Babysitter or Boyfriend?

Chapter 6

Chapter Six

About an hour and a half later, Conner and I skidded to a stop in front of my apartment. We had sprinted the last block or so back, and were breathing too hard to even speak for several seconds. I smiled at him, and he flashed me a tiny grin in return.

"This has been fun," I finally said, feeling a bit shy all of a sudden. "Maybe we should run together more often." My cheeks grew slightly warm, and I hoped my suggestion wasn't too forward. I wouldn't have worried about it with any other guy, but Conner...well, it was pretty obvious why.

He paused for only a second, then replied in a soft voice, "Yeah, we should," Conner shifted from one foot to the other, a little awkwardly, and didn't meet my gaze for more than the briefest of seconds. I had a pretty good feeling I was the first girl he'd been even remotely alone with since he and Becca broke up.

"Well, I guess I'll see you around then," I said, smiling at him once more.

Conner's eyes finally locked on mine. "Yeah," he murmured, and suddenly a strange, sort of pained look crossed his face. "Avery, I...I really did have fun running with you today." With that, he dropped his gaze from mine, turned away, and jogged off to his own apartment.

I was grinning from ear to ear as soon as he was gone, but that grin faded as quickly as it had come when I entered the apartment. In the kitchen, Alex and Brooke were pouring pancake batter into a sizzling pan and laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world. Watching, I all of a sudden felt just slightly sick to my stomach.

Alex spun around, his face lighting up when he saw me. "Ave!" He strode into the foyer to give me a hug. "Wow, you're sweaty. Have you been running?"

I glanced down at my shorts, tank top, and running shoes, then gave him a 'duh' look. I wasn't sure why, since early yesterday afternoon, I felt so annoyed with Alex. I mean, sure, in all the years he and Jake had been friends, I'd gotten irritated several times with his obnoxiousness. However, that irritation had never lasted more than an hour or two.

I decided to try my best to push aside all feelings of resentment towards him-although Conner and I were very slowly becoming friends (at least I liked to think so), Alex was really all I had in Santa Barbara. I couldn't afford to push him away. "Um," I began, glancing down and then back up at him. "What are you doing here?"

Alex smiled. "I was here to see you, crazy," he replied, tousling my hair. "I wanted to see if you wanted to join me for breakfast. You weren't home, obviously, but Brooke invited me to stay for pancakes and...well, what can I say? I was starving. Couldn't resist."

I wanted to sigh and say, 'Yeah, I'm sure your hunger was the only reason that kept you here,' but figured that might make things really awkward for all three of us. So instead I just said, "Cool."

"You want some pancakes, Avery?" Brooke said cheerfully from the kitchen. "I mean, I'm no Martha Stewart when it comes to cooking, but at least they're not burnt."

Alex laughed. "Hey, I had five of them. They were delicious." He patted his flat stomach in an obvious way, as if to prove his liking for the pancakes.

The playful grin and tiny wink Brooke flashed him was not lost on me.

"I'm okay, thanks," I muttered. "I had a banana before I left. Besides, I like to wait at least a half an hour to eat after running."

Alex frowned down at me. "Ave, do you really think it's safe to run all by yourself in the morning?" He asked, and then a grin quirked briefly at his lips. "Not that I don't think you could kick some serious butt if you had to, but I don't know. You're a young, pretty girl, and things can happen."