Chapter Two

Lily had exactly three rules for first dates:

Don't get ice cream if you’re lactose intolerant (learned that one the hard way).

Don’t let your mom talk to them.

Definitely, absolutely, under no circumstances should you catch actual feelings.

By 9:17 p.m., all three rules had exploded like a science fair volcano.

Jack had left an hour ago, still smelling like chocolate fudge and teenage confidence. And Lily? She was lying face-down on her bed, re-living every word they’d said, every weird moment, and that one time she accidentally called him “bro” during a laugh fit.

“Bro,” she muttered into her pillow. “Who says that on a date?!”

Her cat, Lasagna, blinked at her from the windowsill like even he was judging her life choices.

*********************

The next morning at school, Lily tried to be chill.

By "chill," she meant sprinting past Jack at his locker and pretending to be very interested in a flyer for the Chess Club Bake Sale, which sounded like a trap for introverts with weak willpower.

“Lily!” Jack called out. “Wait up!”

She considered jumping into a nearby trash can.

Instead, she turned, smiled (probably too wide), and waved like a malfunctioning robot.

“Hey!” she said, voice three octaves too high. “Fellow person! How are you... existing today?”

Jack looked at her like she had spontaneously grown another head. “Uh, I’m good. Are you... okay?”

“Me? Totally fine. Normal. Alive. Not overanalyzing every moment of last night or anything. Haha.”

Jack grinned. “So you were overanalyzing.”

“I—WHAT? No! I don’t do that! I’m a cool and mysterious woman of mystery!”

He leaned against the locker with a smirk. “You’re literally wearing socks with cartoon waffles on them.”

“I contain multitudes,” she muttered.

---

As they walked to homeroom, Jack nudged her shoulder. “So... did you have fun? Like, real fun. Not ‘my mom made me be nice’ fun.”

Lily bit her lip. “Yeah. It was... nice.”

“Nice?” he said, pretending to be deeply wounded. “You wound me, Waffle Socks.”

She rolled her eyes. “Okay, okay. It was better than nice. It was fun. Great, even. Possibly magical. You have been upgraded to ‘good at fake dates’ level.”

“Wow. High praise. What’s the next level?”

“‘Boyfriend material,’” she said quickly—and then immediately wanted to disintegrate into molecules.

Jack blinked. “Oh. So... that’s a level I can reach?”

Lily froze.

“Well,” he added quickly, “not saying I have to reach it. I mean, unless you want me to. Not that I—ugh, why are words so complicated?!”

They stopped in the middle of the hallway, both red-faced and trying not to combust.

Then Jack laughed.

Like, really laughed. Loud and warm and unbothered.

“You know what?” he said. “Let’s pretend we’re both bad at flirting. It’ll be less pressure.”

Lily grinned. “Deal. Like a truce for emotionally stunted teenagers.”

“Exactly.” He offered his hand like a knight or a dork or both.

She shook it. “Agreed. From this moment forward: zero expectations, infinite sarcasm, and waffles forever.”