The Cure for Second Lead Syndrome by Amanda Abram

CHAPTER 11

“Man, I missed iced coffee,” Natalie murmured, admiring the large French vanilla iced beverage in her hands before inhaling about half of it up the straw with one swift suck.

“Nat, you were only gone for a week,” I said with a smirk. “Actually, you weren’t even gone for the full week. You were gone for like half a week.”

“So? I still missed it.” She set her cup down on the patio table and leaned back in her chair. “I also missed this coffee shop. And the ocean. And seeing people like that walking around without a care in the world.” She pointed behind me, and I turned to see what looked like an eighty-year-old man walking toward the pier wearing nothing but a bright red Speedo.

With a snicker, I turned back to her and said, “But you had a lake. And birds.”

She threw her head back and let out a loud groan. “Oh my God. So. Many. Birds. Bria, I had no idea there were so many different types of birds. Did you know that?”

“I did not,” I said with a smile.

Natalie sighed and took another sip of her iced coffee. “So, what’s the next part of your plan?”

“What plan?” I asked, playing dumb. I hadn’t told her about my conversation with Paige yet. She had no idea there was about to be no more plan.

“Duh. Your plan to get Paige to fall for Caleb.”

Just as she finished her sentence, the words Second Lead flashed across the screen of my phone, as it began to vibrate against the table. I quickly swiped to ignore the call.

“Was that Caleb?” she asked, pointing at the phone.

“Oh, uh, yeah.”

“Why did you ignore the call?”

“Because I’m busy hanging out with you.”

“I don’t mind if you talk to him. You should call him back.” She reached for my phone to presumably call him for me, but I smacked her hand away and grabbed it before she could.

“Hey, what was that for?” she grumbled.

“Sorry. I don’t like other people touching my phone.”

Natalie narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “I’ve touched your phone a million times in the past.”

“Yeah, well—” I stopped when my phone made a dinging sound.

“He left you a voicemail,” Natalie said.

“I know what that sound means,” I huffed.

“Are you going to listen to it?”

“Not right now.”

“Bria, why do I get the sneaking suspicion you’re ghosting Caleb?”

I initially planned on coming up with some random excuse but decided to come clean instead. With a sigh, I said, “Because I am ghosting him.”

She gasped. “But why?”

I glanced around the coffee shop’s patio to make sure nobody we knew was lurking around to hear us, and then I told her everything that Paige had said to me the night before. About how she loved Caleb like a brother. How she’d be thrilled if he and I started dating. When I was done, Natalie looked positively crushed, as if she were the one about to get her heart broken, not Caleb.

“Oh no,” she breathed.

“I’m so stupid,” I moaned, burying my head into my arms on top of the table.

“No, you’re not,” Natalie said, giving my arm a comforting pat.

I lifted my head back up. “No, I am. I was so convinced I was going to make this work. That I could make her fall for him. But even worse—I convinced him. And now he thinks that he has a chance with her when he really doesn’t. I don’t know what I’m going to do. How am I going to tell him? Should I tell him?”

Natalie chewed on her bottom lip as she stared off into space. The great thing about Natalie was that she was a problem solver. I could always turn to her with my issues. She always had a solution.

“Well?” I asked hopefully. “What do I do? How do I fix this?”

Natalie returned her gaze to me with a look of sorrow. “Honestly, I don’t think you can.”

I pouted. “That’s not what I wanted to hear.”

“Of course, it’s not.” She leaned forward and played with the straw in her drink. “But here’s the thing: remember what I said to you last night? That K-dramas never steer us wrong? Well, they don’t. But karaoke, piggyback rides, catching someone when they stumble—those all work, but only when it’s the male lead doing them. It’s why the second lead never ends up with the girl. It would go against the formula. It was noble of you to try to change that, but let’s face it: you were doomed from the start.”

She was right. It was never going to work the way I wanted. No matter how hard I tried. No matter how foolproof I thought my plan was.

“How do I tell him he has no chance with her?”

Natalie sighed. “I’m not sure you do. Is it really your place to tell him?”

“I think maybe it is. I mean, I obviously can’t go forward with the plan anymore knowing it’s all for nothing. If I give up on it suddenly, he’s going to question why. The truth will end up coming out at some point anyway. I just wonder if it should happen sooner rather than later.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Natalie said with a sympathetic smile.

“Seriously? You’re supposed to be good at stuff like this.” I returned my head to my arms and stared blankly at the surface of the table.

“I’m only human, Bria.” She paused for a moment. “Can I ask you a question, though?”

“Go ahead,” I mumbled.

“Is it possible—hear me out for a sec—that maybe you and Caleb kinda like each other? As, like, more than friends or whatever it is you two consider yourselves to be?”

My head shot back up in surprise. “What? No. Of course not. Nat, I already told you—”

“Yeah, yeah. I know what you already told me. But I was there last night, and I’ve gotta say, I kinda agree with Paige. I saw Caleb sing the first half of that song to you. I saw the way you two were looking at each other.”

“He was only singing the first half to me because I told him to do that if he got nervous.”

Natalie smirked. “I’ve seen nervous, and when that boy started singing to you, he was not nervous.”

I sat back in my chair and scowled. “Oh yeah? Well, did you happen to see the way he sang the second half of the song to Paige? Because I did. He’s hopelessly in love with her. He has no feelings for me whatsoever. And vice versa.”

“You sound kind of defensive.”

“I do not sound defensive!”

Looking amused, Natalie finished off the rest of her iced coffee and stood from the table. “Ready to go?” she asked, dropping the subject.

With a nod, I pushed my chair back from the table and joined her.

Bless her heart. I knew I didn’t have Natalie convinced there was nothing going on between me and Caleb, but she was going to let it go anyway. Because she was my best friend. And because she knew that, if I ever realized I had feelings for Caleb, she’d be the first person I’d tell.

***

With my mind racing a mile a minute, I spent the rest of my Sunday afternoon cleaning the house. I vacuumed all the rugs. I mopped the kitchen floor. I started a load of laundry. I cleaned my room. I was just finishing up loading the dishwasher when my parents arrived home from wherever they’d been all day and entered the kitchen.

They stopped dead in their tracks when they saw me standing in front of the sink wearing a pair of yellow rubber gloves holding a dirty plate in my hands.

“Hello, Bria,” Mom said slowly. “What are you doing?”

“The dishes,” I replied simply. I placed the final plate inside the dishwasher, threw in a detergent pod and started it up.

“I see that.” Mom glanced around the room and then down at the floor. “Is the floor clean?”

“Yeah. I mopped it.”

Finally unfreezing, Dad swiftly made his way over to me, placed his hands on my shoulders and stared down at me. “Bria, if you’re still in there and you can hear me, Daddy’s going to save you, okay? We’ll expel this demon from you, one way or another.”

I rolled my eyes. My dad was a big dork. “I’m not possessed—I’m bored. I still don’t have my television-watching privileges, remember?” I threw a pointed look over to Mom. “I’m trying to keep my mind occupied.” So I don’t think about anything related to Caleb.

Dad let go of me and stepped back. “Everything okay, kiddo?”

They were both giving me concerned looks now. “Yeah. Typical teen girl stuff.”

That was all Dad needed to hear. “Okay. Well, I’m gonna head downstairs—”

“Oh, wait,” I said as he turned to go. “Before you do that, where do you keep all the stuff you use to wash your car?”

He arched an eyebrow at me. “Why?”

“Because I want to wash your car.”

Dad exchanged a glance with Mom before answering. “It’s all out in the garage. On the bottom shelf of the metal rack. Everything you need should be there.”

“Thanks,” I said with a smile.

He returned my smile with an apprehensive one. Like there was a small part of him that was concerned I was being possessed by a demon. One that also happened to be a clean freak.

When he was gone, Mom walked around the kitchen island to join me at the sink. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked.

I nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Is there anything you’d like to talk about?”

Nothing that she could help me with. “No, thanks. I’m really okay. Just looking forward to my TV ban being lifted tomorrow.” I glanced at her with wide, hope-filled eyes. “After all, tomorrow was the day Natalie was supposed to come home.”

Mom chuckled. “Oh, that’s right. Of course. The ban will be lifted tomorrow.” She narrowed her eyes slightly at me. “Have you not been going over to Natalie’s house to watch your shows?”

Actually, I hadn’t. It had never crossed my mind—or Natalie’s mind—to do that. We’d been so busy concentrating on my plan since she got back that watching K-dramas wasn’t high on our priority list.

That was about to change.

“No. I haven’t. I’ve been doing as you requested: going out and enjoying my summer vacation.”

With a pleased grin, Mom took my hands and slipped the gloves off them. “I’m glad to hear that. I’ll bet if you were honest with yourself, you’d realize you didn’t miss watching TV that much after all.”

She was right. I’d been having a lot of fun hanging out with Caleb, writing and directing my own real-life K-drama. Only somehow, the plot got away from me and took on a life of its own. Now it wasn’t going the way I had scripted, and it was turning into a complete disaster.

“Yep,” I said shortly. “Well, I’m gonna head out to the garage.”

Before she could say anything else, I quickly made my exit. I didn’t want to keep talking to her. If I did, I’d probably tell her about everything.

And I didn’t feel like talking about it right now.

I found all the supplies I needed to wash my parents’ car exactly where Dad said they would be. Within minutes, I had it hosed down and was starting to soap up one side of it when I heard a car approaching the house. Springing up from my squatting position, I glanced over the top of the hood to see it was Caleb who had pulled up. In a panic, I immediately dropped back down into a squat, hoping he hadn’t seen me.

I’d been ignoring his calls and texts all day, and I wasn’t ready to explain why. I was so desperate to hide from him, I almost considered crawling under the car when his voice suddenly spoke up behind me, startling me.

“Looking good.”

“Huh?” I moved to turn but lost my balance and fell backward directly onto my butt. Luckily, it was such a short distance, it didn’t hurt anything but my ego.

With a laugh, Caleb reached out to help me up. Reluctantly, I placed my hand in his, and he pulled me to my feet in one swift motion.

“I said ‘looking good’,” he repeated. I was starting to blush when he pointed past me and added, “The car.”

Oh. Right. The car looked good. Because I was washing it.

I certainly hadn’t thought he’d meant that I was looking good.

“Thanks.” I dropped the mitt back into the bucket of soapy water and said, “So, um, Braden’s not here.”

“That’s okay, actually,” Caleb said. “I’m not here to see Braden. I’m here to see you.”

Of course, he was.

“Is everything okay with us?” he asked bluntly, a slight look of concern on his face.

“Yeah,” I replied coolly, running a wet hand over my messy ponytail. “Why do you ask?”

“I dunno.” He shrugged. “It seemed like you were acting kind of weird last night. And today, I feel like you’re avoiding me. You haven’t responded to any of my calls or texts.”

“Oh, right. Sorry about that. I’ve been busy, that’s all.”

Caleb smirked. “Washing cars?”

“Exactly. Washing cars.” I casually leaned against the wet, soapy surface of the driver’s side door. “It’s my new side hustle.”

Caleb’s smirk morphed into a charming grin. “I’d hire you.”

“I’ll give you my business card,” I said, returning his grin.

“Great.” He glanced around the front yard as he rubbed at the back of his neck. “So, hey, are you going to Jordan’s party on Wednesday?”

I didn’t know Jordan Anderson was having another party, so this was news to me. “Doubtful. I haven’t received my invitation in the mail yet.”

“That’s okay,” Caleb said with a chuckle. “You can be my plus-one.”

I stared blankly up at him. Was he asking me to the party? As in, like, a date?

He must have realized what it sounded like because he quickly added, “So we can, you know, work more on our plan.”

Our plan. There was no more plan. But he didn’t know that. Because he didn’t know what Paige had told me the night before.

“See, here’s the thing,” he continued. “Last night, I could have sworn I detected a bit of jealousy from Paige.”

“Oh yeah? What made you think she might have been jealous?”

“Well, she kept asking me about you. Asking what was going on between us. Like, she thinks we like each other or something. I don’t know. Maybe she detected something when I was singing to you.”

Was there something to detect? I wondered, and then instantly wondered why I’d wondered that.

“I mean, it wasn’t intentional, but I think she thought I was singing the song for you, and that I was trying to make you jealous.”

That was exactly what Paige thought. He knew his best friend well. Except, not well enough to realize that she wasn’t jealous at the idea that he liked me. She was thrilled at the idea.

“And you think that she was jealous that you were trying to make me jealous?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” he said, throwing his hands in the air. “I was thinking if you went with me to Jordan’s party on Wednesday, we could test out my theory.”

“How would we do that?”

“I don’t know. I was hoping you could figure that part out.” His grin returned as he gently punched my arm with his fist. Like we were best buddies.

Instead of jumping at the opportunity, I stared down at the ground and sighed.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, his voice suddenly serious.

This was it. This was the moment I had to come clean with him. This was when I had to break his heart with the truth about Paige.

Wiping my hands on my shorts, I said, “Let’s sit for a moment.” I walked over to the front steps and took a seat on the top one.

He joined me a second later, sitting so close next to me, I could feel his leg lightly brush against mine.

Swallowing hard, I kept my eyes focused straight ahead, staring blankly at the house across the street. How do I do this? What am I supposed to say? And how am I supposed to say it?

“Why Paige?” I asked finally.

Caleb cocked his head to one side. “Huh?”

I turned to look at him. “Why Paige? Why are you in love with her?”

It was a simple question; I expected him to answer without hesitation. Instead, he fell silent for a few moments, and I almost had to wonder if he’d even heard me.

“Because she’s nice,” he replied finally, staring off into space. “And pretty. Funny. Smart.”

“Is that it?”

He turned back to me, confused. “Are those reasons not enough?”

“No, they are,” I assured him. “But half the girls at our school are nice, pretty, funny, and smart. So, why Paige? What makes her special? What sets her apart from every other girl?”

“She’s my best friend.”

“Natalie is my best friend, and she is also nice, pretty, funny, and smart. But I’m not in love with her.”

“That’s too bad,” Caleb said with a smirk. “That would be kinda hot.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, as much as I didn’t want to. “But seriously. Have you ever liked anyone but Paige?”

“Well, yeah,” he said. “I’ve had crushes on other girls, but this isn’t a crush. It’s—”

“Love,” I finished for him.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “Love.”

It was then that I realized I couldn’t go through with telling him. At least, not yet. I also realized I couldn’t give up on my plan either. So what if Paige said Caleb was like a brother to her? So what if she seemed like she’d be happy if Caleb and I got together? Maybe that was what she truly thought. But it was easy to think that while Caleb was still single. Maybe she had to be shown how it would feel to see him with another girl. Not in a hypothetical situation, but for real.

Maybe then she would change her mind.

I owed it to Caleb to give my plan all I had. After all, I was the one who had harassed him into going along with it in the first place. I had to see it through to the absolute end. And if I could come up with something epic for Jordan’s party, maybe I could even change Paige’s mind.

Maybe she would finally see him as more than a friend.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll go to the party with you.”

Caleb’s face lit up. “Really? That’s fantastic! So, what’s the plan?”

I chuckled. “I don’t know yet. You literally brought this up to me like two minutes ago. I don’t work that fast.”

“Oh. Right.” He chuckled along with me and bumped his shoulder against mine. “Thanks for helping me, Bria.”

I smiled. “No need to thank me. It’s my pleasure.”

“You’re a great friend,” he added as an afterthought.

My smile slowly vanished as a subtle, twisty pain shot through the center of my chest. “Thanks.”

“Well, I should get going.” He rose and descended the steps. When he got to the bottom, he turned back around. “Let me know if you need me to come by to help brainstorm.”

“Will do,” I said. I gave him a wave, we said goodbye, and then he left.

As soon as he was gone, I returned to my parents’ car. The soap had started to dry on, leaving ghastly soap spots behind. With a heavy sigh, I retrieved the mitt from the bucket, slid it over my hand and got back to work. Not just washing the car but trying to come up with a way to make Paige so jealous, it would force her to realize she was madly in love with Caleb.

It would be my biggest challenge yet.

I just hoped I could deliver.