“I didn’t do this. I swear.”

“It doesn’t matter because I’m not going anywhere. You can try all you want, but I’m here to stay. I earned this part, and I’m keeping it because I’m good.”

“I agree. You are and you should. I like you, Lacey. I thought we were friends. I would never do this.”

It was hard to fight with someone when they seemed so concerned and sincere. I crossed my arms. “I didn’t actually tell Remy, but I’m on to you,” I mumbled. I fled to my trailer, leaned back against the door and let myself cry again.

Waiting in front of someone’s house until they got home from school was not creepy behavior. Especially not after telling said person that I needed to sort things out, implying that lots of space was needed. He was obviously giving it to me. He hadn’t called, texted, or stopped by in twenty-four hours. Scratch that, twenty hours. And eight of those hours had probably been spent sleeping. Another eight he’d been at school. So that left four hours where he hadn’t called, texted, or visited me. Four hours! Okay, I was being creepy, but that thought didn’t make me turn the key in the ignition and drive away.

I checked the clock on my phone. School had gotten out thirty minutes ago. I’d been sitting here for thirty minutes. Maybe he had something after school. Paper stuff. Or maybe he worked right after school. I pulled up my messages again to make sure I hadn’t missed any. “You could just text him, Lacey, instead of being creepy.”

There was a knock at my window, and I screamed. Very loud. Then I looked over to see Donavan standing there. I powered down the window.

“Hi,” he said with a smile. “Were you talking to yourself?”

I matched his smile because I couldn’t help it, seeing him made me happy. It had been twenty and a half hours, after all. “Yes.”

“Should I leave you alone to finish that out?”

“No, I think I’d made my point to myself pretty clear.”

He patted the top of my car. “Did you want to come in?”

I nodded, and he opened the door for me.

“How was school?” I asked as we headed up his walk.

“Good. How are you?”

“Not great.”

“I’m sorry.” We stopped on the porch, and he fished out his keys and opened the door.

“Is your sister here right now?” I asked.

“No, she has volleyball.” We walked inside, where he dropped his backpack and then led me into the kitchen. “Can I get you anything?”

“You have a trampoline,” I said. The window over the sink had a nice view of the backyard.

“We do.”

“I haven’t been on a trampoline in years. My mom calls them bone breakers and won’t let my sister and brother have one.”

“My sister broke her wrist on it last year.”

I smiled. “Don’t tell my mom that. It will only make her think she’s right.”

I must’ve been staring at the trampoline longingly because Donavan said, “Do you want to jump on it?”

“Yes!”

He laughed like I was kidding, but I was already heading for the sliding glass door across the way. The trampoline had a net around it. I slipped off my flip-flops, unzipped the net, and rolled onto the bouncy surface. Then I stood and took several small practice bounces before I gave it my all.

“This is so fun!” I called to Donavan as he walked out of the house with two bottles of water. I bounced onto my knees and then to my feet again several times before I finally launched myself onto my back and stayed there until all was still again.

The trampoline moved as Donavan climbed through the opening and joined me. He must’ve left the water on the padded border because when he lay down next to me, his arms were free. I moved my foot over to his to see if he’d taken off his shoes. My bare foot slid over his socked one. “Just checking,” I said.

“Everyone knows you take your shoes off on a trampoline.”

I left my foot up against his, and we stared up at the clouds lazily making their way across the blue sky for several quiet minutes.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked, calling me out once again.

“No.”

He reached over and took my hand.

“I talked to Remy this morning. Leah told me that directors talk to each other and I should be less worried about what the public thinks about me and more worried about what Remy thought of the article . . . about me.”

“And what did he say?”

“That I’m green . . . but spunky.”

“You are spunky.”

“I don’t know if he’d hire me again. If he’d recommend anyone else hire me. If all this on-set sabotage keeps happening, he probably won’t.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I still have at least five more weeks of filming. I guess my plan is to make the drama on set stop and to change the online narrative of me.”

“How?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Can’t Grant write some nice things about you online? He has millions of followers. That would help the online reputation at least.”

“He won’t. I already asked him . . . twice. I’ll figure something else out. In the meantime, I’m going to jump on a trampoline, pretend everything is fine, and make out with this boy I really like.” I shifted onto my side and propped my head up with my hand so I could see his cute face. “As a well-known critic, what are your thoughts about this plan?”

“What are my thoughts about denial?”

“I was thinking more the making-out part.”

He smiled, still looking up at the sky. “As a critic, I think this plan is flawed,” he said. “It could make things muddled while someone is trying to sort things out.”

“That’s a good word, muddled. That feels like a writer word.”

“Yes, it’s descriptive.” He finally looked over at me, and I could see the smile in his eyes. He stared at me for a long moment. “On second thought,” he said. “Muddled isn’t a bad thing, is it? It always makes for a more interesting plot.” His hand went to the side of my neck, and I met him halfway in a kiss. It was almost as if we hadn’t just kissed the night before, it felt just as good this time. I tangled my legs up with his and pulled myself closer.

“You always seem to talk me into doing things I know I probably shouldn’t do,” he said against my mouth.

I smiled but didn’t pull away. “This didn’t take much convincing.”

He gave me a small peck, then another before pulling back. He squinted his eyes as if studying me. “You’re right. We better try that again, so I can figure out why that is the case.”

Before I could laugh, his mouth was on mine. I closed my eyes. There was nothing to figure out. Things may have been muddled with my parents, with Remy, with Amanda, but in this aspect of my life, everything was perfectly clear. I didn’t need to sort anything out here. It was no mystery why I liked kissing Donavan Lake.

“By the way,” I said, pulling back and propping myself up on my elbow again. “I talked to Amanda.”

He matched my position, his brow immediately showing his worry. “And?”