Peppermint Kiss by Kelly McKain Read Free Book Online

push it. “My dad’s not around either,” I said then, surprising myself.
    â€œOh,” said Marco. The bell went and we began to wander in. “What happened?” he asked.
    â€œYou know, the usual,” I said, trying to sound offhand about it. “He had an affair, Mum found out, they split up, his business failed and we got kicked out of our house. That’s why we moved here.”
    Marco stopped still, staring at me. He looked shocked. I was a bit shocked too, actually. Had I really just said that? “Woah, wow,” he muttered. “Are you okay?”
    â€œYeah, I think so,” I said. “It’s all still…you know. A lot to take in.”
    That was when he took my hand. I gasped as another surge of electricity crackled between us. “I’m sorry,” he said, squeezing it.
    â€œThanks,” I mumbled, squeezing his back. It felt like he understood,
really
understood, in some deep-down way. Well, I guess his dad had let him down too.
    We kept walking, and he didn’t let go of my hand, and I didn’t let go of his, all the way to the double doors.
    School went okay. Marco didn’t ask any more about my family. I think he got that I didn’t want to talk about it, and that I wasn’t keen on the others knowing just yet. There was no more spontaneous hand-holding (unfortunately!) but I managed to fix it to sit next to him at lunch, while making it look like it had just worked out that way.
    Last lesson was the Media Diploma thing I’d signed up for. The teacher, Mr. Mac, was really nice, and young, and he talked to us in a normal way like we were just people and not
pupils
. Not everyone in our class was taking that option so there were only twelve of us, and we all got to sit round a big table together, like you would in sixth form.
    We had to do a photography and design project to create a promotional leaflet or flyer for something, and we were actually going to have some printed up at the end by a professional press and go and get them displayed in shops and the information centre and the library and different places. We could work in pairs if we wanted and Summer instantly grabbed my hand, going, “Bags I’m with Abbie.”
    â€œHey, I thought we were doing a promo for Headrush!” Marco complained.
    She grinned. “We were, but actually I’m not that
into
the idea of following your band around, taking pictures. I don’t want people thinking I’m one of the
fans
. Your head’s big enough already.”
    Marco pulled a face at her and turned to Ben. “Looks like it’s you and me then, mate. But you’re not going to make me do, like,
nature
, are you?”
    â€œI’m doing mine on the Estate Environmental Conservation Group at Dartington,” Ben said. “I’ve already arranged to take the photos this weekend, when I’m volunteering.”
    â€œOh,
good
,” Marco grumbled. “I won’t have to actually do any
conserving
, though, will I?”
    Ben rolled his eyes. “Maybe I’ll just go by myself, and you can write the leaflet text from my notes. Deal?”
    Marco grinned. “Deal.”
    Me and Summer knew we wanted to do something different and cool, but we didn’t know what. We were going to take each other’s numbers and text when we got any inspiration, but then I remembered that my phone had stopped working the night before – like Saff’s – so I made some excuse about how I couldn’t get any coverage down here and I needed to change networks. I couldn’t tell them what was really going on with us and money – it was way too scary, not to mention embarrassing (I didn’t even tell
Marco
exactly how bad things were). I’d only just met them, and anyway, it was so nice to escape to school and just feel normal for a while.
    For the rest of the lesson (well,
session
, as Mr. Mac called it), we looked at loads of