Heartthrobs Don’t Date Wallflowers (Texting the Boyband)

Chapter 16

sixteen

On the mornings my mom couldn’t drive me to school, it was always a little chaotic. I liked to sleep in as late as possible and snooze every single one of my alarms until I absolutely had to jump out of bed. Then, I’d pull on my uniform in record time, brush my teeth while also doing my hair, and run out the door while trying not to choke on my breakfast.

But today, when I ran outside, there was a car outside the front gates of my house. The same car, in fact, that I’d been driven home in yesterday. And Zach Miles was leaning against the passenger door of it.

I faltered in my step, suddenly wondering whether my uniform skirt was on straight and if I’d remembered to braid both sides of my hair because it was feeling a little lopsided. I actually ran a hand over my hair just to make sure that it was right, and sighed in relief when I determined I’d braided both.

Zach’s eyes came up to me just as I was coming down the path, reaching the end of the path and adjusting my skirt, because I wasn’t positive if it was on right.

“Hey,” he said.

I was pretty sure my mouth formed the syllable “hey,” but no noise came out. He didn’t seem to notice.

“I thought I’d give you a ride,” he said.

“Uh,” was all I responded because what exactly was I supposed to say when an internationally known pop star showed up at my house and told me that he wanted to drive me to school?

“Get in,” Zach said, apparently taking my random noises as a yes. He pushed off from the passenger door so that he could open it for me. I stared at the open door, then at him. I had to be on some sort of prank show, right? I mean, there was no way that Zach Miles was offering me a second ride in as many days. That just didn’t happen. Not to girls like me.

The fact that he went to my school at all was weird enough, but this? This was just over the top.

“That’s okay,” I stammered out. “I can catch my usual bus, and you?—”

His eyes landed on my hand, and I looked down as well. My fingers were still purple and bruised, swollen.

“You shouldn’t have to take the bus with your hand like that,” he said.

“My hand being hurt has no impact on how I take the bus.”

“Does it hurt?”

I stared at him for much longer than was probably socially appropriate, wondering what exactly his angle was here. Did he really feel that bad about the situation? Because it hadn’t really been his fault. Somebody had pushed him and he’d fallen into me. Things happened. It wasn’t his fault that I had my hand in the locker or that he’d pushed me at just the right angle to slam it closed with my hand It was just an unfortunate set of events.

“No,” I lied. “Anyway, I should get going to catch my bus.”

“Just get in the car.” His voice was a little more forceful now, like he was exasperated—with himself or with me, I couldn’t tell. He blinked, showing off his long, luscious eyelashes. It wasn’t fair that guys always had the nicer eyelashes, and they didn’t appreciate it ever. “I don’t want to think about you being on the bus with your hand like that, when I could just be driving you. I’m already here, so just get in.”

“Are you sure this isn’t just a ploy to kidnap me?”

“If I wanted to kidnap you, I wouldn’t have given you the choice. I would have just grabbed you as soon as you walked out.”

“Yeah, like you could take me. I could fight you off, no problem.” I held up my metal travel mug full of coffee. “This is practically a weapon.”

He raised his eyebrows, looking both amused and unimpressed at the same time.

“Well, I’d say let’s put it to the test, but I really don’t want you to call the cops on me for trying to kidnap you,” he said. “Plus, then my manager would be upset, and you know, even if you didn’ t actually get me in trouble, if anybody saw me trying to kidnap a girl, they might get the wrong impression.”

“Can’t do anything to ruin the image,” I said teasingly. But inside, my heart sank a little. Of course, that was why he was offering me a ride, and that was why he was so careful to take me to the nurse’s office yesterday. All of it must have been about his reputation.

If people saw that I was hurt yesterday and he had just ignored me like those girls wanted, then that would have looked bad on him. The other girls in the hallway would have noticed and tweeted about how Zach Miles had been rude to a fan. And then the hate campaign would start, everybody telling him how terrible he was for doing what he did, even though he hadn’t actually really done anything wrong.

I wondered if he planned for people to see us this morning. If he’d thought about what it was going to look like when we pulled into the parking lot at school and everyone had their eyes on us. I didn’t like the idea at all—I hated being the center of attention, in a positive or negative way.

“I’m really okay,” I said. “Trust me, I’ll be fine on the bus and?—”

“Please,” he said. The word was so quiet, so earnest, that it made my heart melt a little. Because how could I say no when he was looking at me like a cute puppy?

Suddenly, for a moment, my heart fluttered. And I understood why fans felt the way they did. Why they could look at this boy on stage or in a video and think, I am in love with him . Poppy told me pretty much every fan had a favorite member of the band, and Zach was up there in terms of popularity. Of course, none of them were hurting too badly in that department since they were still the most famous boyband in the world, but I suppose there must be losers even in a group of winners.

But Zach wasn’t a loser, not by a long shot.

“Okay,” I said finally. “I mean, if you’re sure it wouldn’t be a problem.”

As I settled into the passenger seat, the scent of leather and something distinctly Zach filled the air, smelling just like his clothes yesterday.

Seriously, when had I memorized the scent of him without realizing?

Zach slid into the driver’s seat next to me, his movements smooth and casual, like this was just another day, nothing unusual about it. I, on the other hand, was hyper-aware of every little thing—how close we were sitting, how quiet it suddenly felt in the car. Was it just me, or was the silence getting louder?

Zach put the car in gear, and we pulled away from the curb. I glanced out the window, watching the familiar houses of our street blur past, but my mind kept bouncing between the fact that I was in Zach’s car and the weird little flutter of nerves that came with being this close to him. Was this normal? Did girls usually get rides from their neighbor-slash-boyband-member-slash-guy-who-almost-broke-their-fingers?

“You don’t talk much,” I said when the silence became unbearable.

“Neither do you.”

“Yeah but I don’t regularly perform to thousands of people. It’s a different standard for how shy I am.”

“Guess I save all my talking for the stage,” he said. “It’s exhausting, you know. One wrong word, and I could crush a thousand teenage hearts.”

“Oh, the weight you carry,” I teased. “So that’s why you’re quiet? Self-preservation?”

“Something like that. Or maybe I just prefer listening.”

“To what?”

He mumbled something that sounded distinctly like to you . But that would have been ridiculous.

As we neared the school, I realized I had no clue what the next move was here. Was I supposed to just say thanks and dash the second we parked? Or would he expect, like, post-ride small talk? Was there some unspoken ride-share etiquette that I didn’t know about it?

Zach must’ve noticed my total deer-in-the-headlights panic, because he broke the silence. “You’re really quiet. Something wrong?”

I blinked, totally caught. “What? No, I’m fine. Just, uh…thinking.”

“About?”

“How you… I mean…” My brain was blank. “Do you usually give your neighbors rides to school?”

Nice one, Ivy. Truly groundbreaking conversation skills.

Zach hesitated then eventually admitted, “Not really. You’re the first. ”

“Oh.”

We pulled into the school parking lot, and Zach smoothly parked right up front like he had his own reserved spot. I reached for the door handle, trying to play it off like this was no big deal at all, like my heart hadn’t just done a triple backflip. But before I could escape, he spoke up again.

“Hey,” he said, his voice softer this time. I turned, and he was giving me that same serious look from yesterday, the one that made my brain short-circuit. “You don’t have to take the bus or walk if you don’t want to. I meant what I said last night—I can give you a ride whenever you want.”

My heart went full-on acrobat mode, but I tried to keep my cool. “You don’t have to do that. I’m fine taking the bus.”

“I know,” he said, his gaze steady. “But I want to.”

Oh .

I had no idea how to respond to that, so I just nodded, throat suddenly feeling like I’d swallowed a sandbag.

“Okay, well,” I said, fumbling with the door handle like I hadn’t just forgotten how to function, “thanks for the ride. I’ll, uh, see you later?”

I slung my backpack over my shoulder, avoiding any and all eye contact. But just as I went to close the door, he called out, “Hey.”

I turned back, a little too fast. “Did I forget something?”

“No.” He blinked at me, long and slow. “Just wanted to say, have a good day, princess.”

My brain was basically melting at that point. I mumbled some sort of goodbye, spun around, and all but sprinted into the school, praying no one had seen us together—because if there was a way to stay low-key, pulling up with a literal celebrity was not it, even if we were so early that almost no one was here.

Which was why it took me until I was sitting down in first period and slowly catching my breath to realize exactly what he’d said.

Princess .

There was only one person in the world who called me that.

And it was most definitely not Zach Miles.