Summer Apart by Amy Sparling Read Free Book Online Page A

“We’re good. You can stay.”
    She stands and makes her way toward the front door, ruffling the top of my hair as if I were her child instead of friend and peer. “Of course you do. Don’t worry, I’ll be awake a while so just meet up with me later.”
    “No it’s fine, seriously. We don’t need to talk. I’m here for you.”
    She rolls her eyes and even though I can’t see her face well in the darkness, I know she’s giving me this hint hint nudge nudge look that only I would recognize as her best friend. “He wouldn’t have been calling you if you didn’t need to talk.”
    “She’s right,” Park says, breaking his bout of silence.
    My heart clenches up inside my chest as I watch Bayleigh give me a tiny wave and then disappear into her living room, closing the door behind her and leaving me all alone with Nolan Park. I don’t say a word though, because in spite of it all, she’s right.
    We definitely need to talk.

Chapter 9
     
    “So what’s up?” I ask, all but bouncing on my heels. Ugh! My fake cheerful voice came out sounding entirely too fake and entirely too cheerful and now I just look like an idiot who is trying too hard to look like she’s not super uncomfortable.
    Park slides his hands into the pockets of his jeans and leans his butt against the railing on the balcony. It makes me a little uneasy because just one slip of balance would send him tumbling backward down two stories. I guess I make a face that shows what I’m thinking because Park lifts up his hands and wobbles them, pretending to be a tightrope walker.
    “I’m fine, Becca. Stop worrying.”
    “It’d be safer if you got off the railing like that,” I mutter as I fold my arms and step backward, pressing my back against the safety of the wall behind me.
    “Maybe I’ll just stand by you,” he says in this quiet voice that sends a shiver down my spine. He leaves the railing and walks over to me, turning to press his back against the wall, too. Our arms are touching, my shoulder to his upper arm. The urge to rest my head on his shoulder is so strong it makes my toes tingle. But I hold strong. I keep my head on top of my own neck, supporting itself, just like it was meant to do.
    I am a big girl and I can deal with this.
    “So why did you call me?” As I ask this, I take out my phone and swipe away the missed call notification. Park grabs my hand just when I’m about to put my phone in my pocket again.
    “You changed your wallpaper,” he says, frowning in a way that makes his eyebrow ring look sad too.
    Suddenly I have power. He’s upset that I changed my phone’s wallpaper to a picture of some puppies I found online instead of what it used to be: a picture of Park and me at the BMX track. I want to smile and jump and throw my hands in the air to celebrate that he is sad and I am strong, that he’s still upset over us and that I’m not (at least not on the outside) because I changed my phone screen. Of course I don’t do any of that…I even stifle the smile that tugs at my lips.
    “It was time for a change,” I say with a casual shrug, right before I put my phone back in my pocket, pretend that my skin isn’t still tingling from where he had touched me.
    “I guess it’s time for me to change, too?” he says, taking out his phone. Instead of turning on the screen, he just hands it to me. Confused, I reach up and press the button myself, lighting up his phone’s home screen. I’ve never held his phone before, I think as I mentally look back at all the times we’ve spent together. He’s never really had his phone out around me. I always thought it was because he was too much of a gentleman of text other people when we were together. But lately, I thought it was because he probably had tons of other girls texting him and he didn’t want me to know.
    Whatever the case, his wallpaper makes my mouth fall open. It’s a picture of me. It’s not a selfie and it’s not one from my Facebook page. It’s me, with