Page 57 of It’s All in How You Fall
Nat is incredulous. “You played tennis tonight?”
“Yeah. Golf too.”
Now he’s getting it. “At the country club?”
“Yeah.”
Nat just stares at me. “If that’s what happened… why lie about it?”
“Because…”
I don’t want to share this “gym class” experiment with anyone else.
I made a deal to set him up with my friend.
I have a crush on him.
Nat’s big brother bullshit detector is running hot as he watches me fumble for a way to explain why I’ve been spending so much time with his best friend and neither of us have said anything about it. “Because it’s… embarrassing.” His smirk wavers. Encouraging. “Look, you were right. Dad was right. I need to do something with my time. Alex felt bad and offered to help me. So, in summary: You were right, I was wrong, and it’s embarrassing.”
Nat absorbs my attempt at a compliment without a flicker of smugness. That’s not promising. “And so there’s nothing going on between you two?”
“No!” I snap, in pretty much the same defensive way I did with Sunny and Peregrine, but it feels different because nowI feel different. And I’m talking to Nat. So I add a distinguished/anguished, “Gross.” I try to look properly horrified, though my heart slides into a new, laughing rhythm. There is literally nothing gross about that boy, and even Nat knows it.
My brother reads my body language as closely as a gymnastics judge evaluates for execution. I stay still, sticking my horrified little sister face as well as any dismount. My muscles twitch from my extended attempt at a wrinkled nose and puckered mouth.
Finally, Nat drops his arms to his sides, posture relaxing. “Good. Because if he put the moves on you, I’d take two inches off his vertical through his kneecap.”
For extra emphasis, he steals back my racket and mimes going in, Nancy Kerrigan injury-style, on my left leg. I squirm away and steal back the racket, finally getting past him and down the hall. Roadblock averted. “No you wouldn’t. If he can’t rebound, Northland is screwed. And you hate to lose.”
“Caroline, I think you’re underestimating how pissed I’d be if anyone, even Alexander Oscar Zavala, came at my little sister with unwanted attentions.”
I almost tell Nat about Sunny. About how I orchestrated a setup, and he just needs to pull the trigger—it would clear Alex of any suspicions, but it would also mean betraying his trust with his best friend, and I’ve already done enough betraying with that information. So I don’t. Instead I say, “Everyone knows not to mess with you, Nat.”
25
The next day, I arrive at the Northland tennis courts ten minutesearly. Alex is already there, sitting in his car. I come up on him and rap two knuckles on the window. The second I move my hand out of the way, knock finished, is the second I realize that Alex Zavala is shirtless.
The swoop of his throat. Pecs. Nipples. Abs. Happy trail. Holy hell.
I was slightly too distracted to notice, but he’s not necessarily shirtless as much as he is mid-shirt change. A fresh tank top is tangled between his upper arms—which just happens to leave his entire torso exposed.
To me. The idiot who didn’t look before she knocked.
His abs contract under a layer of golden skin as he tenses at the sight of me, standing literally a foot away, gaping at his driver’s-side window.
Alex hustles to complete the maneuver, and I try but can’t tear my eyes away as the fabric skims his body. My cheeks are warming, and I’m pretty sure my mouth hangs ajar.
He finishes with the shirt and the door pops open. My body finally reacts, and I step back and away, my eyes flying to the grass, the tree overhead, the high school beyond. Anywhere but him.
“You’re early,” he says.
“Yep.” I force myself to look at him. “Also blind. Should’ve looked before I knocked. Sorry.”
He grins. “My protein shake exploded.” Oh. An accident. He spilled on his clothes. He nods at my tank top, one of Nastia Liukin in her all-around pink leo from Beijing with a sparkly scroll underneath.Gold medal if you’re Nast-y.“I don’t have endless tank tops like you.”
“You’re going to have to up your game, Zavala.”
“With you? I know, Caro, I know.” Alex reaches back into the car for his hat—discarded along with his original shirt, apparently—and heads to the trunk for his racket bag. I spy a couple of basketballs in there.
