Page 61 of The Bad Boyfriend Curse
“Are you kidding, Noah? A ton of research? Comparing income potential and labor economics for different school programs? Ilivefor this stuff.” That makes him laugh even though I’m one hundred percent sincere about it. “Let me help you. We’ll do it together.”
“How? You’re grounded.”
Good point. I guess we can do it over the phone, though he doesn’t have his own computer. He borrows his father’s when he needs one, but I don’t think his father would approve of what we’re doing, given how he reacted about TMU in the past.
I suddenly remember something. “My parents are going tobe out late tomorrow night. Some fundraiser in Toronto. They hired a car to take them there and back because they don’t want to stay in the city overnight, but they’ll be gone for hours.”
Noah shakes his head. “There’s no way I’m going to sneak into Jason LeClair’s house.”
“No, my mother specifically said that I can’t have friends over. But I’m allowed to go for walks in the neighborhood. How will she know if I’m in a house in the neighborhood instead?”
He raises a brow. “I’m not going to Sadie’s. Sneaking into Andrew LeClair’s house would be as bad.”
“You’re not going to sneak. You’re going to be invited. And not to Jason’s or Andrew’s house but to their parents’ house. Sadie has the entry code to her grandparents’ place. She and Liv have been hanging out there all summer.”
Noah still looks skeptical. And to be honest, I don’t blame him. He wasarrestedfor trespassing at the LeClair plant. This would be trespassing at thehomeof the owner of LeClair Industries. But there’s no way we’ll be caught. Sadie will cover for me.
“C’mon, I know you want to be alone with me.” I run my hand over the soft skin of his midriff again, making him shiver.
He chuckles and leans into my touch. “I thought the point was to research schools and stuff?”
“Yeah, but how long could that possibly take?” I ask, putting on my most innocent look. “My parents won’t be home for a long, long time. And the house is literally a three-minute walk from Jason’s.”
He shakes his head, smiling. “Meera Noorani, you have the best ideas.”
That night I call Sadie, and after I explain the situation to her, she readily agrees to let Noah and me use her grandparents’ house to research schools. She says she can disengage the alarm remotely and gives me her code to get into the house. I tell Noah to meet me outside the house at eight.
When I get to Jason’s parents’ house the next night, Noah is waiting out front with a bike. “Where did you get that?”
“It’s Aaron’s. Chain keeps coming loose and the brakes are shot, but it got me here.” He glances at the house. “You sure there’s no security system here?”
I shake my head. “There is. But Sadie turned it off. She does that when she has parties here.”
Noah nods, but he still seems nervous. “I was kind of expecting this house to be bigger.”
I head toward the front door. “They also have a cottage in Muskoka and a big house in Spain.” I use the code Sadie gave me to unlock the door.
Once we’re inside, we drop our things and take off our shoes. After grabbing some Cokes from the fridge, we go to the couch in the family room, and I put my computer on the coffee table. “Okay, which schools did you look at already? Did you make a list? We can start—”
Noah interrupts me by kissing my lips, and I make an embarrassing little gasp of surprise. I’m about to stop him because I figured we’d do our research first, then make out as a reward. But he bites my lower lip, and his tongue slips into my mouth, and I decide that his idea of kissing first is much better.
He finally pulls away a few minutes later. His face isinches from mine, and he has the sweetest expression of mischief on his lips.Ugh… I like his face so much. “Sorry, you were saying?”
My lips squeeze together a moment as I try to regain my… everything. The effect this guy has on me is like nothing I’ve felt before. “I… I mean… I have no idea.”
He chuckles, burying his face in my neck. “Sorry for distracting you.” He plants a soft kiss there. “I’ve wanted to do that all week.” He kisses me again before finally sitting up straight, dramatically, but gently, pushing me an arm’s length way. “I’ll be good now. Let’s research schools.”
“Yeah, like I’ll be able to focus on anything now,” I say sarcastically as I put my computer on my lap. Not that I’m complaining.
Eventually we start compiling on a spreadsheet a list of community-college music programs in Ontario. We note which ones have January intake, the application requirements, and the job prospects for them. It’s great. I mean, anytime I get to work on spreadsheets and research is great, but working on spreadsheets and research with Noah is even more fun because he’s extra adorable when he’s thinking and his brows scrunch up. But really, it’s amazing to be able to see him get excited about his future. He’s always sounded dejected when talking about it before.
“I don’t know,” he says after we look at a music management program at a community college in Toronto. “I’m not sure I want to be on themanagementside of it. Music managers always seem so… skeevy to me.”
I add a column on the spreadsheet:Is the career skeevy?Noah laughs as I add a Yes/No drop-down list and color the column mustard yellow, the skeeviest color I can think of.
“You weren’t kidding when you said you love spreadsheets. Why don’t you want to go into finance or economics, a job that uses spreadsheets and data more?”
“Rule number one of career planning as taught to me by Dr. Tan: Finance is boring.”
