Chapter 1
The door slammed into my face with a sickening thud. And not an in my face, conversation ending, go away! kind of door slam. It was a me walking by, a door whooshing open, wood hitting my forehead, kind of door slam; a couple inches lower and it would have been my nose making that crack. I placed a steadying hand against the wall and pinched my eyes shut, willing the pain away. The door swung closed with the same swishing sound that had alerted me to it’s opening a moment before.
“Are you okay?” A deep, distinctly male voice pushed through the dizzying darkness. A firm hand pressed against my left arm, another wall holding me up. I opened my eyes to find the world a blurry mess. The blue-green lockers I knew were to my left could have just as easily been a swaying sea, and the boy in front of me a pretty mermaid lounging on a rock while combing her long, flowing hair. Even so, there was something oddly familiar about his voice.
“I’m good,” I answered, trying to sound as casual as possible, trying not to flinch as the movement of my mouth pushed twinges of sharp pain against my skull.
“No, really,” he said, concern weaved loosely into his words. “You don’t look so good.” I could feel his pepperminty breath on my face, and wondered if he was chewing gum. His blurred face looked kind of like a skull to me, hollowed and bare. It was possible that he had very pronounced cheekbones. Or maybe I just had a concussion and was suffering from weird, blurry delusions.
Having a stranger so close was starting to freak me out, and I blinked frantically in time to my quickening breath, trying to get my sight back. To my surprise and relief, my vision started to clear, giving definite edges to the wall, the lockers, my shaky hands, and the gorgeous boy with his face merely inches from mine. His eyes were a luminescent golden-brown, framed by long, dark lashes, and his cheekbones were actually rather nice.
I jumped back as his voice, face, and name all clicked together, and my recognition was reflected back at me in his endless eyes. “Leonardo,” I squealed, completely in shock as I said the name of the super-hot player who also happened to be in my all-immersion Spanish class. His voice, in Spanish so rough and unsure, was rich and refined in his native English. Alarm bells were going off in my head as I backed away, telling me exactly who the predator was in this situation, and who was the prey.
I moved slowly away from tall, dark, and handsome, my head still spinning slightly from its meeting with the door. I tried to estimate how many girls he’d taken to places like this and kissed. He probably hadn’t hit them in the face with a door. He had broken their hearts though, which seemed a lot worse. I wasn’t his type anyways, not really. It was better to be the wounded gazelle that ran away than the dumb gazelle that made-out with and then got caught and devoured by the lion. But, my goodness, it was one really, really, really attractive lion.
“Don’t think that,” I thought.
“Don’t think what?” he asked, wrinkling his brow in confusion. Maybe it wasn’t a thought after all. Or he was a mind reader. You never know-- it could be a legit thing.
“Um, nothing, yup, nothing at all,” I stammered. ”Great cover-up, genius. He didn’t notice a thing.” At least that thought was is my head and not out loud.
“Seriously, Jasmine, you don’t look so good.” He once again leaned slightly closer to get a better look at my face, surprising me with the use of my name.
“Wow, thanks,” I muttered, then instantly regretted the sarcasm that was essentially second nature to me, at least in my mind.
“Anytime,” he laughed, and it occurred to me that we might actually be be flirting. “I think that I should walk you to the nurse’s office,” he said, not even seeming to care as the bell sounded around us, signaling the start of class. Maybe rules didn’t apply to level 10 hotties like Leonardo. Perhaps I could get out of second period English by being a hottie by association.
“Nah, I’m fine, really, just go to class,” I replied, giving my voice as much force as I could muster. To be honest, his close proximity was almost as disorienting as the whole door-to-the-face thing.
“Woah, what’s going on here?” asked a mischievous voice. “If you two are making out, go get a room.”
“That’s totally not what we were doing, Nando. I just hit her in the face with the door. Accidentally, of course,” Leonardo told his friend, Fernando, who also happened to be in our Spanish class, which would meet later in the day. “I was just taking her to the nurse’s office.”
“You really don’t have to do that, Leonar-”
“Leo.”
“Okay. Well, Leonardo, you really don’t need to.” At yet another appearance of my sarcasm, he half-smirked, half-grinned, making the room about ten million times brighter.
“But I want to.” I could tell that he wasn’t going to give up any time soon. Might as well just agree to it and get it over with. He must have seen the reluctant acceptance in my eyes because he began to lead me down the hallway, his hand resting protectively on the small of my back.
“You know, this is the longest conversation we’ve had in English,” Leo told me.
“¿Quieres hablar en Español?”
