Counting Down with You(38)

Ugh. This entire situation was so much easier when he wasn’t talking.

“Stop flirting,” Cora says, her eyes bright with amusement.

I gape at them. “I just told him to die.”

Nandini looks exasperated. “We’re Gen Z, Karina. That’s how we flirt.”

“She’s not wrong, Ahmed,” Ace says, surprising all of us. He grins, and both Cora and Nandini look at him like he just grew a second head. “It sounds like you have a crush on me.”

“If by crush, you mean a growing urge to choke you, then yes.”

“Choke me, huh?” Ace smirks, reaching forward to wrap a lock of my hair around his finger.

Blood rushes to my cheeks. “Shut up.”

Ace chuckles and lets go of my hair, letting it spring back to hit me in the face. “We’ll talk more about this later.”

I open my mouth to protest, but he leans forward, his lips brushing my forehead, soft and unexpected. I fall silent.

Ace stands up and leaves before I can scramble together a coherent thought that isn’t just WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

“Oh my God,” Nandini says.

I turn toward her, my cheeks heated. I forgot my friends were there.

Cora isn’t even saying anything, her eyes so wide they look like they’re about to pop out of her head as she stares after Ace’s retreating back.

“Karina... Karina, what the fuck?” Nandini asks.

I shake my head. “I.” I can’t think of anything else to say. “Uh.”

Cora finally turns back to me. “Karina. He has a crush on you.”

“No,” I say immediately. “He’s being a clown. He needs to keep up his act.”

“Dude,” Nandini says, her voice high-pitched. “He definitely likes you. Stop acting clueless. I’ve had five different classes with him over the last three years, and he’s never even looked in someone else’s direction like that.”

I shake my head, but my heart is pounding ridiculously hard in my chest. I know it’s not real, that he’s faking a relationship because of Xander, but my traitorous body apparently didn’t get the memo. “I’m telling you. It’s to keep up the act.”

“Karina, I have read enough fan fiction to know exactly how this goes,” Nandini says and Cora nods in agreement. “If he doesn’t already have a crush on you, he will. It’s only a matter of time.”

I groan. “Real life isn’t fan fiction.”

Nandini gives me a pitying look and turns toward Cora. “When they inevitably end up together, do we get to say ‘I told you so’?”

“Hell yes,” Cora says, offering Nandini her pinky.

Nandini hooks their pinkies together without hesitating. Apparently my body isn’t the only traitor at this table. “It’s a pinky swear.”

I hook my own pinkies together pointedly. “And I swear I’ll tell you both ‘I told you so’ when Ace moves on after we’re done with our study sessions.”

Cora offers me a wicked grin. “Those are going to be your famous last words, Karina Ahmed.”



PART 2


Blaze




20


T-MINUS 20 DAYS

“You know, you’ll lose your little bad-boy reputation if you keep badgering me,” I say as I sit down. “No one is going to think you’re cool and aloof anymore.”

In the last few periods, I’ve managed to calm down. As lunch came to an end, I saw Xander sitting only a few tables away from us. No wonder Ace was acting so boldly.

“I didn’t ask for that reputation,” Ace says, putting his feet on the table and crossing them at the ankle. He’s wearing heavy combat boots that are at odds with his designer skinny jeans. “Though I am pretty cool and aloof.”

I raise an eyebrow. “You like mint chocolate ice cream, playing the piano, and space.”

“But only you know that,” Ace says, taking out a black marker from his jacket and uncapping it. I nearly smack it out of his hands when he starts doodling on the table.

“Isn’t that destruction of public property?” I say, hoping it will dissuade him, but he only snorts. “Ace, please stop?”

He looks up at me, his eyes more blue than green today, and his marker falters. “Yeah, okay.”

I blink. “Really?” That was easier than I thought it would be.

“Yeah, Ahmed. What are we looking at today?”

It takes a moment for that to sink in before a smile pulls at my lips. “I was thinking we could take a break—”

“I’ve been saying that.”

“—from reading comprehension and focus on poetry.”

He sighs. “I suppose.”

I roll my eyes. “Hear me out. Just pretend they’re song lyrics. You love music, right? That’s why I thought poetry might work better for you. We have that poetry project coming up next month, anyway.”

He hums, looking at me with an inscrutable expression. “You’re something else, Ahmed.”

I frown. “What? Did I say something wrong?”

“It’s not a bad thing,” Ace says. “You’re thoughtful. I like it.”

“Oh.” My clothes suddenly feel too hot. Is it possible to blush with your full body? I grab my bag and take out the collections I snagged from my bookshelf so I have something to do with my hands. “I brought some poetry books from home. Is that okay?”