Notorious by Cecily von Ziegesar Read Free Book Online Page B

her? “I’d like to …” She took a deep breath and looked up at him, lowering her voice a little so that everyone wouldn’t hear. “But, um, what’s going on with you and Callie? Are you together or not? Because …” She trailed off.
    Easy looked surprised and flustered. “No, Callie and I aren’t really …” He paused, not knowing what they were. He picked up his kneaded eraser and started to play with it like it was Silly Putty, stretching it until it broke, then rolling it back together. “I think we both know that things are over. ... It’s just not, technically, official.”
    Jenny felt her chest tighten in a combination of excitement at the possibility of being with Easy and dread over Callie finding out. “I just don’t think it’s the greatest idea for us to be spending a lot of time together before you guys are, you know, official,” Jenny surprised herself by saying. She even kept drawing as they talked, capturing the way his eyes crinkled when he was trying not to smile. “She’s my roommate, and I don’t want things to get weird.”
Weirder than they are,
she added silently.
    “Hey, I totally understand.” Easy reached across their desks and pulled down the top of Jenny’s sketch pad so that she would look at him. “I didn’t mean to cause any problems for you.”
    She lightly sketched in the loose curls that framed Easy’s face. “I know.” She noticed something stuck in his hair, and without thinking twice about it, she leaned across the desks toward him, making sure her boobs didn’t touch her paper and smear her drawings. He leaned toward her a little, and Jenny was sure she was blushing as she pulled a piece of leaf from one of his thick dark curls. She held it up for him to see.
    “I wondered what you were doing,” Easy said, sounding a little disappointed, like he thought she was … what? Going to kiss him? Goose bumps covered Jenny’s bare arms, even though the art building was always a thousand degrees because of the kilns. “I was out in the woods this morning,” he said mysteriously.
    “Really? How come?” She loved the idea that Easy was sort of a wild boy, like a woodland sprite or something, only not the gay tights-wearing kind. Jenny glanced up at the sound of the door closing. She’d kind of forgotten where she was. Kids were headed outside, armed with their sketches, to spray them with fixative. Class was almost over already? How did that happen? She looked down at her table and saw that she’d drawn a whole stack of sketches of Easy.
    “I like to paint there. It’s quiet. I’ve got this great spot.” Easy yawned and stretched, glancing around the art room as the students started to move their drawing desks back to their original places, the metal feet squeaking across the wood floor. “I was going to go there again tomorrow. Maybe you’d like to come?” Easy’s piercing blue eyes met Jenny’s, and she tried to understand what he was asking. Tomorrow? Did that mean he would be breaking up with Callie—
today
? Suddenly it felt like everything was happening so fast. Was it too fast?
    Not that she cared. “Yes. I’d like that.”

    Instant Message Inbox

    To: [email protected]
    From: [email protected]
    Date: Wednesday, September 11, 3:55 p.m.
    Subject: Re: Stables
Did you get my last email? See you at 5!
Kisses and maybe more …
    Xxx,
    C

8
WAVERLY OWLS SHOULD AIR THEIR DIRTY LAUNDRY BEHIND CLOSED DOORS .
    Easy stretched out on his bed and listened to the sounds of guys returning from sports practice, their adrenaline-pumped voices echoing through the dorm as they headed for the showers to get cleaned up for dinner. Alan, his roommate, was out having dinner at The Petit Coq with his parents, probably getting drunk with them on the red table wine. Easy turned the volume up on his iPod and let the sound of the White Stripes fill his ears. He was excused from mandatory team sports because of Credo, and he would have been out riding her