Celebrities Don’t Date Bookworms (Texting the Boyband #1)

Chapter 13

thirteen

My routine stayed pretty consistent over the next couple of weeks. At school, I dealt with being Hudson’s guide around the school, and everyone else in my grade seemingly hating me for it. I wasn’t used to the strange level of attention I was getting from everyone after years of being completely invisible, and I really didn’t like it. I felt like I was on display, being watched at all times for all the wrong reasons.

Sloane, on the other hand, was totally soaking up the attention she got from being Jude’s guide. She was used to being popular—this was just the next step up. And from what I could tell, she wasn’t getting glared at quite as much as I was, so the whole experience probably wasn’t as negative for her as it was for me. She was also in a better position because she and Jude were actually getting along, while Hudson and I hadn’t found good footing yet.

Hudson @hudsonshaw

Why is this town so confusing?? I've gotten lost like 5 times today

Lily @lilypletsch75

We could show you around!!

Christina @chrissy_patricks

Where are you getting lost?

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

The town isn't confusing, you're just bad at following directions :)

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@meganwhite0202 rude

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

@hudsonshaw you get lost in our school. Of course you're going to get lost outside too

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@meganwhite0202 maybe I wouldn’t get lost I had a better guide

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

@hudsonshaw maybe I'd be a better guide if I actually liked yo u

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@meganwhite0202 *clutches hand to heart* ouch. Low blow

Call Me Jude @judeturner

@hudsonshaw imagine being so unlikable that even your guide doesn’t want to spend time with you

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@judeturner like you can’t relate

Call Me Jude @judeturner

@hudsonshaw I can’t actually. @its_sloane adores me

Sloane @its_sloane

@hudsonshaw @judeturner what can I say? It’s true

Neeeeeeeil @neilhadley

@hudsonshaw haha loser

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@neilhadley et tu, neil?

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

you know, I’m suddenly starting to like the guys a lot more

Call Me Jude @judeturner

@meganwhite0202 did you not like us before? :(

Sloane @its_sloane

@judeturner don’t worry sweetie, she loves you *stage whisper to megan* say you love him, he’s very sensitive

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

@judeturner of course I love you 333

I’d been sitting with Jude and the other boys about half the time at lunch because Sloane insisted, but I still didn’t know them very well. For a group of celebrities, they were actually pretty shy. Not to mention that we had never gone an entire lunch period without them being pulled away to sign autographs or take selfies with other students, Principal Roman’s warnings about how to treat the boys already forgotten.

Neeeeeeeil @neilhadley

@meganwhite0202 We should start an “I hate Hudson Shaw” club. You can be the president

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

@neilhadley YES I’ve always wanted to be the president of somethin g

Hudson @hudsonshaw

@neilhadley @meganwhite0202 if you keep talking like this, people are going to think you’re serious

Why Are You Following Me @meganwhite0202

@hudsonshaw I am deathly serious :)

Unsurprisingly, my inbox started to fill with responses from fans telling me to quit being so mean to Hudson. I rolled my eyes and turned my phone off. I didn’t care what any of them thought of me or how I should be conducting myself on Twitter. It wasn’t like I knew any of them that well. Sure, a couple of them went to school with me, but we weren’t friends. The only opinions that mattered to me were Sloane’s, who obviously supported my tweets considering she was the first one to like every single one of them, and the boys in the group chat, who had no idea what my twitter was or why I would be interacting with Hudson anyway.

I wasn’t sure when exactly that shift happened—the one that had me actually forgetting that I didn’t know them in real life because I’d spent so much time chatting with them over text. Other than Sloane, they were genuinely my closest friends, and the fact that I didn’t know any of their real names was just a funny quirk. Nothing weird to see here… or, so I had to tell myself so I didn’t go insane from curiosity. An d in the evening, Bay and I talked, the calls getting longer with every passing day.

“Secret?” I asked him during our call on Thursday night. We’d already been on the phone for two hours, and I really needed to hang up and get some sleep, but I was prolonging it for as long as I could.

“You’re not going to like it.”

“Don't tell me it’s something about noodles again.”

He laughed. “No. It’s not that bad.”

I rested my chin on my pillow. “So, what is it, then?”

He was silent for so long that I thought he had muted himself. Just as I was about to say something, he spoke.

“I think we should meet. In person.”

I felt like my stomach had twisted itself inside out.

“What?”

“I want to meet you. I want to see you in person, to put a face to your name. To even know your name.”

I pushed myself up to sit. Lying down felt too informal for this conversation.

“Bay...”

“Don’t say no,” he said softly. “Say you want to think about it. Say you want to wait. But please don’t say no.”

“I thought you wanted to wait,” I said. “You said...”

“I know what I said. But I changed my mind.”

“Why? ”

“Because,” he took a deep breath, “because I think I’m falling in love with you.”

The air was knocked out of my lungs.

“You can’t be in love with me.” I didn’t know why I said the words. After all, wasn’t I the one that was in love with him? So head over heels in love that I spent almost every waking moment thinking about him, wondering what he was doing, where he was… whether he felt the same way about me?

“Why not?”

“Because... Because you don’t even know me!”

It was the same thing I’d been telling myself every day since I realized my feelings for Bay. As much as I believed wholly and completely that I was in love with him, how could I be? I mean, really be?

“I know you. I know your nickname is Eggo because your brother couldn’t pronounce your name as a kid. I know your bedroom walls are yellow, but you secretly wish they were blue. I know you have one best friend, but sometimes you worry that she’ll drop you because you think she’s popular and you’re not—which I can't believe, by the way. I know you’ve lived in Bibridge your whole life and you think you might never leave. I know you consider yourself an average teenage girl even though from talking to you, I can tell that you are anything but average… and more than anything, I know that I am falling in love with you.”

I shook my head and bit my lip, tears welling up in my eyes. Had I really told him all of that? How had he remembered it all ?

“You’re crazy, Bay.”

“Crazy in love with you.”

I laughed and held a hand to my face to help cool it down despite being flushed red.

“Fine.”

“Fine?”

“We can meet in person... As long as you promise not to laugh when you see me.”

“I can’t think of a single reason why I would laugh at you,” he said seriously. “Now... Tell me a secret.”

What secret could I give that would ever come close to his? That would mean nearly as much as what he told me?

“My name...” I said. I hesitated before saying it aloud. This was the final piece of my identity that I had hidden from him—if he had my name, he could identify me, and even though I knew I’d agreed to meet him in person anyway, the idea of it still terrified me. But it was only fair that I shared with him too. “My name is Megan.”

“Megan,” he repeated. I liked the way it sounded in his voice. It was familiar, but I couldn’t think of why. “I like that. You have a pretty name, Megan.”

“I don't suppose you want to share yours?”

I didn't expect him to. My secret was my name, and he had already shared one for today.

“All in due time, Megan,” Bay said. “All in due time.”

Group name: I promise this isn’t a group chat, Dad

Members: Ni-Ni, Bay, Sharky, Tis Moi Luca, Not Zesty, Eggo

Tis Moi Luca

Ok I’m confused

EVERY Friday here is a half day?

Eggo

Yep

You’re just realizing this now?

Didn’t you start school like two weeks ago?

Sharky

Ignore him he’s stupid

Tis Moi Luca

What did I ever do to you Fi

Sharky

You used up all the hot water this morning

Tis Moi Luca

Oh

Not Zesty

Am I the only one who would rather we start two hours later

Instead of ending at 12:30

Sharky

But this way, every weekend feels like a long weekend

Bay

But weekends are for sleeping in

So Z’s right

Eggo

Amen

That’s why you gotta nap after school on Friday

Start it off right

Bay

Wish I could :((

Eggo

Nap?

It’s very easy

Bay

We’re always doing stuff on Friday afternoons

Eggo

Stuff? What stuff?

Bay

Just…

Stuff

Eggo

Helpful

“Who are you texting?”

I dropped my phone in surprise, and it clattered against the cafeteria table. I sighed deeply and looked over my shoulder. Hudson was standing there with a grin, a red cafeteria tray balanced in one hand, and his phone in the other. I continued to lead him down to the cafeteria after English class every day, but I’d only sat with him occasionally—really, only on the days when Sloane forced me to. Whenever I sat alone, I hoped Hudson would go to sit with the other Take Five boys—or with literally anyone but me. I should have guessed that I wouldn’t be that lucky, though. And today was the worst day for him to join me, because I didn’t even have Sloane here as a buffer. She was off at a cheerleading team meeting, leaving me all alone with him.

“No one,” I said. He squinted and stuck his neck out, so he could try to read the phone screen. I shot my hand out to turn it off. It probably didn’t matter anyway, though, because I was sure he’d already seen everything he wanted to. Not that it would mean anything to him—it was just some random group chat.

He took a seat directly across from me and rested his chin on his hands as he stared at me. I tried to ignore him as I dug into the salad in front of me, but eventually, it became clear that he wasn’t planning to look away anytime soon.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

“Megan,” he said slowly. He didn’t say it like he was trying to get my attention, but rather that he was feeling out how the name felt on his tongue. For some reason, that made me nervous. “That’s a pretty name. Any nicknames?”

I narrowed my eyes. Was he trying to figure a nickname for me or something? Did he really think we were close enough for me to agree to that?

“No,” I said coldly.

“None?” he asked. “Not Meg or Maggie or… Eggo?”

I was actually pretty proud of how well I managed to hold back my surprise, even as I felt like my heart was going to leap out of my chest. I took some deep breaths to calm myself down before asking, “Where did you hear that name?”

Hudson leaned forward. “I saw it on the screen.” Okay, so he had seen it on my phone. That didn’t mean anything. I wasn’t sure why he was bringing it up, but whatever the reason, it was better than the alternative would be. But just as I started to calm down, Hudson said the words that made my world come crashing around me: “And more importantly, I’ve been talking to a girl named Eggo for a few weeks.”

I was going to vomit.

“Oh?” I asked. I tried to keep my voice light and breezy. “How strange. I guess it’s a common nickname.”

“I know I haven’t lived in Canada for that long,” Hudson said, spreading his hands, “but I’ve personally never heard the nickname. Is that just a me thing? Do I need to get out more?”

My hands were shaking so much that I barely felt like I had control over them, but I didn’t let that stop me from reaching for my phone. I barely even noticed what I was doing as I open the call app and pressed on Bay’s contact. And I genuinely thought I might pass out when I immediately heard his phone start to ring.

I had not been talking to Hudson freaking Shaw for the past few nights. The boy who asked me to share my secrets, who called me love, who thought I was cute… that couldn’t be the same boy who had spilled coffee on me, and asked me to be his guide. It just couldn’t… right?

Even as I thought that, though, the pieces were falling into place in my mind. The fact that he had just moved here. That he lived with four other boys in a mansion. That they were British, and cute, and rich… This was my own fault. Of course, it was him. How had I been so stupid? Bay was Hudson Shaw’s nickname, and I’d known it—hadn’t Grace once told me so? Not to mention that Hudson himself had told me who he was. I hadn’t believed them when they told me they were Take Five... And now I was paying the price for it.