Girlfriend Material by Melissa Kantor Read Free Book Online Page A

believe this. Brad Lander gave me some kind of potion that made me think I liked him. Can you imagine?! Luckily I found the antidote, but I’m still pretty grossed out. Call me, okay?
    But it wasn’t Laura, it was Meg. “Hey, little sister.” Okay, I know I am, technically, Meg’s little sister, but does she have to say it like she’s forty years older than I am, rather than four? “I hope you’re having a good time .” Her voice had a singsong quality, as if she were speaking to someone who might still believe in the tooth fairy. “Mom said you’re settling in and adjusting and everything, which is good because I know you were freaking out before you left.” Read: Because I know you’re the most immature person in the universe . “So anyway , I hope you’re having fun in the sun and that we get to talk soon . Okay. Bye.”
    Ugh. I could not hit the delete key fast enough.
    As I dialed the number Tina had given me, I was worried Natasha’s mom would ask me all kinds of questions about my teaching experience, and I’d have to lie; but when I explained who I was, Carol just thanked me for taking on Natasha as a student ( a student—like I had others!) and told me about ten thousand times that the biggest problem Natasha had was confidence.
    “Sure,” I said. “I know what you mean.”
    “Oh, you do?” said Carol.
    Her asking made me wonder. Did I? I mean, I knew what confidence was, and I knew what it felt like not to have any. Maybe not on the tennis court, but definitely on the much bigger court we call life. Still, I wasn’t sure Carol really wanted to hear that I believed I could help her daughter due to my having spent the past forty-eight hours as a social leper.
    Luckily, the question had been rhetorical. “That’s great,” she said. “So would ten o’clock tomorrow work for you?”
    “Yeah, sure,” I said. So would eleven or twelve or one or …
    “Wonderful. And is twenty dollars an hour all right?”
    Considering that the most money I’d ever made in my life was nine dollars an hour to babysit these six-year-old twins from hell who live on our block, twenty dollars to hit a tennis ball back and forth (something I’d happily do for free) was way more than all right.
    “Sure,” I said. “That would be fine.”
    “Terrific,” said Carol. “She’ll meet you tomorrow at ten. I’ll reserve a court.”
    The town of Dryer’s Cove was so damn quaint, it was like a postcard come to life. There was a general store, a liquor store, an old-fashioned pharmacy, a bookstore, some antique and clothing shops, a penny candy store, half a dozen restaurants, and the library Tina had told me about. As I slid the bike into the bike rack in front of the library, I realized I’d forgotten to look for a lock in the garage; but then I noticed that none of the other bikes were locked up. Between the trust in their fellow citizens this indicated and the tiny, old-fashioned wooden building I was about to enter, I felt like I’d stepped back in time, to 19or something. The fact that I was wearing a vintage sundress I’d bought with Laura at this used-clothing shop we like only intensified the feeling that I’d been transported to another decade.
    Even though I had only one hour of Monday scheduled, just having something to do the next day made me feel less lame for having nothing to do today. Wasn’t that what Sundays were for: hanging around doing nothing?
    I pushed open the door and found myself in a low-ceilinged, wood-paneled room. I took a deep breath, loving the familiar smell of books. There was a small annex off to the left with some large armchairs set up so their occupants could look out the window at the library’s lawn with its charming gazebo atop a small hill. Straight ahead of me was a long table with newspapers and magazines spread out across it.
    I’d expected the tiny library to just have mysteries and romance novels and other summer reading, and they did have that stuff, but they