Or hopefully she will.

Kel walks past me into the house. “Good luck,” he says, his voice full of pity. I laugh and shut the door behind me. I’m halfway to my car when Lake opens her front door and walks to the driveway.

“You ready?” I yell to her.

“Yes,” she yells back.

I wait for her to walk to my car, but she doesn’t. She looks ready. Why is she just standing there?

“Well, come on then!” I yell.

She still doesn’t move. She folds her arms across her chest and stands still. I throw my hand up in defeat and laugh. “What are you doing?”

“You said you would pick me up at seven-thirty,” she yells. “I’m waiting for you to pick me up.”

I grin and get in the car, then back up into her driveway. When I get out and open her door, I notice she’s not wearing the house shoes. I was sort of hoping she was serious this morning. It’s not quite dark yet, which is unfortunate since I can’t stop staring at her. She curled her hair and put on just a touch of makeup. She’s wearing jeans and a purple shirt that brings out the hue of her eyes, making them even harder to look away from. She looks . . . perfect.

Once we’re both in the car, I reach behind me and grab the bag out of the backseat. “We don’t have time to eat, so I made us grilled cheese.” I hand her the sandwich and a drink. I’m hoping she’s not too upset that we aren’t going out to eat. We just don’t have time. I almost went to her house earlier to let her know we weren’t, in case she didn’t eat, but I decided to throw something together at the last minute instead. I sort of wanted to see how she’d react to not being taken on a typical date. Maybe it’s a little mean, but she’s smiling, so she doesn’t seem to mind.

“Wow. This is a first.” She puts her sandwich on her knee and twists open her soda. “And where exactly are we going in such a hurry? It’s obviously not a restaurant.”

I take a bite of my sandwich and pull out of her driveway. “It’s a surprise. I know a lot more about you than you know about me, so tonight I want to show you what I’m all about.”

She grins at me. “Well, I’m intrigued,” she says before she takes a bite of her sandwich.

I’m relieved she doesn’t press me further about where we’re going. It would be sort of hard to explain that I’m taking her to a club on a Thursday night to watch a bunch of people recite poetry. It doesn’t sound near as appealing as it actually is. I’d rather let her experience it for the first time in person without having preconceived notions.

When we finish our sandwiches, she puts the trash in the backseat and shifts in her seat so that she’s facing me. She casually rests her head against the headrest. “What are your parents like?”

I glance out my window, not wanting her to see the reluctance in my expression. It’s the exact thing I was hoping she wouldn’t ask about until the drive home, at least. I’d hate for this to be the first thing we talk about. It would put a somber mood to the whole night. I take a deep breath and exhale, hoping I’m not appearing as uncomfortable on the outside as I’m feeling on the inside.

How the hell can I redirect this conversation?

I decide to play the game Caulder and I play sometimes on the drive to our grandparents. I hope she won’t think it’s too cheesy, but it’ll pass the time and may even help me get to know her better.

“I’m not big on small talk, Lake. We can figure all that out later. Let’s make this drive interesting.” I adjust myself in the seat and prepare to explain the rules to her. When I turn to look at her, she’s staring at me with a repulsed look on her face.

What the hell did I say? I replay my last sentence in my head and realize how it sounded. I laugh when it dawns on me that she completely misconstrued what I just said. “Lake, no! I just meant let’s talk about something besides what we’re expected to talk about.”

She expels a breath and laughs. “Good,” she says.

“I know a game we can play. It’s called, ‘would you rather.’ Have you played it before?”

She shakes her head. “No, but I would rather you go first.”

I feel like if I use some of the ones Caulder and I have used it would be cheating, so I take a few seconds to think of a new one. “Okay,” I say when I come up with one. I clear my throat. “Okay, would you rather spend the rest of your life with no arms; or would you rather spend the rest of your life with arms you couldn’t control?”

I remember when Caulder and I tried to get Vaughn to play this game on our way to Detroit once; she rolled her eyes and told us to grow up. I watch Lake, hoping for a different reaction, and she just stares at me straight-faced like she’s actually contemplating an answer.

“Well,” she says. “I guess I would rather spend the rest of my life with arms I couldn’t control?”

“What? Seriously?” I laugh, glancing over at her. “But you wouldn’t be controlling them! They could be flailing around and you’d be constantly punching yourself in the face! Or worse, you might grab a knife and stab yourself!”

She laughs. Damn, I love that laugh.

“I didn’t realize there were right and wrong answers,” she says.

“You suck at this. Your turn.”

She smiles at me, then furrows her brows, facing forward and leaning back into her seat. “Okay, let me think.”

“You have to have one ready!”

“Jeez, Will! I barely heard of this game for the first time thirty seconds ago. Give me a second to think of one.”

I reach over and squeeze her hand. “I’m teasing.”

It wasn’t my intention to keep holding on to her hand, but for some reason it feels right, so I don’t let go. It’s so natural, like we didn’t even contemplate the move. I’m still staring at our interlocked fingers when she continues with her turn, unfazed. I like how much she seems to be enjoying the game. I like how she seemed to prefer the grilled cheese sandwiches to a restaurant. I like girls who don’t mind the simple things every now and then. I like that we’re holding hands.

We play a few more rounds and the bizarre things she comes up with could give Caulder a run for his money. The half-hour drive to the club seems like it takes five minutes. I decide to ask one final question as we’re pulling into the parking lot. I pull into a space and reach over with my left hand to kill the engine so that I don’t have to move my right hand from hers. I glance over at her. “Last one,” I say. “Would you rather be back in Texas right now? Or here?”

She looks down at our fingers that are interlocked and grazes her thumb across my hand. Her reaction to my question isn’t a negative one. In fact, it almost seems just the opposite when her lips crack a smile and she looks back up. Just when she opens her mouth to respond, her attention is pulled to the sign on the building behind me and her smile fades.

“Uh, Will?” she says hesitantly. “I don’t dance.” She pulls her hand from mine and begins to open her door, so I do the same.

“Uh, neither do I.”

We both exit the vehicle, but the fact that she didn’t answer that last question isn’t lost on me. I grab her hand when we meet at the front of the car and I lead her inside. When we walk through the doors I make a quick scan of the room. I know a lot of the regulars here and I’m hoping I can at least find a secluded area in order for us to have some privacy. I spot an empty booth in the back of the room and lead her in that direction. I want her to be able to get the full experience without the constant interruption of conversation from other people.

“It’s quieter back here,” I say. She’s looking around with curiosity in her eyes. She asks about the younger audience when she notices pretty quickly that this isn’t a regular club-going crowd. She’s observant.

“Well, tonight it’s not a club,” I say. She scoots into the booth first and I slide in right next to her. “It’s slam night. Every Thursday they shut the club down and people come here to compete in the slam.”

She breaks her gaze from the table of kids and looks at me, the curiosity still present in her eyes. “And what’s a slam?”

I pause for a second and smile at her. “It’s poetry,” I say. “It’s what I’m all about.” I wait for the laughter, but it doesn’t come. She looks directly at me, almost like she didn’t understand what I said.

I start to repeat myself when she interrupts. “Poetry, huh?” She continues to smile at me, but in a very endearing way. Almost like she’s impressed. “Do people write their own or do they get it from other authors?”

I lean back in my seat and look at the stage. “People get up there and pour their hearts out just using their words and the movement of their bodies. It’s amazing. You aren’t going to hear any Dickinson or Frost here.”

When I look at her again, she actually looks intrigued. Poetry has always been such a huge part of my life; I was worried she wouldn’t understand it. Not only does she understand it, she seems excited about it.

I explain the rules to her regarding the competition. She asks a lot of questions, which puts me even more at ease. When I’ve explained everything to her, I decide to grab us drinks before the sac comes on stage.

“You want something to drink?”

“Sure,” she says. “I’ll take some chocolate milk.”

I expect her to laugh at her joke, but she doesn’t.

“Chocolate milk? Really?”

“With ice,” she says, matter-of-fact.

“Okay. One chocolate milk on the rocks coming right up.”

I exit the booth and walk over to the bar to order our drinks, then turn around and lean against the bar and watch her. This feeling I get when I’m with her . . . I’ve missed it. I’ve missed that feeling of feeling. Somehow, she’s the first person in the last two years of my life who gives me any sense of hope about the future.

I realize as I’m watching her that I’ve made a huge mistake. I’ve been comparing what her reaction to things might be based on what Vaughn’s reactions were in the past. It’s not fair to Lake to assume she would be turned off by the simplicity of the date or by the game we played on the drive here. It’s not fair to Lake that I assume she wouldn’t like poetry simply because Vaughn didn’t. It’s also unfair of me to assume she would push me away if she knew that I was Caulder’s guardian.

This girl isn’t anything like Vaughn.

This girl isn’t anything like any girl I’ve known. This girl is . . .

“She’s cute.” Gavin’s voice jerks me out of my thoughts. I look over at him and he’s leaning against the bar next to me, watching me watch Lake. “What’s her name?” He turns around and orders two drinks from the waitress.

“Layken,” I say. “And yeah. She is cute.”

“How long have you guys been dating?” he asks, turning back to me.