“Sorry,” Chloe said after taking a sip of her drink. “That sounded better in my head.” She looked imploringly at me. “I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s cool,” I said quickly. I looked across the table at Cash, and I felt the tension ease up a bit. “I mean… really, there’s no comparison. Unless Cash has his tease status formally announced at prom, I think the crown is safe with me.”

“I’ll get on that—having it announced at prom,” Cash replied. “But anyway, it’ll be hard to get a date now. With this sex strike going on. Might as well just wait.”

“Hold up,” Adam said, and his attention was back on me. “You mean the strike isn’t over? Even now that you and the buffoon are done?”

I shook my head. “No. The strike doesn’t end until the rivalry does.”

“You’re kidding.” Adam groaned.

“Why would you think it was over?” Ellen questioned. “You didn’t ask me about it.”

“I just assumed now that Lissa doesn’t have to put up with Randy’s shit, everything would go back to normal. Isn’t that why this whole thing started? Because he’s a douchebag?”

“Actually,” Ellen said before I could respond, “it’s not just about Randy. We’ve been over this a thousand times before, Adam. It’s about everyone. I got pissed when you guys shoved Luther into his locker and left him there for a whole block. I wasn’t cool with that, and I’m not cool with this, either. None of the girls are. So, like Lissa said, it’s not over until the rivalry is over.”

Adam rolled his eyes. “Sure. We’ll see how much longer it lasts.”

“At least our efforts are organized,” I said. I was beginning to lose the affection for him that I’d felt upon first approaching the table. “We’re supporting one another and talking to one another and helping one another through this. All the boys do is sit around and wait for us to change our minds, but that’s not going to happen. The strike doesn’t end until the rivalry does.”

Adam frowned at me, and he started to say something, but Chloe cut him off.

“Look, can we not fight right now?” she asked. “Normally, I’d be all about the drama—watching it, not taking part in it, of course—but after Friday night, I’m on overload. So can we skip the debate here, kids?”

Adam slouched into his seat. “Whatever.”

“For the record,” Ellen added, turning to Cash, “nothing in the oath the girls made says we can’t date. Besides, only the current girlfriends of the teammates made the oath to begin with. There’s no reason for you to use that as an excuse.”

Cash smiled at her. That winning, charming, perfect smile that won me over time and again. “You’re right,” he said. “Strike or not, I’m not really looking for a girlfriend…. But”—and I swear his eyes locked on mine—“if someone special came along, I wouldn’t be stupid enough to let her get away.”

“Well, that’s good to hear,” Ellen said. “As long as you’re keeping your options open.”

But I didn’t think it was good to hear at all. Cash had basically just told me that I wasn’t worth his time. He’d let me go before, so clearly I wasn’t special enough for him to date. The hope I’d carried after his visit yesterday was crushed. The way he’d looked at me when he said it left no room for misinterpretation.

“Oh, well, that’s a dick move,” I blurted out. “You basically just said that every girl you’ve ever flirted with wasn’t worth it. And since pretty much the entire female population here has thrown themselves at you at one time or another, you’re implying that you’re too good for all of us.” I scrambled hastily to my feet when I saw the barely contained shock on the faces around the table.

“Lissa—” Cash began.

But I was already stumbling away.

“Where are you going?” Chloe asked.

“I’m, um, not feeling well,” I said. “I’ll see you in class later.”

Before she could ask again or I could convince myself to chance a look at Cash, I grabbed my purse and hurried toward the cafeteria door, wondering how I’d been stupid enough to think he liked me, and why it was so hard not to fall for him.

chapter twenty

“Did you really think I was going to let you get away without explaining that one?”

I blinked at my reflection in the bathroom mirror, surprised to see Ellen standing behind me. She smiled and walked over to the sink next to mine.

“Chloe wanted to come,” she said. “But I told her I hadn’t been on a Lissa-in-crisis mission in a while, so she let me take this one. So what was that about?”

“Nothing.”

“Lissa, I’ve known you for eleven years. I can tell when you’re lying. Something freaked you out enough to make you run out of the cafeteria like that. Was it Randy? Are you upset about him being with that girl?”

I shook my head. “No… I mean, yeah, I am, but that’s not it. It’s… it’s Cash.”

I don’t know what made me decide to tell her the truth. Maybe I was just sick of holding it in, or maybe it was the nostalgia effect, missing the days when Ellen and I would share our darkest secrets with each other. Either way, I spilled my guts to her right there in the girls’ bathroom. I told her about the party over the summer, how Cash had never called me, how I couldn’t fight the feelings I still had for him even though, especially after what he’d just said at the lunch table, he clearly didn’t have those feelings for me. By the time I’d told her everything, the bell for third block had already chimed and we were late for class.

“Screw him,” Ellen said.

I stared at her. “What?”

“Don’t get me wrong, I like Cash. He’s friends with Adam, and he’s a nice guy, but if he can’t see how special you are, then he doesn’t deserve you. Screw him.”

“Oh.” My brain was in the gutter, because that wasn’t how I’d thought she meant it at first.

“The last thing you need right now is boy drama,” Ellen said, picking my purse up off the bathroom floor and handing it to me. “So don’t bother. You’re awesome no matter what he thinks, okay? Just relax a little.”

She didn’t understand that that was part of the problem—I was too relaxed around Cash. It was too easy to say things I shouldn’t. Like what I’d blurted out at the lunch table.

“Maybe use the extra energy to focus on taking care of the rest of us,” Ellen continued as we walked out of the bathroom. “This strike has gone on longer than we’d anticipated. We all thought it would be two weeks, but it’s been almost three, and I know they didn’t show it, but a few of the girls are getting antsy. Instead of worrying about the stupid boys, why not focus on finding a way to lift morale? How does that sound?”

“Right,” I said. “The strike. I’ll focus on the strike and stop worrying about Cash and Randy. That shouldn’t be too hard.”

She gave me a reassuring smile and squeezed my arm before we separated in the hallway.

But the whole idea of not thinking about Cash got overturned the next night at work. I was doing well there for about five seconds. It was hard not to notice certain things, though. Like the way he seemed to be staring at me more than normal.

I worried that he was going to confront me about what I’d said at lunch the day before, about how no one was good enough for him. But when he decided to strike up a conversation in the Religion section, I was relieved that he’d chosen a different subject.

“So have you been reading Lysistrata at all?” he asked, walking up behind me as I reorganized the shelf of Bibles.

“What?”

“That book I told you to read. The Greek play about the sex strike.”

“Oh, right.” Stop blushing, I told myself. I shouldn’t be embarrassed to talk about this. “No, I haven’t yet. Sorry.”

“Too bad,” he said. “I’d love to hear your take on the battle-of-the-sexes aspect, since that’s kind of what’s happening in real life.”