Page 58 of Scoring Lessons

The main female character, just like me, had gone through a shitty breakup.

It was incredible how some men managed to be the biggest pieces of shit, even in fictional worlds.

“At least you got out of it young,” I muttered to myself as I flipped the page where she was spiraling about how her life had been turned upside down.

Okay, so some of the similarities were borderline scary. But even then, I was enjoying the hell out of this book. So much so, I was running out of the colored tabs I’d specifically chosen for it. I annotated it every time she said something I resonated with—which was way too often—or every time she bantered with her brother’s best friend and love interest, Elliot.

But there was something in particular I’d annotated and taken note of that I kept going back to. My fingers brushed all the tabs until I found the one I was looking for. This was a unique color from the rest because I didn’t want to lose it.

It was a wish list she’d created of the things she wanted to do before she graduated from college. It ranged from fun dates to exploring her sexuality in hopes of rediscovering herself. It made me realize that by swearing off dating for so long and jumping into a serious relationship with Jack, I’d missed out on so much. I wondered then if creating a list for myself was the next step for my new life, even if I refused to do any of it. It wasn’t like I had—or trusted—someone to help me mark these things off my list.

A knock on the door made me practically jump out of my skin. When I opened the door, I found Wesley with his natural, laid-back grin.

“What are you doing here?”

“I come bearing gifts.” He wiggled a brown takeout bag in the air.

I narrowed my eyes without a word.

“Some of the guys went out to drown their sorrows, but I didn’t feel like going.” He shrugged.

“That still doesn’t answer why you’re here.”

He let out a long sigh as he raked his hand through his hair, letting a few strands fall lazily on his forehead. “Honestly? I didn’t want to be alone. Today was a shitty day,” he murmured. “And I thought maybe we could…hang out?” His cheeks turned pink when he finished speaking.

My heart did this thing where it fell into the pit of my stomach and tugged painfully at the weird flash of vulnerability he’d shown me.

Were we becoming friends? Was I starting to like him enough to feel sorry for him? No. That couldn’t have been it. I was only being a good human being. Stacking good karma points never hurt anyone.

I stepped to the side and widened the door as I waved my hand in a come in motion. “I’m only letting you in because whatever you have in there smells good.” The lie flowed easily out of my mouth, because admitting I wanted to spend time with him was not happening.

“I went to Rorita’s and got your favorite.” He strode to the little desk that was next to my bed and dropped the bag.

“How can you possibly remember that? We were kids when we tried that place.”

“I remember more than you could ever know.”

My heart fluttered, ready to take off.

Stop it, heart, you can’t be trying to flap around like some sort of a fucking butterfly.

It didn’t matter how much I ordered my heart to calm down; it was thrashing against my chest, begging to be let free.

“Who knew you were such a sentimental sap?” I joked as I hopped into bed.

He handed me a burrito. “Our moms worked hard to make that trip happen. Of course, I remember.”

“Yeah,” I said softly. “They always tried their best to deal with three moody teenagers.” I snorted a laugh. “Remember the motel we stayed at?”

“With the mystery stains?” He shivered at the reminder. “Please, I’m trying to eat here.”

“And all the yelling from that couple from next door.” I chuckled. “We practically got no sleep after returning from the parks.”

“We still managed to make it fun.”

“That’s true.” I smiled. “Life used to be so simple then.”

“I think we’ve done pretty well,” he said as the bed dipped with his weight.