Awkwardly Ever After Read Free Page A

had propped open against a tree, giving herself an excellent view of her surroundings while remaining relatively invisible. Not that Isobel Peters ever needed help going unnoticed. “I would let my trusty dragon take care of the situation. Or ask a warlock friend to intervene. Those things are way more likely to happen than a date with Spencer King. At least for me . What’s going on, Mel?”
    â€œOkay, so let’s say someone was trying to set me up on a date with Spencer King. Hypothetically.”
    She shoved her glasses higher up her nose and stared at me in disbelief. “Nothing about this conversation seems hypothetical. Do we need to review the definition again?”
    â€œFine. It’s . . . well, honestly I’m blaming Mackenzie for this one.”
    Izzie grinned and closed her textbook with a resounding whump. “Let me guess: Mackenzie wants to set you up with Spencer because he is Logan’s best friend and she feels guilty about interrupting their bromance time.”
    She might not like being the center of attention, but that’s never stopped Izzie from paying attention to the intricacies of everyone else’s lives. That, combined with her analytical nature and her inability to lie with anything even remotely resembling a straight face, made her the world’s best confidant. I could trust Izzie to keep my secrets safe. I imagined it’d be similar to admitting my sins to a priest; what happens in the confessional, stays in the confessional.
    Forgive me, Father. I’ve been having some thoughts about my best friend’s little brother that probably don’t meet up to your godly standards or whatever. . . .
    Yeah, I didn’t think saying fifteen Hail Mary’s would really help in this particular situation. I’d also kept my embarrassing crush on Dylan to myself. And luckily, Izzie had never needed to know every particular to point me in the right direction, which was why I considered her undeniable talent for giving advice as one of Smith High School’s best kept secrets. Nobody would think to ask a girl who acted like she had a supercomputer chip wired into her brain for relationship pointers. Izzie might be good at understanding people, but she didn’t exactly come across as a people person.
    â€œI think Mackenzie’s in the mood to play matchmaker, but I don’t think her relationship with Logan has anything to do with it.”
    Izzie laughed outright. “If that was the case, don’t you think she would have noticed by now that you’re head over heels crazy about her little brother?”
    â€œWhat are you talking about? I’m not—”
    The three-minute warning bell cut me off and I watched in stunned silence while Izzie began methodically packing up her backpack.
    â€œSorry, was that supposed to be a secret? You mention him all the time, Mel.” Izzie pitched her voice higher, which sounded doubly absurd coming from her. “So I spent the night at Mackenzie’s house and Dylan told us the funniest story about his soccer practice. And then he challenged Mackenzie to a game of basketball, but when she pointed out that he had an unfair advantage, he said they would play on rollerblades! ”
    I felt my cheeks turning redder. “I don’t remember going into that much detail.”
    But Izzie was into her act now, and I could tell by the sparkle in her eyes that she wasn’t going to let it drop.
    â€œSo they took Mackenzie’s rollerblades to a nearby court and both put one of them on and used me as the referee.” Izzie’s voice finally dropped to her normal husky register. “This is the point in the story when you get a glazed look in your eyes.”
    Yeah, it was. Because that’s when I started thinking about the way Dylan’s dark hair had looked windswept and tousled as he focused on beating his older sister, only to look up at me and flash a bone-melting