The Art of Taking Chances Page 9

  “You guys go ahead,” Kurt says. “Alex’s chain needs a little TLC.”

  A flood of emotions whoosh through me so fast all I hear is the roar of my pulse in my head. He must have been watching me while Kaylee was hitting on him.

  Me.

  Kaylee’s lips tighten into a scowl, but Topher and Mica exchanges smiles.

  “Yeah it does.” Topher laughs, and Mica shoves his shoulder.

  “We’ll find you on the trail,” Mica says.

  I don’t dare look at Kurt until they’re swallowed by the forest and I feel a tug on my braid. He’s looking at my hair in his hand.

  “I’ve always liked these,” he says, a wistful smile playing on his lips.

  My nerve endings are on fire, but I somehow manage to laugh. “Is that why you’re always hitting me with them?” My voice is light, teasing.

  On reflex, I touch my braid—the one he’s twirling between his fingers—and our hands touch. But instead of moving away, his fingers twist with mine.

  Everything stops. My breathing, the birds in the trees high above, even the water near our feet. Time stands still as his other hand grazes my arm. His touch is feather-light over my collarbone, and when his fingers slide into the hair at the base of my neck my knees go weak.

  “They’re a nice excuse,” he says.

  I’m ninety-nine percent certain I know where this is going, but I need to make sure. “For what?”

  “To touch you.” His voice is soft, drawing my body toward him.

  My free hand drifts to his bicep—the same arm Kaylee tried to claim earlier—and the intensity in his gaze nearly sets me on fire. Then he’s dipping his head toward mine.

  Our lips touch first, a gentle brush asking permission, then we move closer until our bodies press together. As if thinking the same thing, we untangle our hands, each reaching for the other as the kiss deepens.

  My fingers trail over his shoulder, up his neck, and into his hair, while his free hand wraps around my waist, holding me firmly against him.

  In the moments I dared to dream this might happen, this is how I imagined it—in the middle of the woods with the sun shining down on us through the trees.

  His lips move from my mouth to my neck, and I sigh against him. “Why haven’t we done this before?” I ask.

  “Believe me, I’ve wanted to.”

  I pull back to look him in the eyes, my heart full. All the fear I had over losing him as a friend vanishes as I realize how much more we can have. How being friends first doesn’t mean it can never happen—it means it’ll be that much better when it does.

  As his lips capture mine, one final thought dances through my mind: falling for your best friend totally rules.

  Connect with Melanie

  Thank you for reading The Friend Rules by Melanie Hooyenga! To connect with Melanie and learn more about her books and special offers, visit www.melaniehoo.com.

  More Than a List

  Yesenia Vargas

  Chapter 1

  I sat on the living room couch, staring at my phone and wishing I was the one going to the Demi Lovato concert tonight.

  A girl from my math class had posted about it on Instagram, saying she and her group of friends were already in Atlanta gearing up for the night of a lifetime.

  I kept on scrolling through my Instagram feed, trying to get the concert out of my mind. My dad was heading out of town today anyway. He’d never let me go at the last minute, and the first thing he’d ask was who I was going with. I had a handful of friends at school, but we’d grown apart the last few months, and I knew they were busy with graduation anyway.

  I came to another post and stopped scrolling. It was from one of my friends, Kelly. We hadn’t talked in a while, but I usually knew what was going on with her because she posted several times a day.

  This one featured her with a silly exasperated expression on her face. I could tell she was shopping somewhere. Kelly’s mom was behind her with a cart full of supplies for her dorm, and it looked like she was about to put something else in there. I could make out a metallic desk lamp, and bed sheets. Kelly was going away to college in August, but apparently, her mom was already freaking out about it and buying everything in sight.

  I grinned to myself before reading the caption.

  UGHHH. My mom won’t stop buying stuff for my dorm. I’m pretty sure it won’t even all fit in there! SEND HELPPPP #momsofinstagram #isitsummeryet

  The smile slowly faded from my face and morphed into pain. The post was funny—that was Kelly. But the post hit too close to home.

  I turned off my phone and threw it toward the opposite end of the couch before bringing my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms around them.

  I took a deep breath, trying to calm down. I was tired of crying. I didn’t want to go back to breaking down every time I thought of my mom. It had been six months, but time had frozen with her death. I knew I had to move on at some point, even though life felt all kinds of wrong without her in it.

  I bit my lip, hard, and blinked away the tears as I practiced deep breathing. Then I grabbed my phone, stuck it in my back pocket, and headed upstairs. Sometimes all it took was a movie on TV or an unguarded comment from one of my teachers, but something always reminded me of her being gone.

  I slowly opened the door to her studio. It was the smallest room in the house, but she had loved spending time in here working on her art. Local schools and libraries commissioned her a few times a year to create something for their buildings, usually murals. Whatever it was, mom dreamed up all her pieces in here first.

  I made my way over to the window and opened the blinds, letting the sun’s rays cover the room with their morning light. The room seemed to come alive again. I walked over to my mom’s desk and sat down.

  Everything was still there. Whiteboards and calendars hung on the wall, and sketchpads with pastels and colored pencils covered her desk. A couple of easels propping up blank canvases were posted around the room, just the way she had left them. My dad had wanted to empty the room out not long after the funeral, but I had asked him to leave it a while longer. And here it still was, six months later.

  I brushed my fingers on the wooden desk. I missed my mom more than ever. The doctors had found the cancer when I was in eighth grade. After a while, the doctor told us she was getting better, that it was going away. That she had beat it. But last year, it’d come back with a vengeance and taken her away in a matter of weeks. A few more months, and she would have been here to see me graduate tomorrow.

  But life didn’t work that way. At least not for us.

  I exhaled and paged through some of her sketchpads, tears brimming my eyes and making everything blurry. I set those aside and touched all the tiny things left on the surface of her desk. Paperclips. Pencils of different kinds. Erasers. A used-up checkbook. Her favorite pencil sharpener. So many pieces of her were still here.

  I spun around in her desk chair, my hand still on the desk as if I were holding onto it. The empty moving boxes my dad had carted in here after the funeral sat unwanted in the corner.

  A knock sounded at the door, and he walked in. My dad was in his usual suit and tie, and there was a carry-on bag behind him. His eyes lit up as he gave me a soft smile, but I noticed the way they dimmed when he glanced around the room. “Hey, pumpkin. I’m heading out. Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

  I looked up at him. “Yeah, of course. I was just thinking I could start sorting through some of Mom’s things while I wait for Aunt Sheryl to pick me up.”

  He nodded and gave me that look. The same one he always gave me when my mom came up. It said he was sad about losing his wife but was completely devastated that his daughter had lost her mother.

  “Okay, then,” he said. “I’ll be back tomorrow just in time for your graduation. Then we’ll have dinner at your favorite place.”

  “That sounds great, Dad. I can’t wait.”

  He sighed and put his hand on my head, then my shoulder. “How are
you eighteen already? It seems like just yesterday your mom and I were walking you into pre-K. Remember you said your name was Wiley? You couldn’t say Riley.”

  I laughed. “Dad, you promised you wouldn’t do or say anything embarrassing tomorrow.”

  “Did I?” he said with a little gleam in his eye.

  I stood up and squeezed him. He hugged me back and kissed me on the forehead. “Call me if you need me. But I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

  “I will,” I said and then teased, “I mean, I am legally an adult now. You don’t have to worry about me.”

  “I always do.” He kissed me on the head one more time. “Promise you’ll save me leftovers? You know that shrimp fried rice is my favorite.”

  “Definitely.”

  My Aunt Sheryl and I always got Chinese takeout when we hung out, and my dad loved it. I always saved him some. It was our thing.

  He gave me one more hug, and then he was gone, off on another business trip. I sat back down and opened the top drawer of my mom’s desk. It had the usual office and art supplies. I grabbed three cardboard boxes and started sorting things into Keep, Donate, and Trash.

  I was on her filing cabinet when I came across the envelope. It wasn’t the usual flimsy white envelope. This one was thick and cream-colored—the fancy kind. And it had my name on the front, in my mom’s handwriting. I’d recognize it anywhere.

  I opened it without thinking, wondering if I’d find my birth certificate or passport or something like that. But what I found was a short letter.

  The words inside were pretty much what she had said to me before she’d died.

  My beautiful Riley,

  I’m so sorry I had to leave you so soon. I wish I had more time to see you grow up, but you’re strong. Remember that life won’t give you anything you can’t handle.

  You’re blooming into a young woman before my eyes, and it breaks my heart that I won’t be there to see it. Oh, what I would give to watch you experience what’s still ahead of you and be there for you when life is hard.

  I wish I could have seen you as a lovely blushing bride on your wedding day or be the extra set of arms you need when you have a newborn. Your dad will have to do it for me.

  Riley, know that I’ll always be with you. No matter what, I’m proud of you, and we love you so much.

  You’ve got this.

  Mom

  Her words became illegible through the fresh tears in my eyes. My mouth turned upward at the same time. I couldn’t believe I’d have something like this from her to keep forever but I was also devastated I wouldn’t get another letter from her again.

  There was something else too. My fingers found a second sheet. I slid the letter behind it and scanned the page in front of me.

  A list. I recognized it right away.

  We had created a checklist during my freshman year while she had been in remission. It had been our way of celebrating her victory against breast cancer. The list contained everything we’d do together by the time I graduated high school, almost like a reverse bucket list. There were only a handful of items. We’d meant to add to it, but I guess we’d forgotten about it. At least I had. My mom hadn’t. Her letter was dated not long before she’d passed away.

  I blinked several times, my eyes full of tears again as I realized that she had wanted me to do all of this before I graduated. I sat down, biting my trembling lip as I thought of her writing this letter and enclosing the list for me.

  I read through it again, remembering the fun we had writing down every item.

  Mom had bent over the paper, shielding it from me as she wrote down the last one. She laughed and pushed the paper toward me. “You’ll need to do this one without me.”

  Have my first kiss.

  I had laughed so hard my stomach hurt.

  “You can’t go off to college without having had your first kiss,” she’d said, still smiling, but her tone told me she was completely serious.

  The sound of the doorbell jarred me back to reality. I walked downstairs, sure my dad had forgotten something and come back so I swung the front door open.

  Only it wasn’t my dad. Axel, my best friend and neighbor, stood in the doorway.

  “Morning,” he said, walking in. Then his eyes went to the letter still in my hand. “What’s that?”

  I shut the door behind him and ran my thumb over the letter in my hand. “Oh, it’s…my mom’s. I found it in her office.”

  “Oh. Okay. That’s cool,” He shoved his hands in his pockets and avoided my eyes. He knew this was still hard for me to talk about. So I usually didn’t.

  I folded up the list and looked at him. “So, what are you up to?”

  Axel relaxed a little. “I was going to ask you the same thing. My mom and brothers are shopping the whole day, and I have nothing to do. You want to watch a movie or something later? Order takeout?” Then he paused. “But if you’re busy, that’s okay—”

  “No, uh, actually,” I started, taking a seat on the couch. I pulled the letter out again.

  Axel sat down beside me.

  I took a breath. “I was just looking at this. It’s a list of things I was supposed to do before graduating. My mom and I came up with it a while back, when she’d gotten better. I just found it again, but graduation’s tomorrow. So much for doing it.”

  My voice came out a little wobbly at the end, and my throat tightened.

  I wanted to say I wished I had found it sooner, but I didn’t want to cry in front of him.

  Axel held out his hand. “May I?”

  I nodded and gave him the list. I immediately felt calmer. He read it for a minute. “This isn’t that long. I bet we could do it.”

  I looked at him, a small smile forming on my face.

  “I mean, not we, you, obviously, but I’ll come with you. Keep you safe and whatnot…

  I involuntarily snorted, already feeling better. That was Axel, and why he’d become my closest friend this year. He was such a gentleman, the guy who helped you carry something heavy without having to ask him. Who would do anything to make your day a little brighter.

  “What? I’m the better driver,” he said with a laugh and then looked at the list again. “Road trip? Totally doable. Concert…”

  He paused to think.

  “The Demi concert is actually happening tonight,” I said. “But no way I can go. My dad would kill me if I just went, especially on my own.”

  Aunt Sheryl probably wouldn’t think it was a good idea either.

  “Oh yeah. Isn’t it a few hours away?”

  I nodded. “Like three.”

  Axel looked at the clock on our living room wall. “We could totally make it if you wanted.”

  I laughed. “No way.”

  “And this dye your hair thing. We could do that on the way. Pit stop.”

  “I cannot believe you,” I said, but I was having fun listening to him.

  “Now this first kiss thing,” he said, and I felt my cheeks turn hot. “I don’t have a lot to work with here, but I’m sure I can find you someone at that concert. Maybe the hair dye thing will help.”

  I grabbed a cushion and swung it at his head, but we were both laughing.

  “Seriously, though,” he said. “We’ve got nothing to do tonight and tomorrow. You said your dad’s out of town? I’ll tell my mom I’m staying with a friend tonight. She won’t care.”

  “My aunt is supposed to be picking me up later so I can stay at her place.”

  Axel thought for a moment. “Tell her your dad didn’t go out of town after all. His trip got cancelled.” He shrugged.

  I stared at him and couldn’t help but smile. “Axel, he would murder me if I snuck off. Like murder me. Forget graduating and going to college.”

  “He won’t find out, Riley. Trust me. And we’ll be back before he is.” He raised his eyebrows repeatedly with a silly grin on his face.

  He had me laughing again, but I thought about what he was proposing. “You know, he gets so busy he doesn’t
usually call except on his way back and it’s usually me, not my aunt…”

  “There you go,” Axel said, raising his arms. “We can totally do this. Who says you can’t do everything on this list by graduation?”

  “Axel, we cannot miss graduation.”

  He stood up. “We won’t miss graduation. We have plenty of time.” He pointed to the list. “Your mom wanted you to have an adventure before heading off to college. We should do it.”

  I sighed and stood up. “Your car or mine?”

  Chapter 2

  An hour later, we each had a small duffel bag ready. I bought the tickets online with most of my savings, Axel was analyzing the route on his GPS app, and I had called my aunt, lying to her and telling her my dad’s trip had been cancelled after all.

  It was way easier than I imagined, both the lying part and how quickly she believed me. It turned out something had come up for her anyway.

  Now we were on the road, our stuff in the back and the radio on loud as we cruised down the freeway. Just outside of town, Axel pulled into a tiny gas station.

  “Let’s go ahead and fill her up,” he said, hopping out of my Honda and pulling out his wallet. “You paid for the tickets. I got gas, hotel, and food.”

  I gave him a hug. “I’ll go grab us some snacks.”

  A few minutes later, we were on our way again, this time with enough Doritos, Rice Krispies Treats, doughnuts, nachos, sour gummy worms, and Dr. Pepper to hold us over until after college. And just like I had imagined my first road trip back in ninth grade, there was lots of music and bad karaoke. I pulled out and we took our first selfie. Obviously, I couldn’t share it, but we had to save the memories. I stared at the picture, the bittersweet moment hitting my chest like a hammer. This should have been my mom and me, but I was also grateful I had ended up here with Axel.

  In between songs, I rolled down the window and stared out toward the horizon, letting my hair fly uncontrollably in the wind. The cool air felt incredible against my face and neck, and I let my head fall back as Axel drove us closer and closer to freedom.