Pivot Point (Pivot Point, #1)(15)

An old man walks by and smiles. “A gift for the little lady,” he says. My dad waves politely. When he’s gone, along with his butterflies, my dad takes me by the shoulders and points. A single butterfly rests on a flower five feet from us, its plain white wings moving slowly up and down. “That is real, baby. Isn’t it pretty?”

I curl my lip in disappointment. “It’s boring.”

A barking laugh pulls me out of the memory. I glance over my shoulder to where a few girls quickly stop whispering. I shoot them narrow eyes. Am I the only one who failed the stupid door test?

At lunch, Laila gives me one look and says, “What’s wrong?”

We walk toward the outdoor stage—our normal lunchtime hangout—and I give a frustrated grunt. “I failed an Illusion Detection test today.”

“Failure is so relative,” Laila says.

“No. It’s not. You either pass the test or you don’t. There’s nothing relative about it.”

She shrugs. “But you’ve aced all your other ones, so it averages out.” She sits on the cement stage, letting her feet dangle over the side. “So, therefore, it’s relative.” She jerks her head to the side. “Sit down.”

Seeing her so calm makes me think I’ve completely overreacted. I’m prone to do that. I take a deep breath, dig out my lunch from my backpack, and hop up beside her. A semicircle of grass fans out to surround the stage and soon it’s full of people.

As I open my bag of chips, Laila leans forward. “This stage isn’t very high, right?”

What is she talking about? I follow her gaze to the ground. “I guess not.”

“So it wouldn’t hurt too bad if someone got pushed off?”

I look to the left, where several other regulars are lined up along the stage, lunches on their laps, feet dangling. “Who’s getting—” Before I can finish my sentence, she grabs my arm and flings me off the stage. I gasp in shock, wondering what evil plan this act has accomplished. I don’t have to wonder too long when Duke practically trips over me.

“Are you okay?” he asks as I collect my scattered lunch.

“Fine.” I shove my sandwich and chips into my ripped lunch bag and straighten up.

“Addie,” Laila says, feigning concern and jumping down next to me. “Did you get hurt? What happened?” But her “concern” is instantly replaced with a smile for Duke. “Hey, Duke, we didn’t see you.”

More like I didn’t see him. Laila quite obviously saw him from a mile away.

Ray bends over and picks up my water bottle, which had rolled up against his massive foot. Seriously, he has to wear at least a size fifteen. The guy is huge. “Here,” he says, handing it to me.

“Thanks.”

“Where are you two headed?” Laila asks.

Duke points in the general direction of the parking lot. “Off-campus.”

“Really?” Laila says as though this is the biggest coincidence ever. “We were just going to get something from my car. Mind if we walk with you?”

I could murder Laila right now. If only I could get my hands on a weapon—a size-fifteen shoe might work.

“Of course not.”

And of course Laila squeezes herself between Duke and Ray, leaving me with no other option but to walk next to Duke. After only a few steps she has managed to become so engrossed in a quiet conversation with Ray that Duke and I are left in awkward silence.

“Sorry,” I finally say, because unless he’s an idiot, it’s pretty obvious what Laila just did.

“I’m not. Now I don’t have to make up some sorry excuse to talk to you.”

I’m confused. “Don’t you have man code?” I don’t know why I said it; it just flew out, but I can’t take it back.

“What do you mean?”

Now I have to explain and I don’t want to. I let myself get distracted for a moment by a backpack floating through the air in front of me. Eventually it lands in its owner’s arms, and I look over at Duke, who is waiting for me to speak. “You and Bobby are good friends.”

“Yes.”

“Bobby asked me to homecoming.”

“And you said no.”

“So don’t you have that thing where if your best friend likes a girl, she’s off-limits?”

“If every girl Bobby liked was off-limits, I’d never get to go out with anyone. The only girls Bobby restricts me from are those he’s kissed. You haven’t kissed him, right?”

“No!” At least not in my real life. I had in my Search, but Bobby didn’t know that. I feel my face go bright red.

Duke lowers his brow. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. I haven’t kissed him.”

“Well, then there you go. Man code does not apply.”

I’m trying my best not to be flattered, but it’s hard. This is Duke Rivers. He smiles, and I find myself smiling back.

“What do I have to do to get you to come to one of my games?”

“Play on a Norm team,” I say before thinking.

He tilts his head. “Really? So that’s what this is about? You don’t like people using their abilities to win at sports? Are you a Naturalist? Do you want us to merge with Normal society?”