Justin would rather stab himself in the eye with a fork than go back to P.E. class the next day because he knew what was waiting for him.
Everyone had whispered about him or mocked him to his face after he delivered Emily's message to the coach. He was going to be known as the kid who almost broke someone's nose for the rest of the school year.
To no one's surprise, they were playing volleyball again. Emily—with a gauzy bandage over her nose—was one of the team captains. An athletic-looking boy Justin didn't know was the other.
Here it goes. Listening to everyone else get picked first.
"I choose Mike," the boy captain called out.
"Jerry," Emily countered.
"Felicia."
"Madeline."
Justin zoned out until his name was called. He looked around in surprise. More than half of the kids hadn't been chosen yet. Was this a joke?
"Justin," Emily called again. "Get over here."
In a daze, he wandered over to Emily's team as the picking continued. Why did she pick him? There were still a bunch of decent players left who hadn't been picked.
He approached her with obvious questions in his eyes once the teams had been decided. She smiled at him. "I bet you're wondering why I picked you."
"Yeah," he admitted sheepishly.
She laughed and her sparkling green eyes crinkled. "I'm hoping that having you on my team will prevent you from launching another ball into my face."
Justin didn't have a response for that.
Emily clapped him on the shoulder, still smiling. "Go stand on that side of the court. I'll be safely over here."
He nodded mutely and went to his assigned spot. Emily's strategy had been solid. No one launched the ball into his side of the court so they actually won a couple of games against the other team.
At the end of class as students fled the locker rooms, Justin dashed after Emily and held out a white shirt with their school's logo on it. "Here. For the one I ruined."
She seemed surprised. "Wow, you actually did it. I didn't think you would. Not that that's a bad thing, it's just…thanks."
She stuffed the shirt in her backpack and slung it over her shoulder before flashing him another dazzling smile. "See you."
Justin forgot how to breathe. It took the bell ringing to realize that he was going to be late for class if he didn't move quickly.
He didn't speak to Emily again until the last day of school when people were signing yearbooks. He hadn't been very popular in that class (or any class other than computer science, really) so he stood off in the corner by himself.
He didn't know why his mother bothered to even buy him a yearbook. The only people who signed it were teachers and the other kids from the robotics club.
"Hey, Justin!" A voice snapped him out of his reverie.
Looking up, he was surprised to find Emily standing in front of him with a Sharpie in hand. "Let's sign each other's yearbooks."
"Sure!" Justin agreed, still wondering why she had approached him.
He wasn't very creative, simply writing 'HAGS –Justin' using the popular abbreviation for 'have a great summer.'
His signature was squished into a corner because Emily's yearbook pages were nearly full. Apparently, she was pretty popular.
She handed him back his yearbook and smiled before saying "see you next year!" and bouncing back to her friends.
Opening his yearbook, Justin didn't have to look very hard to find what Emily had written in sparkly purple marker. 'You made P.E. this year a class I'll never forget! HAGS –Emily'
The whole thing was surrounded with little doodles of swirls, stars, and smiley faces, taking up nearly half a page. Not that it mattered. Most of his blank pages for signing remained blank.
His cheeks heated up as he clutched the book to his chest. Those doodles…were actually pretty cute. He glanced over at the group of students Emily had rejoined.
Her curls were tied back in a braid today and she wore a blue and white striped shirt with matching flip flops. His heart flopped. It wasn't just her doodles that were cute.