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he wore. That didn't stop my peripheral vision from seeing Haley take a seat at the desk next to mine again and noticing that he wore an untucked, dark grey, button down shirt. Jordan sat down in front of him, immediately turning around to face him.
    My treacherous ears began to burn, and irritation boiled below my skin. Why the hell did he have to sit next to me? I had clearly given him a chance to keep his distance. I wanted him to keep his distance because, if I was truly honest with myself, I knew that I was in danger of developing a crush on him, even after just one day. It would be so easy, so familiar. It was just an effortless little jump off the cliff and the long rush of a free fall until I hit the rocks of reality at the bottom and broke with the inevitable hopelessness.
    "Good morning, Stephanie," Haley said quietly, turning in his seat to face me.
    "Hi." I barely glanced up.
    "Oh, hey, Stephanie!" Jordan chirped.
    "Hey," I said, giving her the quickest nod and smile I could get away with. One always had to acknowledge the queen.
    "So, anyway, Haley," Jordan said, turning to him. "Where are you from?"
    "Hmmm?" he replied, still looking at me. My peripheral vision was getting really tired of trying to watch him but not see him, and the muscles in my jaw were locking up.
    "I asked where you were from."
    "Oh."
    "Like, where did you live before moving here?"
    "I've lived in many places."
    "Oh my God," Jordan gushed. "Like an army brat or something?"
    Haley didn't even acknowledge her and simply leaned over toward me. I shivered, wanting his attention, not wanting his attention, and generally hating myself.
    "Are you cold?" he asked me, his voice raspy and low.
    I curled up inside my chunky, lumpy, brown wool sweater and shook my head as I risked a quick glance up at him.
    "I'm freezing," Jordan announced, and a spasm of annoyance crossed his face. "At least Stephanie has that really, really big sweater. Isn't it warm, Stephanie?"
    The way she said it made it seem that I was so fat, that I, in fact, needed a tent of a sweater to cover myself. ( Did I know this sweater was a product of fair trade wool from female yak herders in Tibet? Yes, Mom.) Still, I managed to give her my best dumbly-happy-to-be-noticed-to-by-Queen-Jordan smile that every Snub Club member was familiar with.
    "It's very warm," I replied.
    "Does the cold bother you?" Haley asked me.
    I blinked hard, as if it could clear my ears. For some reason, the way he said "cold" had sounded weird to me. It was like the word had an echo, and the echo had a meaning.
    "I hate the cold," Jordan proclaimed. Her voice sounded completely normal, so I just chalked up my momentary weird hearing to whatever. God, was I becoming a hypochondriac like my mother? Shoot me now.
    Haley had turned in his desk chair so that he faced me completely now, even as I still sat forward. His whole posture was tense, waiting. Oh. Waiting for my answer. Duh.
    "I don't mind the cold," I said. "Not really. It just came so suddenly this year. I mean, it's not like the weather in New England isn't kind of insane to begin with, but frost on Labor Day? That's just weird. I should ask Morris about it. He usually knows about everything like this."
    Was I babbling about the weather? I was. I was seriously talking about the weather to Haley Smith.
    I tried to brazen out my embarrassment with a smile that felt too tight on my face while my ears went from bake at 350º to broil.
    “You think the weather is unusual?” Haley asked me.
    Forgetting to be embarrassed for a moment, I raised my eyebrows and huffed out, “Don’t you?”
    “I absolutely do,” he replied, shadows of a sly, sexy smile playing at the corners of his lips. “And, I’m glad you think so, too.”
    Huh. Wow. I had no clue what to say to that, nor were my vocal cords working after that last smile of his. Thankfully, Jordan spared me the task of answering.
    "I was in a bikini, laying out, the day before Labor Day," she piped up.