Air is scratching its way through my chest like a woman with long red nails is slowly scraping her nails on the chalkboard that is my lungs. I do this every morning, but somehow it never gets easier. Beth runs beside me, and she's cool as a cucumber, breathing easily in the crisp early autumn morning air. She's hardly breaking a sweat. It's like she's unlocked a mysterious breathing secret that only she knows. I hate her right now as she turns and starts running backwards to face me, a cocky smirk perched upon her peach-colored lips. Her eyes are glowing with humor as she watches me struggle with the one thing I've never been good at: athletics.

Beth Mendoza is my best friend, and one of the school's star athletes. She never beats me in academics, so she feels the need to rub my lack of athletic ability in my face every chance she gets. Which is every morning. It's part of the deal we made at the beginning of the semester. We'd have three weekly evening study sessions together if I worked out with her every morning on the track before school starts. Somehow I feel like I got the short of the deal, but I convinced myself that working out every morning would be more to my benefit than hers. I feel like an idiot for thinking that way now.

"What's wrong, Lumen?" she says, her deep voice mocking me as she uses my last name. "Having a hard time keeping up?" I open my mouth to give her a snarky retort, but only choking gasps come out. She throws her chocolate ponytailed hair back and laughs. "How about we finish this lap and then hit the showers?"

Oh my God, yes. I can only nod my head in response as she flies past me, finishing the lap in a run and leaving me behind to walk the rest of the way. I'm clutching the stitch in my side as I finish the lap, watching her do her finishing stretches. I know I should stretch with her, but I'm starting to feel like I'm going to puke up my breakfast. So I walk over to where my water bottle is sitting on the bleachers and take a few small sips. She joins me a minute later, and we start making our way to the girl's locker room. I want to talk to her, but I'm still choking on oxygen, so we walk in silence, listening to the sounds of the morning birds chirping. I glance at Beth next to me and see that she's scrolling through her phone, checking her social media like the internet obsessed queen she is.

We make it to the locker room, and I waste no time throwing my sweaty body inside the empty locker room showers. The water feels like heaven as it touches my skin, and the steam is rejuvenating my lungs, bringing them back to life. I moan in pleasure, and I'm so thankful that Beth is the only other person in the room with me. I hear her laugh, but I ignore her. My mind starts to drift now, and I'm back to thinking about Baker Scott. He's been on my mind almost constantly since my meeting with Ms. McClain. Since then, I've been trying to spot a nerdy kid with glasses and a pocket protector walking around the hallways, looking more studious than me. I know that's a terrible stereotype, but that's what I keep picturing in my head.

Last night I went back and looked through my old yearbooks, thinking maybe if I could see a picture of him then I'd recognize him. Remember him. But in the spot where his picture should be in all my yearbooks there's only a gray square. Which means he's never had a school picture taken. I checked the club pages and found his name in the sports section, but again, I couldn't find him in any of the pictures. This guy is such an enigma. And the more I struggle to find him, the more I find myself thinking about him.

When I get out of the shower, Beth is still scrolling through her phone. She doesn't take a shower on campus, because she lives only a couple minutes away, and she has a free morning period. Usually after our run, she goes back to her house, takes a shower, and has a bite to eat before her Pre-Calc class begins. Meanwhile, I have 30 minutes to shower, dry off, and do my makeup. I'm really beginning to regret this deal I made with her.

"So hey," she says, taking her eyes off her phone at last. "Baker Scott." I glance up at her as I dry my hair off with the towel and lock eyes with her. The sound of his name sends shivers up my arms, and I maintain my composure. "You wanted to know more about him, right?" I nod my head. I didn't tell Beth why I wanted to know about Baker Scott. If I did, she might call me out on my crazy. I think she just thinks he's a guy I have a crush on. And I'm okay with that right now. As long as she gives me more information. "He's a football player. Plays for varsity. Wide receiver. Been going to school here with us since freshman year."

My brow furrows in confusion as I pull my makeup bag out of my backpack and get to work on my face. How the hell has he been going to school with us since freshman year and I've never noticed him? Especially with him getting the grades that he gets. And stealing my spot as the top of the class. And why doesn't he have any pictures in any of the yearbooks?

"How have I never met him before?" I ask, genuinely confused. "He's a football player. Shouldn't he be like... popular?"

Beth jumps up on the counter and sets her phone face down. Tell-tale sign that she's texting a new guy. I make a mental note to ask her about this later as she says, "I've asked around a little bit, and I guess he just keeps to himself. Doesn't really do the party scene. Or, you know... the social scene. Just plays the game and goes home. No one really knows too much about him other than the fights he gets into."

I blink in surprise. Somehow I just can't picture the quiet jock who stole my spot at the top of the class getting into fights. Well, I can't really picture him at all. There are no pictures of him. "Fights?"

She nods. "Yeah, I guess he's always coming to school with bruises. Andrew St. Cloud told me that Baker is a bit of a scrapper. Got into a fight with Gregor Hatfield freshman year and was suspended for three days. But that's all anyone seems to know about him. Why do you want to know who Baker Scott is? Finally find someone to preoccupy your thoughts while Ollie is unavailable?" she asks me, and I hear the suggestive tone to her voice. I roll my eyes at the mention of Ollie, my on-again off-again boyfriend.

I shake off the butterflies in my stomach at the mention of Ollie's name and shrug my shoulders. "No reason, really. Just heard his name somewhere and thought I'd ask about him."

Beth scoffs. "Bullshit. But whatever." She turns and picks up her phone again. "If you don't want to tell me, that's fine. But don't lie to me. I know you way better than that." Her fingers are flying as fast as her feet on the track field, and I don't know how the hell she's able to text so quickly and still hold a conversation with me. Her words sting a bit, and I sigh. She freezes, and I know she knows that I'm about to tell her the truth.

"Fine." I check around the room to make sure we really are alone, and then I lean in and whisper, "McClain told me yesterday that I lost the top spot in the class."

Her jaw falls open, and I feel a wave of shame crash over me. The embarrassment burns my soul like a flat iron against my ear. "No way! Summer Lumen, second in her class? I never thought I'd see the day!"

I glare at her as I gently shove her shoulder. "Shut up," I growl, and she bursts out laughing. "She also told me the guy who stole my spot is named Baker Scott. I kept racking my brain trying to think of who he was, but I've never even heard his name before. And I guess I was just curious."

She shakes her head, still laughing. "So what's the plan? We going to Tanya Harding the situation? Meet him in the back of the school and beat the shit out of him with an Advanced Biology textbook?"

"Oh my God, Beth!" I yell, and now she's doubled over laughing. "I don't want to sabotage him! It was just idle curiosity!"

"Sure," she replies, and her laughter dies down a bit. "Well, whatever you need, just let me know. Whether it's an extra study session or a couple socks filled with pennies and an alibi." I throw my wet towel at her, and she starts giggling again. Then her phone bings with a new text, and I know I've lost her. I'm glad I told her the truth. My stomach has eased up, and I feel less tense. This whole things is ridiculous. It doesn't matter if I'm the top of the class or not. It's like what Ms. McClain said, my chances of getting into Columbia are still pretty high. Valedictorian or not. And I repeat this to myself again and again throughout my day, forcing myself to push the name Baker Scott out of my head.

Beth finishes texting whoever she's currently seeing and slides her phone back in her pocket. "Okay, enough about Baker Scott," she says as I pull my mascara out of my makeup bag. "Let's talk about the real elephant in the room here. Ollie Thompson."

Oh God, here we go. "Beth, that's such old news. Ollie and I have been broken up for months now. We're just friends. Besides, he's seeing Vivian Hotchkiss now. I saw them last week making out by his locker." A very gross and public display of affection that should definitely not be occurring while school is in session. When Ollie and I were together, we only made out under the bleachers during lunch. In privacy.

Beth smirks. "Yeah, I know. But I also know that he and Vivian broke up a couple days ago. I heard a rumor that he was caught going to second base with her on her living room couch—"

I wrinkle my nose. "Ugh, what even is second base anyway? Everyone always uses that term, but what does it even mean?"

"Oh my God, Summer, it means he touched her boobs," Beth explains exasperatedly, and I freeze, my mascara hovering just above my left eye. Ollie touched another girl's chest? "Anyway, I heard that after he was caught fondling her chesticles," I interrupt her with another snort, but she continues, "her parents got super pissed. They pulled her out of school, and her mom plans to homeschool her now. Which is why Ollie broke up with her."

"So?" I say as I continue applying my eye makeup.

Her brown eyes are definitely getting a workout today with how much she's rolling them at hem. "So that means he's single again. Which opens the door for you."

My hand shakes, and I smear mascara on my left eye lid. "Shit," I say as I reach for a napkin to wipe it up with. Beth is standing beside me, and I can see her amused smirk in the mirror. "Beth, Ollie and I broke up. Like, forever ago. He probably doesn't want anything to do with me."

"Hmm," she says as she looks at her neatly trimmed nails. "That's not what I heard."

My heartbeat picks up its pace. "What have you heard?"

She shrugs her shoulders nonchalantly. "Oh, nothing much. Only that Ollie told Christian Stevenson that Vivian was a sloppy kisser in comparison to you, and that he's going to try to get you back with him.

Oh God. I'm not sure how I feel about this. Ollie was my first sort of love. If you can even call it that. We dated in freshman year, then broke up right before prom because I didn't want to have sex with him. Then we got together right before sophomore year and broke up just before homecoming because I found out he was sleeping with Melanie something-or-other from his English class. He begged for me to take him back a few weeks later, and we dated for a couple more months before he dumped me for Vivian. It was an ugly breakup consisting of lots of ice cream and chick flicks with my mom.

"You know I don't care what Ollie does, right?" I ask her, hoping she can't hear the lie in my voice. The truth is, I never got over Ollie. But only my mom knows how devastated I was by the breakups. Beth doesn't know any of it, and I'm sure if she did know, she wouldn't be doing this right now.

"Don't bullshit a bullshitter," she says as I finish applying my mascara and pull out my lip gloss. "I know you still like him. Why else would you avoid him all the time?"

I shake my head as I smack my lips together, evening out the coating of lip gloss. "It doesn't matter if I like him or not. I'm way too busy for a boyfriend right now."

Beth nods her head. "Oh, right, right. I forgot. You're too busy plotting your move against Baker Scott." I give her another shove, and this time I manage to push her on to her ass. "Ow!" she says, but she's laughing all the same.

"Serves you right," I say with a laugh of my own. Then I check my Apple watch for the time. "Shit, I have to go. Class starts in three minutes."

She gets back to her feet. "Fine, fine. But this talk isn't over, Lumen! I'll break you! You'll see!" I roll my eyes at her, a smile tugging at my lips as I rush out of the locker room and make my way to my first class of the day. And I do my best to push thoughts of Ollie Thompson, the boy who I thought could be the one, and Baker Scott, the boy who is ruining my life, out of my mind.

Author's Note:

Okay, my dears, what do we all think of Beth Mendoza? I can't wait to read all your thoughts in the comments! Obviously we'll be meeting a few more characters soon. But when will we meet the enigmatic Baker Scott? Keep reading to find out!

Be back soon with chapter three, my dears! Stay safe and healthy until then!
XOXO,
~Aly