TMI (5 page)

That term was new. “What's that?”

“It's software that helps you rapidly develop video games. It does the heavy lifting, like rendering graphics—”

Bailey held up a hand again. “Yeah, and that's when you lose me.”

Chase grinned. “Sorry.”

“No, no, I have to learn all this.” She didn't mention that learning how to use all this software would help her stop obsessing over Simon.

“So what do you have so far?”

“Nothing digital. I have notebooks filled with sketches Meg did and notes I've been making on the rules, the maps, and stuff.”

Chase's face tightened when she mentioned Meg. Bailey squeezed his hand. “I know it doesn't feel like it, but trust me, she likes you too.”

His eyes slipped shut. “I wish.”

“I know her, Chase. Better than she knows herself. She's nuts about you. She paints you.”

Chase's face lit up like a five-year-old's at a playground. “Me? She paints
me
?”

“Yep. Like every day. And she'd
kill
me if she knew I told you that, so that stays between us, okay?” She stood up and piled their trash on the tray.

Chase stood and grabbed her in a hug.

“Oh! Um…it's okay, Chase. She'll come around.”

“Thanks, Bay.” He grinned and took the tray.

Bailey glanced toward the theater and smiled.
Please
tell
me
Meg
saw
that!
She prayed.

Meg sat at the ticket counter gleaming brightly under the harsh lights. She'd cleaned it about six times so far. And refilled the machines with paper. And reorganized the gift card supply. And even brought her homework to do during her break. She stared out the window, her fingers itching for a paintbrush, a sketchbook, something—anything that would occupy her mind for more than a minute.

Stupid, stupid, stupid!
Losing her cool over a stupid picture…in front of Chase. She shut her eyes and groaned. He'd looked at her with horror. But he hadn't run. He never judged. Well, okay, he
was
shocked, but still, the only thing she saw in those potent eyes was worry, and that made her feel kind of warm and fuzzy. She scrubbed at another spot on the counter and felt sick. He shouldn't worry about her. She shouldn't like that he did. They weren't dating. They weren't even friends—at least not like she and Bailey were. How had this happened? Despite all her efforts, despite The Plan, Chase was sneaking under her carefully drawn lines, and damn it, she wanted more.

The research project they'd been partnered up on last semester had been a lesson in more ways than one. She wasn't sure how it had happened. They'd visited the Museum of Modern Art on their own because Bailey had some family commitment and couldn't make it. Chase wasn't the least bit saddened by that news. He'd bought her train ticket, pulled her out of the path of a taxi that jumped the light, and let her push him from floor to floor to stare at exhibits. At some point during all that, the echoes of her dad's voice died away. She never protested when he dragged her to Rockefeller Center, pointed to a spot, and said, “This is where the tree goes every year. Close your eyes and imagine it's Christmas.” She did, and he kissed her, and it was like all the colors in the world exploded.

They'd had a great day and finished all the research they'd had to do. On the train ride home, she'd even let Chase make plans—movies, the school dance. He even said something about taking her to his prom. They'd “worked” for hours after they'd gotten home, talking, laughing, sharing, and eventually typing up their paper. Long after the sky had darkened, Chase stood up, said he was going on a food run, came back, and served her.

Her cold little heart thawed and then melted for him and then refroze when they'd gotten their grades.

C-.

She'd never gotten such a low grade before. She hadn't really talked to him about it. She'd just…stayed away. It hurt. But it got easier every day. She was over it. Mostly.

The next movie would start in less than an hour. She would soon be busy again. She tossed the rag on the shelf under the counter and looked out through the glass doors and—
bam!
Her gaze locked on him like a guided missile. Her belly did that slow roll it always did when she saw him, and she
knew
she had that stupid smile on her face.

And then he grabbed Bailey in a hug.

The earth tilted on its axis. Her stomach pitched. Her smile burned—oh, how it burned. Her fingers curled with the need to tear Bailey's highlighted curls out by their roots. When she found herself at the door with no memory of giving her legs the command to walk, she forced air into her paralyzed lungs.

In.

Out.

Damn
it
. It wasn't supposed to be like this. She'd taken every precaution—stayed distant, apart, aloof. It wasn't supposed to hurt. It wasn't supposed to
matter
.

No. Fight it.
She forced herself to see through the green mist of jealousy. Green Envy, she'd call this color if she were painting this scene. Or maybe Jade Avarice. Calmer, she recited her list of reasons. She had to focus on school. She had to graduate. She had to find scholarship money and get a degree. It didn't matter what field. Any degree. Something that would help her find a good job. A job with benefits. A future. The Future.
Her
future. She
had
to be able to take care of herself. She'd promised her dad she would not waver. This hurt would stop soon as long as she was smart and stayed on course.

The other hurt never would.

Bailey figured that ordering burgers for two parents and four brothers would take a long time, so she decided to visit Meg while Chase fed the Gallagher army.

“Hey!” She skipped through the doors and waved with her whole arm.

Meg lifted her head, and Bailey gasped. “What's wrong?” Meg's face was pale and her eyes were just…flat. “Are you still mad at Chase?”

Meg grunted once. Bailey couldn't tell if that was a yes or a no or a laugh or a sob. “Hey…so Chase said he'll help me with the game. Isn't that great?” Bailey bounced on her toes.

Flat dark eyes snapped to hers. “Great. Sure.”

Bailey bit her lip and blinked back tears. Meg was—
oh!
Of course, she saw the hug!
Achievement: Unlocked.
Bailey swallowed her smile and glanced over her shoulder. “Chase should be here in a minute. He's picking up burgers for his entire family. He was supposed to pick up Dylan and forgot, so Dylan walked all the way home by himself, and his parents are totally pissed about it, and then Ethan and Evan cried because Dylan and Chase were fighting, and then Connor got mad because Dylan yelled at him, and all that made his parents even angrier,” she said before she paused for a breath. “So Chase promised to buy everyone Happy Meals to make them feel better.”

Meg only stared at her, so Bailey thought she should tighten the screws—nothing too cruel, just a little twist. “Oh, I almost forgot why I came in. I just wanted to tell you not to come by after work. Chase and I will be working on the game. I mean, you can come over if you want to, but Chase will be there and I know you don't like leading him on and stuff, so—”

“So.”

Meg said nothing more. Bailey shivered. She'd always heard about people acting cold, but she'd never actually been on the receiving end of such frost before, and she didn't like it. But it was for the best of reasons, and Meg would forgive her.

Eventually.

She hoped.

She glanced over her shoulder again, saw Chase carrying two huge bags of food, and decided it would be best if she helped him instead of waiting in here. “Bye!” She spread the word over two syllables, waved, and hurried out of the theater before Meg said a word, biting back her smiles all the way home.

When Chase dropped her in front of her grandparents' house, she figured she'd find Gramps in the family room with his newspapers and coffee. Gran would probably be doing the laundry or making up some delicious treat in the kitchen. She walked up the porch steps, fished for her key, and heard a car pull into the drive. She turned, watched her mother climb from a hot sports car, a BMW coupe by the looks of the front end. Bailey had dated a boy who had driven one—well, it must have been his parents' car—but it was still pretty cool. He'd taken her to the movies and to dinner and dropped her off. What was his name? With a mental shrug, she decided it didn't matter. He'd never asked her to go out with him again. Stupid jerk.

Nicole climbed out of the passenger seat, her curly blond hair ruthlessly straightened by a Brazilian blowout. She didn't shoot Bailey the warning look, the one that warned her time and again she was to pretend to be Nicole's kid sister, not her daughter. Bailey froze in place. Should she run down and meet her or stay where she was? Her entire routine was now out of step. Nicole smiled brightly and waved, and Bailey instantly knew her mother planned to introduce her to the latest guy.

This was serious. Like big. Deal. Serious.

Okay, I can do this.
She shot back her own bright grin and a waved. “How was your trip?” she asked, slipping into a new routine—that of the loving daughter.

“Bailey, this is John. John, this is my daughter, Bailey.” Nicole's smile was pretty realistic, and she even slipped an arm around Bailey's waist, pulling her close. Bailey only just managed to keep her face from registering shock at this major playbook revision.

John never got out of the car to meet her. That cost him some points in Bailey's opinion. He leaned over the floor-mounted shifter and shook her hand. He was hot, she supposed, in that soft corporate way she knew her mother found attractive. He gripped her hand longer than necessary, and his eyes did a careful head-to-toe inspection. One look at the gleam in his dark eyes, and she knew exactly what thoughts were circling his brain.

Perv.

She tugged her hand out of his grasp and subtly wiped it down her pants.

After a moment or two of small talk, John reversed out of the driveway and headed down the street. Nicole stared after the car, her expression unreadable.

“So?” Bailey dropped the act. “How was it really?”

Nicole dropped her arm from Bailey's waist. “I don't know yet. When he found out I live with my parents, he freaked and actually asked me if I was in debt.” They unlocked the front door, called out greetings to Gramps, and walked into the kitchen. “Then he had the nerve to suggest I was only interested in his money.”

Maybe it wasn't the only thing that interested her, but money
was
a big factor in who Nicole dated, though Bailey knew better than to point that out.

“So I told him about you. He handled
unwed
teen
mom
better than
gold
digger
.” Nicole poured coffee into a cup and sat at the kitchen table. “We have another date lined up.” Nicole saw Bailey's frown. “What's wrong? I thought you'd be happy to not have to pretend to be my sister anymore.”

“Mom, do you love this guy even a little?”

Nicole looked at her over the rim of her coffee cup, her blue eyes serious. “Love?” She laughed once. “Bay, love is—oh, hell. I was in love once. Real, gut-twisting, toe-curling love.” She stared into the bottom of her cup and shook her head. “It wasn't enough.” When she lifted her eyes, Bailey gasped at the heartbreak in them. “I wasn't enough.” Nicole blurted in an uncharacteristic moment of total honesty. “John's good for me, Bailey. As long as we like each other, the rest will come.” Nicole stood, drained her cup, and put it in the sink. “See you later. I need to shower.” She waved and went upstairs.

Ewwww.

Bailey washed the cup her mother left in Gran's sparkling sink, her mouth in a tight line. She hated when Nicole performed her act. This was the guy she hoped to spend her life with! Wasn't love supposed to be exciting and passionate and romantic and fun? Bailey knew that was her fault. Nicole often told her that most of her boyfriends freaked out and took off as soon as they set eyes on Bailey. They didn't want a kid any more than Nicole did. A pang of guilt halted Bailey's thoughts, and she reminded herself that at least Nicole tried. Her dad hadn't even stuck around long enough for that. He'd bailed the second the stick turned blue…or the plus sign appeared…or whatever the tests did seventeen years ago.

She set the coffee cup in the dish drain to dry and trudged upstairs to her room. Nicole's off-key shower singing made her smile. Her date must have been more fun than she'd shared. That was something at least. But then Bailey's smile faded. She didn't have a teen daughter of her own, and yet guys didn't stick with her very long either. Maybe it was a Grant curse. Maybe she should just accept reality and stop dreaming about love and happily-ever-afters and be more like Meg. Practical, realistic, determined Meg, who wasn't going to let any guy sway her from her plans, including the guy next door who was madly, passionately, and pointlessly in love with her.

Bailey clicked through channels for five solid minutes before she huffed out a heavy sigh and tossed the remote to her comfy full-sized bed and wondered why she even bothered to try watching TV because there was never anything good on unless it was Thursday night when
The
Vampire
Diaries
aired. She thought about playing Xbox, but what fun would it be without Simon? She logged into Facebook and read the status updates her friends had posted. No, it wasn't true that she'd bloodied Simon's nose. No, it wasn't true that she'd caught Simon with Caitlyn's pom-poms and—
gasp
—of course it wasn't true that she was pregnant.

God!
She rolled her eyes. People should get a life. She abandoned Facebook and decided to update her blog. She typed her name and password and waited for the site to appear. Her blog had been a work in progress, as Meg always said, since the day she'd started it. At one point, she'd called it “Grant's Random Ramblings”—that had been when she was in her heavy metal rock phase and had a mad crush on a satellite radio DJ named Grant Random. She'd written a three-part series on stamp collecting—that's when the site had seen its lowest dip in visitors ever—and then switched to reviewing her favorite TV show episodes. Those were always fun. But lately, the blog had become a place where she could just muse and vent and wonder and dream, which is why she now called it “Take It for Granted.”

Bailey twirled her hair and bit her thumbnail while she considered how to respond to the various rumors posted on Facebook. She finally decided that complete denial was the best idea. She wrote a paragraph on the rumors and then switched to tips on removing red Gatorade from expensive jeans—you know, just in case Caitlyn decided to try it on anybody else. Her thoughts turned to her absent dad and she added one last thought before she posted the update.

Bailey thought about talking to Gramps about Simon, but the one time she'd talked to him about a boy, he turned sheet white and fled, tossing something that sounded like “Go ask your mother!” over his shoulder on the way out.

She published the new blog update and trolled her favorite social networks for a little while. Simon's relationship status was single, but Caitlyn's was “in a relationship.” She tried not let that bother her.

Failed miserably.

She switched over to email and saw her new blog post had already gotten a comment.

Sorry about your breakup. Why'd you end things if you didn't want to? I'm a guy. I wouldn't look at you the way I look at my dentist.

Aww, that was so sweet. It was from someone signing his name as WyldRyd11. She clicked his profile link, but there was no photo. Only a one-sentence bio:
Gamer, athlete, lover. Serious girls, inquire within.

She thought about it and decided to reply.

Thanks for your comment, WyldRyd11. I broke up with him because I don't think he wants to be with me, and I deserve to be with someone who does.

That sounded exactly like something Meg would say. She was right, wasn't she? Why be with someone if that someone wants someone else? Bailey crossed her arms over her chest and wondered when the ache in her heart would go away, when the urge to keep checking for messages from him would stop.