“What’s the assignment?” I ask, casually announcing myself as I plunk down onto the grass beside Aimee.
I can tell that Aimee’s surprised to see me. A warm pink blush spills across her skin—probably residual embarrassment that the last time that I saw her, she was crying and drunk and blowing snot all over my shirt.
“Hey,” she says breathlessly.
“What’s the assignment?” I ask again.
Her clear blue eyes search my face. Puzzlement creases her forehead and drags down the sides of her mouth. “It’s nothing. I was just complaining about something for one of my classes. It’s not a big deal.”
Jodi leans forward. “Aimee’s professor informed the class that everyone has to write an article to submit to the student paper. She’s freaking out because she has no idea what to write about.”
The pink spots on Aimee’s cheeks deepen. She shakes her head and sits up. One hand goes across her chest defensively. “I’m not freaking out.” She turns to me. “I’m not.”
The faint tendrils of an idea are reaching into the corners of my brain. I squint at Aimee, who’s fluttering her hands and mouthing something to Jodi—probably something about me. Jodi’s got her hands spread out and a what-did-I-do expression on her face.
I clear my throat to get their attention. “What’s the article supposed to be about?”
Aimee pauses and sniffs before she answers me. “It can be about anything I want to write about—the price of a cup of coffee in the union , the fall of communism, how to store tulip bulbs before you plant them… I don’t know. He said that it doesn’t really matter what the topic is, but preferably it’ll be something that the paper wants to print—whatever that means.”
“Her professor will weight the grade accordingly if her article actually makes it to press,” Jodi adds helpfully.
After another long silence, Aimee sighs and does this adorable little shiver thing with her shoulders. “I’ve got some time and I’m sure that I’ll think of something decent.”
“You can always write an article about me. All you’d have to do is ask me nicely.”
Aimee looks at me with obvious skepticism. Her nostrils are flared and her jaw is clenched. “And what makes you think that the student newspaper wants an article about you? Just because every warm-blooded girl around here seems to want a peek at what’s inside your boxer shorts, that doesn’t make you a newsworthy topic.”
My eyebrows go up. “Every warm-blooded girl…” I repeat blithely. “Do you include yourself in that category?”
Aimee sputters. Jodi laughs.
“You don’t have to answer that,” I continue. “And I don’t think that the paper is going to want an article about me. I know it because they’ve been hounding me for an interview for at least two weeks.”
Aimee sucks her bottom lip between her top and bottom teeth. Her blue eyes darken a shade. “Really?”
I try not to smile at the surprise in her voice. “Really.”
“Well…” She scrunches up her nose and twists her hair over her shoulder. “What kind of article do you think they want?”
“Oh you know… the usual fluff piece. You could write about what I’m doing to train during the off-season, and then you could ask me how I think the team is going to do this year, and what makes me tick. That kind of stuff.”
Words move beyond her eyes. She’s thinking, weighing her options. Finally, she says, “But you want something from me.”
Her voice is flat as a board. It’s not even a question. I cock my head to the side and lift my eyebrows. “Maybe.”
“I already told you that I don’t date,” she says. Her expression is laced with determination. Strangely, it makes me like her a little bit more.
“I must have missed something.” I chuckle. “Did I just ask you out?”
Aimee looks down at her hands, a small smile tugs at her mouth. “No.”
“Well, then…”
Her blue eyes swing back to mine. “Spill it already. What do you want from me, Cole?”
“It’s simple,” I shrug, trying to ignore the way my name sounds coming out of her mouth. “I want answers.”
“Answers?”
“Yeah.” Fuck. She’s so close that I can see a tiny bead of sweat dripping down her neck and disappearing under the edge of her grey top. I want to follow it with my tongue. “If you’re going to write about me, you’re going to have a lot of questions. The deal is that for every one of the questions that I answer, I want you to answer one of mine.”