It was just really hard to make this man, the hottest boy in school, look at me for what I felt inside. That’s probably why during the summer when he went back to Ireland and I went home to Cambridge I decided that the upcoming year was the year when I would transform from the awkward caterpillar into the beautiful butterfly.

Jase and I had always done this. First day on the train we’d figured out that each other loved Humpty-Dumpty chips and so one night at almost eleven when everyone else had gone to bed, we snuck down and talked all night by the fireside. It was our Chip Pit ritual. That’s what we named it that first night even though we weren’t really by a fire pit, just a fire place. But Chip Place didn’t sound right.

I was semi-excited about Halloween, but not so much. Everyone else was so-so about it as well. The most anyone said was that they were looking forward to the Halloween feast and for after Halloween when the bats and spiders disappeared. No, what everyone was talking about was Quidditch try-outs. Starr was a whirr of excitement and I had to admit that I was pretty pumped as well, even though I’d given up my Quidditch dreams in my fourth year.

Jase had always been too nice. He’d always been the good guy and he had always been the one to get walked all over in a relationship. I didn’t have enough fingers on my hands to count the number of times he’d be crushed by some girl who had gotten fed up with his sweet and kindhearted nature. It stopped when I hit my second toe, but that seemed like twelve girls too many.

He kept staring into my eyes, his face inches away from mine. It would have been the perfect moment to kiss him, and I was seriously thinking about it except for the fact that I was on my way out on a date with Brad and Nikki was probably waiting downstairs for Jase. Still we stared at each other for a long time and, call me crazy, but I swear he was lowering his head closer and closer to mine. “Allie,” he whispered.

She laughed then and picked up a book and handed it to me. “Do you feel sexy when you hold books?”
“No, not really. I feel like a bookworm.”
“Okay, well do you feel at peace, in charge and excited when you read books?”
“Yes, all the time. I love getting locked into a story so that I have to keep reading and find out what comes next. When I hold books I feel a sense of ease and comfort. I feel strong.” I held the book she’d given me to my chest.
“That’s sexy then,” she decided.

“Do you think Nikki’s fooling around on Jase with Brad?”
“Whoa,” I said as I processed her words. That was a huge accusation, but if the shoe fits? “I’m not sure.”
“That would fry Nikki’s bacon to the point of black if that were true,” Starr said. “If we could dig the dirt on that story we could practically put the postage stamp on her ass right beside the boot mark that Jase gives her when he finds out. She’d be history.”

I looked to my right and saw Nikki had sat down across and a little ways down at the table. She was meshing her long spindly fingers through her platinum blonde hair and the idea popped into my mind. It was wicked and it was cruel and it would probably land me or my friends in detention, if any of the teachers ever found out it was intentional, but somehow I knew we could pull it off.

It looked like waiting was a never-ending theme for me this year. I really despised the waiting, and the fact that Jase had been so thick-headed these past few months to finally see what was staring him in the face. But despite all my earlier reliefs about having finally told him the truth about her, there was still the inevitable her to be dealt with.

Jase stopped in his tracks. Sexy? The word resounded in his brain as he processed her question. He looked down at Allie. Her head was bowed slightly, her shoulders hunched, and her hands holding her stomach. She was turned in on herself, a hard outer shell up to protect her from his answer. Then it dawned on Jase; she didn’t think she was sexy. She thought that that was the reason he’d never told her he loved her.