer of a kindergarten teacher in a room of sleepy five-year-olds.
We all nod, and Bryce begins the tour. We follow him around as he pontificates about the building and sometimes about me. Flora and Willow soon flank him, and I trudge behind.
“You know how some kids are nerdy?” Bryce says.
“Yes,” Flora says, while Willow’s cheeks turn a shade of red that cannot be explained by her favorite Sephora blush.
“Luke was like that,” Bryce continues. “Super obsessed with hockey. Like knew all the stats. The whole history. Every team. Every player.” He shakes his head dismissively. “But since he also played, he got away with it. I mean if he’d been that obsessed about magic games or something I would have for sure given him a hard time.”
“You don’t like magic games?” Willow asks.
“I would like magic games if...” Bryce hesitates, and Willow leans closer, as if she expects my coarse older brother to suddenly start talking about his preference for a certain type of game or larger issues with rules.
I know he’s not going to say that though.
He never does.
“If?” Willow prompts.
