Page 75 of Don't Hate the Player
“Mom,” I say as calmly as I can with a body biochemically primed for skydiving, “who is downstairs?”
“I didn’t catch all their names; they’re a real motley crew. Penny’s with them. She brought your homework. We talked for an hour before I came up to get you. Didn’t you hear the doorbell ring?”
Oh, she’s enjoying this. Mama Romero, or Coach Romero or whoever’s sitting on my bed today, is always two steps ahead. I don’t know who’s waiting for me downstairs, but whoever they are must have worked something far more powerful than necromagic on both of my parents. Mom didn’t come up here to punish me; she wanted to hear my side of the story.
“Romeros don’t lose . . . ,” I say quietly.
“We don’t. Emilia Romero stinks, though, so I’ll give you a few minutes to change. Hamster cage, I’m telling you.”
Well, what am I supposed to do about it now? Once Mom leaves my room, I rip my T-shirt off and run to my closet. The irony of suddenly having too many choices is not lost on me. Mom didn’t say outright that Jake was downstairs, but now that she’s opened up the possibility, I know it’s true. I know it was him. No one else could have told her how I feel because no one else knew! Here’s a shirt. It’s blue, whatever. Bra first; don’t want to show up tits akimbo in front of Jake and Penny and whoever else is down there (Matt?).
By the time I stuff my legs into a clean-ish pair of leggings, I can smell coffee brewing downstairs. One peek under my window shade shows me it’s late afternoon, which makes it a weird time for coffee, but I’m not going to complain. Dad defaults to making coffee for guests regardless of whether they want some or not. They’re lucky he hasn’t started stuffing chunks of cream cheese and guava jelly into premade pastry; he’ll send everyone home with snacks if they give him enough time. I should put on mascara. That will look very obvious. Jake doesn’t care about mascara. Or maybe he does. He’s never seen me without it.
Forget it, I’m too excited. I half run, half stumble down the stairs and turn toward the kitchen, and that’s when I see them. All of them, up close for the first time.
Bob’s legs are so long that his feet touch the ground when he sits on the counter-height stools on one side of our kitchen island. Ki’s are not; her tiny feet are swinging above the ground as she cranes her neck to watch my dad make coffee with his sock drip. Penelope is sitting on the third stool, swiveled partially around to face the people sitting at the kitchen table. I have to step in farther to see who’s there. Penny, looking serious. Matt, looking lost but happy to be here. Mom, spreading out a pile of homework across the kitchen table, and, of course, the boy downstairs.
Jake has his glasses off to clean them on the corner of his blue Unity jersey—they’re all wearing their jerseys—so he doesn’t notice me until he puts them back on. When he does, he smiles. Hello, Jake’s dimples. I missed you.
“Em,” he says. The room goes quiet. “Sorry I couldn’t come soon—” He stops when Penny shushes him. Every eye turns to Bob. The last time I saw him, he looked like he was trying to summon enough laser power in his eyes to burn me alive, but when he swivels his stool around to face me, his handsome face is fixed in an expression of cool appraisal.
“Emilia Romero, aka KNOX,” he begins dramatically. “I’m Bob Quince. This is Kiki Kim, Penelope Howard, and I’m told you know Jake Hooper.”
I lock eyes with Jake across the kitchen. I haven’t talked to him since he left me a message onGLOright after Round 3 saying Unity asked him to steer clear of me until the tournament was over. That seemed fair then. It’s clearly a moot point now. Jake puts a finger to his lips. Shush and listen, Emilia. I comply.
“We each have certain . . . ?skills. Damage, healing; I’m a tank.” Bob presses his hand to his chest.
“Yeah, you are,” Ki mutters under her breath. I see Penelope gently swing a foot out to kick her under the counter.
Bob continues as if he didn’t hear Ki. “I’ve had my eye on you. You’re a top-tier DPS, specializing in ranged damage, necromagic, and some of the most impossible-looking team combos I’ve ever seen.”
Over Bob’s head, I see my parents staring at him like a whole Martian just beamed down in the middle of their kitchen. I bet he told them he had a speech but didn’t tell them what he was going to say. Totally related: I think I love Bob now?
“I’m putting together a team,” Bob says. But he already has a team. They’re literally right there, two healers, a tank, and—where’s the other guy? Their second DPS. Muddy, Jake told me his name was Muddy. Unless he’s hiding in the kitchen island, Muddy isn’t here.
“Recent circumstances have left me with a place on that team for someone who looks a lot like you. Miss Romero”—Bob pauses for effect—“I’m here to talk to you about the Unity Initiative.”
For a second I think I’m going to cry again, but the whole kitchen breaks out into applause and shocks me into laughing instead. They’re clapping for Bob, who slides down from the stool to shake my hand.
“I havealwayswanted to say that. Look at my arm; I gave myself goose bumps. Hi, I’m Bob. Sorry about the highway, by the way. Jake explained everything. We cool?”
Words are difficult right now. I can just about handle nodding while sneaking a glance at my parents, who are pretending to look busy behind the island but are watching me intently.
Matt sees how confused I am and takes it upon himself to start explaining. “So. I was having a normal one on Tuesday when this guy”—he jerks his thumb over at Jake—“comes up to me in the library saying he’s gotta find Emilia, Emilia isn’t texting him back, yada yada . . .”
Penny jumps in: “And Matt was, like, no one can talk to Emilia, her parents are keeping her away from school to be safe, she’s probably not gonna be at school for a few days. But Matt textedme, and I was like ‘hey, I’m bringing Emilia’s homework on Friday, so if you want me to bring her a message I could make a little something happen for our boy Jake, if you know what I mean.’ ”
“I didn’t,” Jake adds, “know what she meant. I just needed to talk to you. When I heard about the dox and Fury, I wanted to see you so—to tell you something.” He glances over at my parents, who didn’t seem to notice anything amiss. He didn’t tell them about us. Which makes sense; there is no us yet. Is there going to be an us?
All I know is it’s fantastic to hear Jake’s voice again. I want to turn his voice into a lotion and rub it all over—Wow, I have beenmassivelyundersocialized for the past four days. I am 100 percent feral.
Matt’s talking again, thankfully diverting that particular train of thought. “Anyway, Penny told me to talk to Jake about talking to her about talking toyou. Turns out he had something more than a message to bring you.” He gestures broadly at Bob, Ki, and Penelope.
“Hi, I’m Penelope. You can call me P. Unless you callherP.” Penelope points to Penny, who shakes her head. “No? Cool. Jake got us all to meet in Philly on Wednesday and told us his plan: we group up, piggyback on Miss Penny’s homework trip to make sure someone answers the door, and make you an offer you can’t refuse.”
“It was actually my idea to offer you a spot on the team,” Ki adds. Tiny, bossy, pink-haired, and pretty. I love her already.
“They showed up on our doorstep at three forty-five talking like they had an appointment.” My mom puts one mug of coffee in front of Bob and another in front of Penelope. “Penny was with them, so I knew they weren’t from the bad internet.”
