Yes

H.N. Roberts brings us a Young Adult Romance, this one set in the hallways of high school... Cool kids, cliques, nerds, the prom... H.N. sums up the high school years in less than 1200 words...

Adulting may be hard, but teenaging isn’t easy either.

Slamming my locker shut, I gaze around the bustling hallways. My eyes land quickly on the school’s quarterback and the popular crowd. A group I was once a part of, right up until the day that you become an outcast. All it takes is a whispered word, or a turn of financial standing, or even a new person who suddenly is more popular and doesn’t like you. I fit none of those. I was an outcast because I wasn’t pretty enough once we hit sophomore year.

Pretty isn’t exactly the right word. I was the kid who didn’t lose the baby fat once everyone else did. Not that I was fat. I was just curvy in a land of people who tried to be muscular or skinny.

“Don’t look at them.”

Spinning around, I almost drop the books in my hand. I manage to hit at least three people passing by with my backpack, which garnered grumbles and a few unsolicited bad words my way. What was worse was that I began to fall face first to the floor.

If it wasn’t for a couple of strong arms that were tucked inside a bulky sweater, I may have been the laughing stock of the school until the next big disaster struck. Looking up, I find Bradley Mara standing there holding me upright. With his black glasses and messy hair, he always gave a vibe of cool nerd. He was the kind of person who lived on the outskirts of the popular crowd, but never really claimed to be anywhere near it.

“So, you falling for me already?” He shoots me a wink and a sideways grin.

I push out of his arms and straighten my clothes giving him a small shrug. “Why? Is that an option?”

“Yeah.” That grin spreads. “It always is. Seeing as I fell for you already.”

I can’t hold back the blush on my face. I sweep some of my hair behind my ear in a fit of nervousness. I can’t believe Bradley is flirting with me. Me. Siobhan Miller. I mean I have crushed on him for years. Most classes we have together I sit right behind him and get lost just hoping for the chance that he will turn around and say something just like he did.

He leans back on the lockers next to us crossing his legs in front of him. “You have a date for the prom?”

I shake my head. “No.”

“Nobody asked you?” His words sound shocked.

“Not exactly.” The few guys who did were not actually someone I would consider going out with. Either they wanted me to go to have sex with them or they were not my type at all.

“My luck then.”

I side eye him. “I didn’t say I would go with you.”

He leans down and in towards me. “I have two months to convince you.”

He doesn’t need to convince me at all. I knew I would go with him. But it was nice to see him try to change my mind over the next few weeks.

A rose on my locker.

A cologne scented letter asking me again to go to the prom.

Lunch delivery sent to me. How he managed that one, I have no idea.

Before a month was up, I was laughingly telling him I would go. It was the last bit that really made up my mind. The entire track team that he ran with, went by with a banner that read, Please go to the prom with Brad! He came along last and threw me a pair of pom poms in our school’s colors.

“For my biggest cheerleader,” he told me with a wink before his coach whistled him over to get ready to run.

He came in first and I was there at the finish line cheering him on and telling him the one thing he had been trying to get me to say for the past month.

“Yes. I’ll go to prom with you.”

Swinging me up and around, I was that popular girl for just a moment. Because it didn’t matter what everyone else thinks about you when the special person in your life thinks you are awesome.