WHEN I GOT BACK TO MY ROOM, PAIGE WAS sprawled on her stomach with her laptop in front of her on her bed.
“Whatcha doing?” I asked. I wondered if maybe now was the time to tell her everything. She’d know how to fix this. And I knew Paige—she could handle listening to me and not project my fears onto her relationship with Ryan.
She grinned. “IMing with Ryan.”
My plan to tell her evaporated. Again. I had to stop going back and forth—I was being ridiculous. I needed to stick with my decision. I was not going to do that to Paige when she was just getting into her own relationship. Paige had been all about school, volunteering, and hobbies—never about being boy-crazy. She’d liked a boy before she’d come to Canterwood, but she’d gone away to school before she’d had a chance to see if anything would happen. Ryan was her first shot at a real boyfriend.
“Oooh,” I said in a teasing voice. “I’ll leave you two alone.”
Paige rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. Don’t go. You just got here. I’ll totally be done in a few minutes and we could go see a movie.”
“That’s cool,” I said. “I’m just going to go to the common room for, like, half an hour to catch up on a reading assignment. Come get me when you’re done.”
Paige looked up from her computer screen. “’Kay.”
I grabbed The Secret Garden and swiped a notebook. I had to take notes for Mr. Davidson’s class. It made me feel less nervous if I went into the class discussion with a few notes on what I wanted to say.
When I got to the common room, I curled up in the window seat and opened my notebook. The lies swirled in my head and I tried to force them out of my brain. I really should have been reading, but I couldn’t focus.
“Oooh, writing in your diary?”
I looked up at Jasmine as she walked into the room. Her eyes were on my journal. “Journaling about The Secret Garden for English,” I said. “Want to read my deepest, darkest thoughts about Colin and Mary?”
Jas snorted. “I’ll pass, thanks.” She grabbed a Sprite from the fridge and left.
My gaze went back to the window and I don’t know how long I stared outside before Paige came inside. At least fall break wasn’t too far away. I’d be able to escape from everything and have fun with Paige in New York—it was exactly what I needed.
“Get a lot done?” she asked.
I stood, nodding. “A lot. Let me grab my purse and we can go.”
Paige followed me back to our room. “How was your ride? What’d you do?” she asked.
“Trail ride,” I said. “I should have practiced, but I didn’t feel like it.” I picked up my purse and put it over my shoulder.
“You deserve to trail ride,” Paige said. “You love it and so does Charm. You guys practice all week—a break is okay.”
“Yeah,” I said. “But guess who I went with.”
Paige slowed as we left our room and walked down the Winchester hallway. “Callie?”
“Nope.”
“Wrong.” I laughed. “Keep going.”
“Not …” Paige paused, looking at me sideways. “Not Heather or Jasmine.”
I nodded. “Heather.”
Paige grabbed my arm. “No way! Wow, you must have been totally desperate. She’s”—Paige swallowed—“still alive, right?”
I laughed. “Yes! She’s fine. It wasn’t bad. We didn’t talk, really. Just rode out to the field and raced.”
Paige looked at me. “You won, didn’t you? I can tell.”
“I totally won.”