I roll my eyes, but there’s no real heat in it, and he knows it. I turn to the mirror to try to salvage my makeup, but there’s no point. It’s completely ruined—I look like someone took a hose to a birthday party clown. My black mascara is smudged around my eyes, and my hair hangs in soaked clumps. Honestly, I have no idea how Jay’s managed to talk to me with a straight face.
Some sparkles from my eyeshadow have migrated to my cheeks, so as I wipe them off, I say, “I still owe you for helping me escape the date with Arthur and his mom, but you don’t even like ice cream.” I still don’t knowhow. Everyone likes ice cream. “What’s your favorite dessert?” If we don’t have it at the bakery, I can get Dad to give me a recipe so I can make it for Jay.
His lips pull up, his signature smirk back in place. “I don’t know. I’m feeling pretty fond of coconut cream pie today.”
“You are such a jerk,” I say with a laugh, giving him a shove.
“I thought I was a big softie?”
“You can be two things at once.”
“Do you think I’m a jerk and a softie?”
I nod. “Youdidthreaten to throw me off a cliff. But for what it’s worth, it was really cool of you to step in to coach your sister’s soccer team so she could stay with her friends. I wish I had a brother who would do that for me.”
Something changes in the way Jay’s looking at me again, and like before in the hall, the air turns thick with something heart-pounding and electric between us. He throws his towel in a hamper in the corner of the bathroom without even looking at it and grabs the ends of the towel that’s wrapped around my shoulders, using them to gently guide me toward him.
I go willingly, focused only on his eyes and the way he’s gazing down at me hungrily.
“Carina, are you—oh, there you are!” Emmett’s voice comes from behind me. Jay drops the towel, and I jump away from him like I’ve been caught doing something wrong.
Emmett steps into the bathroom, and if he noticed anything weird going on between me and Jay, he doesn’t show it. “We’ve been looking all over for you. We’ve got to go. The babysitter needs to go home early, so Kalani needs to go back for Maleah. And Jay, your friend Caleb has been looking for you.”
I clear my throat and toss my towel into the hamper. “Yeah, thanks, Emmett. We’re coming.” Thankfully, my face is already all messed up from the melted makeup and pool water, so no one can tell how red it’s turning. Was I really about to kissJay? What is in the air of this house? Is there a plug-in spraying weird hormones everywhere that’s twisting up my thoughts and emotions?
I scurry out of the bathroom without looking back at Jay or Emmett, though I hear both boys following behind me. This time, I squeeze through all the partygoers like it’s my personal mission, suddenly feeling too stuffy in the crowded house. I just need to get outside to clear my head.
Outside, I run straight into Jasmine and Maddie, the girls I was dancing with before. “There you are,” Maddie says, pouting. “Emi told us you’re leaving. We wanted to say goodbye.”
She pulls me in for a hug, not caring that I’m still wet. Jasmine does the same. “If you want to talk about, you know, art and OCAD and stuff, message me.”
I doubt I’ll talk about OCAD stuff, but I’m happy to keep in touch. By the time we trade Instagram information, my friends have joined us, and now everyone is hugging everyone goodbye. Emi is covered in food and smiling from ear to ear. Daphne’s less covered but just as bright-eyed.
I come to Jay and stand awkwardly in front of him. Do I hug him goodbye, like I have everyone else? That seems weird and unnecessary, but he did save my butt back there, even I can admit that. And I didn’t actually hate talking to him tonight. In fact, I spent pretty much the whole night with him, and I actuallyenjoyedit. He solves my dilemma for me by shoving his hands in his pockets and nodding once. “See you around, Princess.”
It feels like an anticlimactic way to end the night, considering everything we just went through together, but anything else feels silly. As I’ve told myself plenty of times throughout the night, this is Jay and he’s a jerk, and nothing has changed just because he was kind of, sort of fun tonight and I wanted to keep talking to him. I nod, taking a few steps backward before breaking eye contact. I turn to join my friends, following them through the party and to the front of the house, trying to ignore the blaze of Jay’s eyes on my back.
“So, that was crazy, huh?” Emmett says, falling in line beside me as we walk down the sidewalk toward his car. He pauses with me while I slip off my shoes, my wet feet sliding around in them making them too unstable. He says, “I’m sorry I froze on you like that.”
Emmett always has the answers, always knows the right thing to do.
“I froze too,” I say. “It happens to the best of us.” Except Jay. Weirdly, Jay knew what to do, even if his solution was to start a food war.
“Yeah, but . . .” Emmett shakes his head, lost in his own thoughts. Kalani joins us on my other side as we start walking again, my heels in my hand.
“Well, that was exciting,” she says, smoothing her hands over her hair. She seems to have escaped the party unscathed. Emmett too, for the most part. “Let’s not tell my parents what happened tonight. This is anexpensivedress.”
I look down at my own ruined dress. There’s a pink stain on my chest and stomach, but it’ll probably come out. My heels will be okay after a good cleaning too. Overall, it could’ve been worse, and throwing food at Jay and the otherswasfun. Emi is basically bouncing on her heels behind us, replaying her conquest play by play to Daphne.
“Where did you disappear to tonight?” Kalani asks me. “I was worried after I went to find Emi that you ran home because you were embarrassed, but Ralph told me you were inside, and you seemed okay when you got out of the pool. If you wanted to leave, you should’ve told me. We could’ve gotten you out of there right away.”
“No, I was okay,” I promise her. “I was drying off inside with Jay.”
Kalani raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow. “Jay?”
“Yeah, he was kind of, um . . . not an asshole.” I don’t know why it’s so weird to admit that I didn’t actually hate my time with Jay today. Maybe because I made such a big deal after our first failed date that I would feel like a hypocrite if I suddenly told her I had a good time tonight. Because no matter what happened today, our first datewasterrible, and no amount of spontaneous food fights or warm towels will change that.
“Did you have fun tonight?” I ask to change the subject.