A Good Enough Reason Read Free

shopping. You have the most awful taste I’ve ever seen.”
    Ellis looked down at his Platform 9 3/4 red T-shirt. “What’s wrong with my clothes?”
    “Honestly? I think you’re the only one in this school who actually gets the meaning of your T-shirt.”
    “You do too.”
    “I was coerced into learning about it.”
    “Oh, please. It’s not like I tied you to the couch.”
    “You said you wouldn’t help me with my English homework if I didn’t watch the movies! All eight of them!”
    “Hey, I did you a favor. They’re classics!”
    “Classics?”
    “Yes. It’d be sad if no one here got the T-shirt.” Ellis shook his head. It was better than talking about hypothetical crushes on teachers, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to make Anna see the flaw in her ideas. It wasn’t the first time he’d tried—and failed.
    “They’re just books, Ellis.”
    Ellis snatched his hand back. “Take that back!”
    “Ellis,” Anna said with a laugh.
    “Anna! It’s like me telling you statistics is boring!”
    “You do, at least once a day, five times a week.”
    “But—”
    “Let’s agree to disagree on this one, okay? I don’t expect you to start liking statistics, and you stop trying to educate me in geek stuff.”
    “I get the shirt.”
    Ellis turned to the side to see who was talking and froze. Anna fluttered her eyelashes at Dale. “Really?”
    “Yeah. Awesome books.”
    “I can’t believe all the hot ones are geeks,” Anna said with a groan.
    Ellis cringed, waiting for Dale to tell her off, but he only chuckled. “You think I’m hot?”
    Anna gave Dale a shocked glance. “You think I’m blind? Are you fishing for compliments?”
    Dale pressed his hand over his heart. “I would never.”
    “Didn’t look like it.”
    The bell rang, and Ellis looked down at his half-eaten meal. He’d forgotten to eat again.
    “Here.”
    He looked up at Dale with surprise. “An apple?”
    “You didn’t eat much.”
    “Oh, well. It happens often.”
    “Take the apple, then. You can eat it before English.”
    Ellis hesitantly took the fruit. “Umm, thanks?”
    The smile Dale gave him made his knees go wobbly. “You’re welcome. See you in class. Oh, and I love your T-shirt.”
    Dale walked away, leaving a stunned Ellis holding an apple. Anna was ecstatic, of course.
    “He’s so nice. Maybe you should have a crush on him instead of on Mr. Shea.”
    “Why?”
    “Because you’d have more possibilities of it becoming more than a crush.” Anna wiggled her brows.
    Ellis snorted. “Yeah, right. At least I’m pretty sure Mr. Shea is gay. Dale had a girlfriend the last time I checked.”
    Anna waved at him. “Details. Now let’s go. I have a history class to get to.”
    “Lucky you.”
    Anna scowled and hit Ellis’s arm before walking away. “Go on. Your boyfriend is waiting for you.”
    “Hey! I don’t have a boyfriend!”
    Several heads turned Ellis’s way, and he cringed. Anna was able to make him forget he shouldn’t be himself when he was at school.
    He looked down and quickly moved away, wondering if Anna had meant Mr. Shea or Dale when she’d joked about the boyfriend thing.
     
     
    ELLIS DIDN’T have a crush on Mr. Shea, but he couldn’t deny the man was totally his type.
    He wasn’t tall, probably around five foot nine or ten, and he had a boyish appearance that made him look younger than his twenty-nine years. Yes, Ellis knew how old his teacher was, but he’d never confess how he’d found out. Or in this case, how Anna had found out.
    He leaned his chin on his palm and looked toward the front of the classroom, trying not to be obvious about the way he was staring. He wanted to run his hand through those blond curls and look into those sinful brown eyes, but it stopped there. Mr. Shea was like the famous actor or singer you knew you could lust after from afar but never touch, and it was more than fine with Ellis.
    “All right. I need you to pass your assignments on Fitzgerald to