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didn’t believe girls should fight. And though Dad couldn’t help but give Marcus points for that, he still insisted that he was coming to the gym with me to meet “this Marcus person.”
    “What?” I said.
    “Let me just get some real pants on,” Dad said, and shuffled off.
    I could have died. I mean, I was pretty sure I was going to just wilt from embarrassment, in that way you can only be embarrassed by your dad when you’re fifteen, and he’s insisting on meeting the guy you have a huge crush on.
    I think about these things now, and how I had no idea how lucky I was.
    Marcus knew, though.
    He was waiting for me by the gate, the way he always was. He’d asked if he should meet me at my house so he could walk me over when it was still dark out, but I’d told him no because I didn’t want to explain stuff to my parents. Guess the cat was out of the bag now. I could see Marcus shift his position, push off the gate, and stand up straight, and then he was walking toward us, tall and big and looking so much like a full grown man that I could actually feel my father getting freaked out.
    Marcus didn’t hesitate. He put his hand out to my dad like it was no big thing and said, “Hello, Mr. Chase. I’m Marcus Roma. You here to see what Lo’s been up to?”
    Marcus was the first person to call me Lo. That threw my Dad for bit, too.
    “Yes, I am,” my dad said. “I don’t appreciate my daughter sneaking out like this.”
    Marcus looked at me. I didn’t know what to say.
    “I apologize, sir,” Marcus said, carefully. “We only have to meet like this because the owner of this gym is…old fashioned.”
    “I told him,” I said.
    “Would you like to stay and watch us?” Marcus asked. “Lo, why don’t you go warm up and I can answer questions, if that works for you, Mr. Chase?”
    I stared at Marcus. He seemed so adult, so in control. I had never felt so young and immature compared to him, and now…
    I felt even more infatuated with him, and even stupider for it. He was so obviously beyond me.
    I was glad to go lose myself in a warm up, working too hard too quickly and feeling nauseous for it, and not caring even a little bit. I jumped rope until my calves started to burn, and then started my shadow boxing, getting my shoulders loose, trying to focus on anything other than the conversation my father was having with Marcus just out of earshot.
    The next time I looked over there, Marcus was showing my dad some basic boxing moves, the two of them talking together like old friends.
    It was the weirdest feeling. If there was a Parental Embarrassment Olympics, I would have medaled that morning. Gold medal in cringing, right here.
    I mean, what was my dad saying about me? I just remember being so sure that whatever headway I’d made into being a cool girl, a friend even, someone maybe on Marcus’s maturity level, it was probably all ruined now. I felt like such a child that my dad had come, that Marcus had to convince my parents that everything was cool. By the time I was done with my warm up, I was actually pissed off.
    Which worked out, because Marcus set the timer on the bell, put on the mitts, and said, “Come on, Lo, combinations, let’s go!”
    So my dad watched Marcus call out punches to me and watched me nail every single one, hitting those mitts as hard as I could, driving Marcus around the floor of the gym, working off all that humiliation. The bell went off after that first round and I looked over at my dad, who was shaking his head and smiling a little.
    “Wow, Harlow,” he said. “Wow.”
    I was sweating, out of breath, feeling weird about my worlds colliding like this.
    “Dad, the bell’s going to go off again in a minute,” I said. Impatient with him. I just wanted him out of there.
    “Ok, ok,” Dad said, putting his hands up. “I’ll leave you to it. I don’t want to mess up your work out. Marcus, thank you, and I’ll take you up on that offer. Harlow, have fun. You’re still