The Stand-In Boyfriend (Grove Valley High #1)(3)

“Yeah, yeah,” Aaron responds, rolling his eyes.

“Honestly man, it’s over.”

“Is that so, Chase?” Sophie asks, cocking an eyebrow, her attraction to him obvious.

Chase turns to her and a smirk covers his mouth. He knows Sophie is into him; she’s not exactly subtle. To be honest, I don’t know why they’ve never gone there. They’ve definitely had the chance to in the past. While Jessie and I are not exactly unpopular—I’m on the girls’ soccer team and Jessie is nice enough to ensure we’re never without friends if we need them—Sophie is on a different social level than us. Loud and outgoing, she’s been a cheerleader since we were freshmen, is in all the school plays, and the fact that she has curves to die for means she’s never been overlooked by the popular guys in school. She could totally run in Aaron and Chase’s crowd if she wanted to, but she doesn’t. She always sticks with me and Jessie. She’s friends with everyone else, but I know we’re her number ones, and I love her for the fact that she’s still totally loyal and would never dream of ditching us.

“Jesus.” Aaron snickers. “Get a room guys.”

Chase starts laughing and turns his attention away from Sophie. “Shut up, dude. We’re just playing.”

I refrain from glancing at Sophie; I’ll just start laughing if I do, because she’s definitely not playing.

“Must be something in the air,” Jessie comments, eager to get back into the conversation. Chase turns to him. “Courtney and I are done too.”

“What?” The word is out of my mouth before I can check myself. I can feel everyone’s attention turn to me. “When did that happen?”

Jessie shrugs like it’s no big deal and I’m not hanging on his every word. “Before first period.”

My jaw falls open. We had lunch together and he didn’t think to mention that he broke up with his girlfriend?

“What happened?” Sophie asks, and I send her a grateful glance. It’ll look much better if she questions him than if I do. I know I wouldn’t be able to hide my feelings and would regret it later.

Jessie shrugs again. “We just kept arguing. She was pissed I didn’t want to go to her uncle’s party or something and we just called it quits.”

“Did you end it or did she?” Sophie asks, sending me a subtle look. I feel like I can’t breathe properly. I have been waiting for this day for months, ever since they hooked up at the start of summer vacation, waiting for him to wake up and realize they shouldn’t be together, realize she’s obnoxious and arrogant and the fact that she has big boobs and hands out blow jobs like they’re going out of style does not mean he should be dating her.

“Uh, me, I guess. Couldn’t be bothered with another fight.”

I’m frozen in place as I process this news. Jessie is single again, finally. Maybe this will actually be it. Maybe now that Courtney won’t be hanging around all the time he might actually begin to see me differently. I glance away from Jessie when I see Aaron subtly nudge Chase in the arm. I glance at the pair of them and their gazes are both fixed on me. I swallow and try to force my face into a nonchalant look. The last thing I need is my crush on Jessie becoming public knowledge.

“Wait, Liv, you don’t think it was dumb for me to break up with Courtney, do you?”

I glance back at Jessie, who is now looking a little confused. He probably wasn’t expecting the radio silence his announcement brought. He probably thought it was a way to bond with Chase, but instead Chase and Aaron are just staring at me, which is totally unnerving. I clear my throat. “No, no, I think it’s good.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. She’s nice and all, but I don’t think you were right together.”

He grins at me and I know he feels reassured. He turns to Chase and Aaron. “You guys heading to Ferguson’s?” he asks, apparently done talking about Courtney and ready to get to the real reason he stopped them from heading straight to their cars. Ferguson’s is a burger joint downtown, hands down the best burgers in Florida. It’s a popular hangout for Grove Valley High, and most of Chase and Aaron’s crowd heads there every Friday after school.

Aaron opens his mouth but then a shout from the parking lot captures his attention. I glance that way and the rest of their group, a combination of the most popular kids at school, are standing around their cars waiting for them. Aaron throws his hand up, waving a finger in the universal gesture for one minute before turning back to me.

“You don’t have practice?”

“No, got canceled.”

“When’s your next game?”

“A week from Thursday.”

“Plenty of time for you to get that paper ready for Donaldson then.” He grins.

“Dude,” Chase says sharply. He glances at me then his gaze flickers over to Jessie before turning back to Aaron. “Do your own damn homework. Don’t make her do it.”

I open my mouth to respond but Aaron gets there first, rolling his eyes and shoving Chase in the shoulder. “We take turns, idiot. I did last week’s paper for us.”

“Right,” responds Chase, looking past us to his friends and giving off the air of someone who is incredibly bored, all the humor of a couple of minutes ago gone from his voice. “Whatever. I just think it’s shitty to let someone do your work for you.”