A/N: I am going on vacation, so, if I end up not updating much (or at all) within the next 9 days, that is why. Comments appreciated!

[Tuesday, January 5]

Tami was suddenly aware of Eric's presence around school. He'd blended in to the crowd before, but it seemed she was seeing him everywhere now. Mostly she saw him hanging out with Joey Washington, an enormous, black fullback who had befuddled many on the team by taking four AP classes his junior year and singing in the spring musical.

Tami assumed Eric must have a local girlfriend in addition to his college one. That's just how football players were. They were the worst offenders. Two-timing playboys, every last one of them. Eric probably snuck off with his sidepiece under the bleachers or in a stairwell during lunch. That's what Mo had done, because he and Tami had different lunch periods this year.

Except...Eric and Tami had the same lunch period, and today he was in the cafeteria the entire time, sitting with Joey and two other football players, a couple of benchwarmers whose names she didn't know. They ate and talked and laughed and played that paper football game, where someone flicks a sheet of folded paper through the goal post of another person's hands.

Tami kept glancing from her own table two rows back every time she heard Eric's laugh burst out, overcoming the indistinct hum of two hundred individual voices with its unique depth. At the tail end of every one of his laughs there lingered an amazing smile that transformed his face, almost as though he became a different person. Why hadn't he been on the ballot for best smile?

"Looking for your rebound guy?" Sarah Wilks asked, following her gaze. Sarah was her best friend. They didn't have any classes together – Sarah was in the advanced academics program and had been on the superlatives ballot for "teacher's pet" – but they worked the same shift at Chili's, and a friendship had bloomed through their shared complaints about the manager and customers. "Eric Taylor?" Sarah asked. "You know he has that girlfriend in college."

"I have no interest in Eric Taylor," Tami insisted. "I'm never dating another football player."

Sarah shrugged. "Joey's in a lot of my classes. He seems to think Eric's a good guy. And he's definitely hot. Eric I mean. Not Joey. If he didn't have a girlfriend, I'd go for him. Think he likes the sexy librarian type?" She lowered her glasses to the tip of her nose and pursed her lips in a fake, sexy pout.

Tami laughed. "I don't know, but I bet Joey does. You know he likes you."

Joey had asked Sarah to junior prom last year. Sarah had said she thought proms were expensive cliches, and she never had any intention of attending one. Tami had gone with Mo, of course. They'd been chosen prom king and queen. Then, at the start of their senior year, they'd been selected Homecoming king and queen. It seemed the whole school thought they were destined for each other. Tami had once believed it too.

"Joey's smart," Sarah conceded. "He's nice. And he can sing. He's just a little big for me. I feel like he'd crush me to death if we ever did it."

The paper football flew all the way over the table that divided them and plopped straight into Sarah's soup. Eric jogged over, leaned with two hands against the edge of their table, and looked at the football floating there. He turned his head back toward his table and shouted, "Touchdown!"

"Foul!" Joey insisted as he stood and made his way ponderously over to the table. "Hey, Sarah." He smiled at her. "Sorry about your soup."

"It wasn't edible anyway," she said. "I'm not sure what the chicken in the chicken noodle is."

"I've still got half a PBJ if you want it," Joey told her.

"He already ate the other five halves," Eric said.

Sarah chuckled, Tami smiled, and Joey pounded his fist lightly on Eric's head.

"Don't mess up my hair," Eric complained as he ran his fingers through it.

"You already messed it up by growing that ridiculous mullet," Joey told him.

Tami chortled.

"It's not a mullet," Eric insisted. "It's not long enough. And it's neat in the back."

"You would look better with short hair," Tami agreed, though the wavy curl toward the bottom in the back was kind of cute.

"Listen to her," Joey said. "She was on the ballot for best hair. Can I touch it?"

"My hair?" Tami asked.

"Yeah. I want to know what's so spectacular about it that it deserves a superlative. Does it feel like silk or something?"

"Man, that's creepy," Eric said. "You don't ask a lady if you can touch her hair."

"I just want to know – what do they mean by superlative hair? Does it feel like silk?"

"Nah, man," Eric said, "it's just thick and flowing and a really nice color. That's what they mean. They don't mean what it feels like."

"No," Tami said. "It's because it feels exactly like silk."

"Really?" Eric reached out and touched the end of her hair where it fell half way down her back. "It is soft," he told Joey.

Joey reached out and touched it too.

"Everybody stop touching my hair," Tami said. "My hair is not a hands-on exhibit."

The warning bell for 4th period rung.

"We have to get to Calculus," Joey told Sarah. "Want me to walk with you?"

"Calculus," Eric said, glancing at Tami, who was standing and grabbing her tray. "Couple of geniuses we got here, huh? Maybe Joey or Sarah should be tutoring you."

"I don't remember Algebra II anymore," Sarah said. "That was two years ago."

"I already finished my volunteer hours," Joey said. "And you know, Taylor, you could have taken pre-Calc this year if you wanted."

"But why would I?" Eric asked. "It's not required."

"What do you have next?" Tami asked as she dumped her tray in a nearby trashcan.

"Shop," Eric answered. "I hope we build something really useful like a birdhouse. My dad just loves it when I bring home birdhouses."

Tami chuckled and picked up her backpack by one strap. "See you tomorrow at tutoring."