“What curse?”
“Peter is being dramatic. There’s no curse, just a very long stretch without any wins for our football team,” someone else replies.
“Yup.” Peter bobs his head up and down. “But that changed last Saturday. Your kiss must have special powers, because our QB was on fire.”
“Who?” I look from Peter to the other girl who spoke.
“Phillip Harrison, our quarterback.”
Understanding finally dawns on me. “Ah, and you think that silly kiss has something to do with it?”
“Yes!” they both answer.
Josh comes into the room, tapping my shoulder as he walks by. “Good job, Chiara. You saved the school’s honor.”
I follow him, grumbling. “Not you too.”
Chuckling, Josh takes his seat, and I do the same. “Do people really believe I’m somehow responsible for this miraculous win?”
“Oh yeah. Most definitely.” He nods.
“Ugh!”
“Oh, and there’s more. Your magical kiss was featured front and center in yesterday’s online issue of the school’s paper. You’re famous now. People are probably planning your wedding to Phillip.”
“Fucking great,” I mumble, wondering if Alistair has seen that picture too. If he did, does he think Phillip is the reason I said I’ve moved on?
For fuck’s sake. Why am I distressed about that?
“Don’t worry about it. The story will die out soon. I mean, unless you two are actually dating.”
I roll my eyes and scoff. “I already told you. I’ve retired from dating.”
“Come on, Chiara. Because of one bad guy? There’s more fish in the sea, you know?”
I look at Josh. He’s staring straight ahead, so I can’t tell if he’s referring to himself. I hope not.
I pull out my phone and send Robbie a quick text message. How come he didn’t say anything earlier when we had class together? Actually, no one made a fuss. Maybe this breaking the curse story didn’t start until later.
ME:Thanks for the heads-up.
Two minutes later, he replies.
ROBBIE:Ah, shit. I totally forgot to warn you. My bad.
“My bad”? What kind of apology is that?
I’m about to send a sassy response back when Alistair walks in. He barely looks at the class, and his “Good morning” sounds more like a grumble than anything else.
“I hope everybody got enough rest last weekend because things are about to get hard in this class.”
“Harder than it already was?” Peter asks a little too loudly.
Alistair glances at the poor guy, glaring. “You think the past three weeks have been hard? That was me going easy on you.”
I’ve never seen this side of Alistair before. He sounds so angry. What happened to him last weekend? He can’t be mad because I kissed Phillip. No way. Even though it would be nice for my bruised ego if he was jealous.
“Today, you’re going to work on a script for a pilot TV show, and I’m splitting the class in groups. The assignment is that a major network is looking for a new high drama series for their prime-time slot. I know just one hour isn’t enough to write a script. I’m not delusional. You have a week to complete it and prepare the pitch to present to me next week.”
“That sounds kind of fun,” I say.
“Sure, but a week to do all that?” Josh shakes his head. “Insanity.”
Alistair begins to divide the class into groups. When he calls my name, he doesn’t look in my direction but keeps his gaze glued to the sheet of paper in his hand. I’m not surprised that I’m not in the same group as Josh, but I groan silently when I discover I’m in Peter’s group. I hope he doesn’t want to keep talking about how my kiss broke the team’s curse.
He smiles when I take a seat next to his, then asks if I’m going to next week’s game.
“I don’t like football.”
“Shhh. Don’t say it out loud. You’ll bring the curse back.”
I sense someone approach right before Alistair asks the group if we have any questions.
“No question from me,” Peter replies, and the other group members say the same.
“Miss Moretti?” Alistair turns to me.
“Nope. All good for me too.”
I feel his gaze on my face, so I’m forced to turn to him. His expression remains impartial, but his eyes seem to blaze with an unfathomed energy. It’s like he wants to enter my mind, read all my thoughts. Slowly but surely, he reels me in with his intense gaze, and all coherent thoughts escape my brain. Damn it.
“Okay then.” He knocks on the back of my chair before moving along to check on another group.
I don’t realize I’m staring at him until one of the girls in my group sighs.
“Man, that’s a hot piece of ass, don’t you think? I’d totally go for him if I thought I had a chance in hell.”
“He’s our teacher,” I retort.
“So?” She raises an eyebrow.
Jealousy rears its ugly head, but it’s not like I can show how mad I am.
“I don’t think he’s all that,” I reply instead.
“Well, I’m sure you don’t considering you’ve got the QB.”
I almost tell her that I don’t have anyone, but it seems to me her statement made Alistair tense all of a sudden. So I don’t correct her erroneous assumption, even knowing it’s a pretty stupid move on my part.
