Read The One That I Want for Free Online

Carter. “Where are y’all from?”
    He named a high school just southeast of ours. They were one of our biggest rivals in academics, band, and sports, but especially football. “Oh, we play you our first game!” I burst out. “We’re going to kick your ass.”
    I was kidding, of course. Both teams were great, and the outcome of the game was always a toss-up. Carter should have understood and responded with a grin and a snappy comeback.
    But Max overheard me, stopped, and turned to stare at me wide-eyed in horror as Carter moaned, “Ooooooh, don’t say that where Max can hear you. He’s a kicker, and kickers are superstitious.”
    Addison turned too and narrowed her eyes at me, angry that I was sabotaging her chance with Max. As my body went into fight-or-flight mode, everything seemed to intensify: the glare of the early evening sun, the heat radiating from the sidewalk, the smell of asphalt, the swish of cars down the university road, and the softer roar of cars on the interstates tangled around the skyscrapers nearby. I
hated
when Addison got mad at me and gave me the cold shoulder until she needed something from me. Most of the time I hadn’t meant to offend her, and there was nothing I could have done to prevent it. This time I honestly didn’t understand what was so awful about what I’d said.
    I cleared my throat and timidly tried to repair the damage. “Superstitious, how?”
    “Max has never missed a kick in a game,” Carter said.
    “Wooowwwww,” Addison said, even though she probably didn’t even know what a record like that meant. I did, and I understood how impressive it was.
    Carter shrugged. “He didn’t start last year, so he didn’t get that many chances.”
    “I made the kick every chance I had,” Max defended himself.
    “And when he made the first one,” Carter said, “Max decided that everything has to go exactly the same way before games, or his mojo will disappear. It’s ridiculous. He wears the same underwear every time.”
    Now Max was eyeing Carter with a look that said,
Shut up, Carter
. I knew how Max felt.
    To lighten the mood, I asked Max, “Do you
wash
this underwear?”
    “I do,” he confirmed, but not in his jovial tone. He started walking toward the Varsity again. We all followed.
    “Everything’s already breaking routine,” Carter went on. “Our first game won’t be like the games last year. He met a beautiful girl from our rival team at football camp. And then she tells him he’s going to get his ass kicked? You’ve just caused Max a lot of sleepless nights.”
    “Gemma!” Addison reprimanded me, sliding her hand around Max’s forearm.
    Rather than being angry with Addison for being angry with me, now
both
of us were mad at me. I had ruined adorable Max’s chance at a perfect season. He would probably get addicted to crack next, and it would be all my fault.

3
     
    I hung back and let Max and Addison and Carter talk, removing myself from the conversation so I wouldn’t attempt any more tricks that I wasn’t skilled enough to handle, such as friendliness, or wit. We reached the bridge over sixteen lanes of interstate traffic. To our right was my favorite view of Atlanta, with the cars whizzing below us, grassy spaces bursting with pink flowers, and skyscrapers towering above it all, their glass panels reflecting the blue sky. I pretended to concentrate on the view—no, I wasn’t pretending, I really
was
concentrating on it, or trying to—because I could think of nothing to say to this Carter person I’d been saddled with.
    We all walked into the Varsity together but got divided at the vast counter when we placed our orders. Ten cashiers boomed, “WHAT’LL YA HAVE?” with no patience for socially handicapped teenagers. They insisted that we move the line along by splitting up instead of standing behind one another.
    It was terrible of me, but I felt a brief moment of joy seeing that Max did not offer to pay for Addison’s dinner. This didn’t