Keeping the Distance (I Heart Iloilo Book 1) Read online

  Jace was right, but that didn’t mean Lance had to like it. He shrugged off his best friend’s grip and grabbed his drink again. When he was about to walk out of the kitchen, a giggly voice announced, “Everyone, let’s play truth or dare!”

  Tonight was not his night. Lance closed his eyes and sighed. Inviting Melissa to this party had seemed like a great idea when they’d been together in the privacy of his car. It was his chance to show him that what he and his friends did for fun wasn’t so bad. Maybe afterwards, she’d finally change her mind and have the guts to tell her father that, yes, they were in fact together. Dating. Whatever she wanted to call it.

  He was wrong. Inviting Melissa to Jace’s party was an even worse idea than attempting to stay away from her.

  ***

  This is just a game, Melissa told herself over and over as Stanley Ferrer gulped down a bottle of beer as quickly as humanly possible. An incredibly stupid game, but a game nonetheless.

  Surprising even herself, she realized she didn’t want to be anywhere else. She was fine where she was, sitting cross-legged on the floor of a foreign living room while surrounded by a bunch of her classmates, her best friend, and her secret sort-of-not-really boyfriend. Across the circle they’d all somehow formed, she met Lance’s eyes and couldn’t help the little grin that formed on her face.

  He looked even more gorgeous tonight in a maroon V-neck shirt with sleeves that hugged his biceps. How was it possible for anyone to look like that in a plain T-shirt? It was enough to make a girl swoon once or twice.

  Their eyes quickly broke apart when their circle burst into, loud ecstatic cheers. Stanley had managed to drink the entire bottle of Red Horse in little more than a minute. They all laughed when his face began to turn the same shade as Lance’s T-shirt, and he had to hold on to the girl next to him. Winning the game wasn’t always everything.

  “My turn!” Mara Cortez, a giggly girl from their school, squealed. She grabbed the empty soda bottle they’d been using from the middle of the circle, her eyes leaping from one face to another with mischief twinkling in them. She placed the bottle in the center of the circle again and pushed it forward with the tip of a finger. It began to spin.

  Their eyes all stayed glued to the bottle as its spinning slowed. It almost stopped on Jace, but it came to a real halt pointing to the person next to him. Lyka, Lance’s ex-girlfriend.

  Ice trickled down Melissa’s spine as Mara clapped her hands in delight. She didn’t like where this game was going. At all.

  She had liked being at the party well enough, but all of a sudden, she found herself wishing she was back in her room with her ukulele within reach. The cardigan in her bag next to her seemed to be calling her, emphasizing her cluelessness in how to act in Lance’s world, among the people he called friends.

  “Truth or dare, Lyka?” A canary-eating smile stretched Mara’s lips.

  Undaunted, Lyka leaned back—cool, calm, the picture of utter confidence. She smiled back. “Dare.”

  Melissa had always liked Lyka. She was the girl everyone wanted, especially with the mole on her cheek that made her look like a 90s supermodel. If they had been given the chance to spend more time together, she sometimes thought they might’ve even been friends.

  But she envied Lyka’s freedom to be with Lance at that moment. Out in the open. Without being scared of what her father might think.

  Mara aimed a French-manicured finger at Lyka. “I dare you to”—her finger swerved in Lance’s direction—“make out with your ex-boyfriend.”

  Regret flooded her entire being. No matter how much she tried, there was no way she could stop what was about to unfold before her. Unless she got enough guts to come right out and claim Lance, say that he was hers and that she’d had enough of this stupid game.

  She couldn’t. The words remained rooted to the tip of her tongue, and she could only swallow them as Lance watched her from across the circle. His expression wrecked her.

  The hope on his face told her everything she needed to know. He was rooting for her to stand up for him, for them. Watching the hope fade from his face, the regret roiling in her stomach morphed into shame. It was enough to drown out the cheers from everyone else.

  In her mind, she could picture things so clearly. She would stand up, brave and proud, and walk up to the center of the circle. “Lyka can’t kiss Lance, because he’s mine. He has been for a while,” she would say.

  Her legs somehow never found the strength to stand up. Instead, it was Lyka who stood up, walked over to Lance, and knelt down in front of him.

  “Hey, you.” Lyka’s voice rang throughout the circle.

  Cam’s hand found hers and squeezed. Melissa glanced at her best friend and clearly read the message in her eyes. Don’t watch.

  But it was too late. No natural disaster, miracle, or supernatural phenomenon could’ve made her look away from the sight of Lyka’s fingers curling around the middle of Lance’s shirt as she pulled him closer. Nothing could’ve made her rip her eyes away from the sight of another girl pulling the boy she loved—yes, loved, she realized belatedly—in for a kiss that should’ve been hers in the first place. Absolutely nothing.

  She couldn’t look away until her vision blurred. Her hand flew up to her cheek, and she blinked in surprise when she discovered it was wet with tears. Suddenly, she couldn’t look anymore. This party and the boy who’d once given her a beautiful dress with clouds on it like a promise. It was all too much.

  She stood up and blindly pushed her way through the throbbing crowd of people she barely even knew.

  “Mel!” Cam’s voice called from behind her.

  She didn’t stop until she found herself in the kitchen and pushed the closest door open. It led to the backyard, and Melissa found herself facing a fountain, a maiden carrying a vase with water bursting out of it. She blinked up at the stars in the night sky as she reminded herself to breathe.

  Arms—strong, warm, and familiar—wrapped themselves around her and pushed her back against Lance’s chest. She didn’t know when or how, but being with him like this became as easy as breathing. He was hers. She was his. It was that simple and complicated.

  “I couldn’t do it,” Lance whispered, his arms tightening around her. “Not with you looking at me like that.”

  With each movement creating a fissure on her already damaged heart, Melissa slowly pulled Lance’s arms away from her and faced him. She tried to look him in the eye because she owed him that much, but her eyes found their way to the ground instead. Staring down at her gold flats, she said, “People can see.”

  “I don’t care,” Lance said with a vehement shake of his head. “Not anymore.”

  His arms began to reach for her, but she stepped away from him while she still could. “Don’t.”

  “Don’t what? Show people that I’m crazy about you?” Lance reached for her again, and this time, Melissa couldn’t help herself. She let his fingers make his way through her hair, shivering under his touch. “Because I am, in case you didn’t know.”

  Oh, he could so easily unravel her with a simple touch, a carefully placed world.

  “I want to eat ice cream with you like that couple we saw on our first date.” Lance’s eyes bore into her face and dug deeper into her with each word. “I want to sit next to you at the library, watching like a creep while you do your homework. I want to be able to put my arm around you and tell people you’re mine at my best friend’s party. Don’t you want that, Mel?”

  She wanted that, too.

  All of it.

  He had no idea how desperately she wanted it.

  She opened her mouth to speak, but her phone began to ring. Sighing, she pulled it out of the pocket of her shorts and stared down at the caller. It was her father.

  Reality came crashing back along with all the reasons why they decided to keep things between them a secret in the first place.

  Lance had obviously had enough of it. His eyes hardened as he saw the indecision bleeding across
her features. His arms dropped away from her, and she became so very cold.

  “Answer it,” Lance said, glancing down at the phone in her hands.

  Tell your father we’re together. Tell him you’re with me right now.

  Or not.

  The words hung unspoken between them. He wasn’t going to push her, but he wasn’t going to sit around waiting for her to grow a backbone either. The phone continued to ring between them like a ticking time bomb.

  If she were brave, she would answer her father’s call and tell him everything about the wonderful boy standing in front of her and how much he wanted to make her be so much more than herself.

  But she wasn’t brave.

  She was everything but.

  Her conversation with her father from the day she and Lance got sent to the principal’s office flashed in her mind like a highlight reel.

  That boy walks around this school like he owns it, throwing his father’s money in all our faces. Do you really want to be associated with someone like that?

  Bad grades. Horrible reputation. Why does your name keep cropping up with his whenever I talk to your teachers?

  Stay away from Lance Ordonez, Mel. I’m telling you this as your father, not your principal.

  Melissa stared up into Lance’s eyes and saw that he really was crazy about her. Every fiber of her being believed it, and she felt the exact same way. Her father had no idea how he pretended to be sick of his fries so he could give them to her, how he changed his jersey number to her birthday, how he’d made her so happy in so many little ways. Her father didn’t know Lance like she did, but she couldn’t bear to disappoint him in the biggest of ways.

  She answered the phone call. “Yes, Papa?”

  “What time will you be home, Mel?” Her father’s voice sounded oceans away. “Do you need a ride home?”

  “No, I’m fine. I…” Her eyes flew up to find Lance watching her. Hope and utter desperation warred on his face. Her throat seized up as all the things she wanted to say came rushing to the surface.

  Pa, I’m in love with Lance Ordonez.

  I love him.

  I’ve been utterly crazy about him since he stole my homework.

  “I…” she tried again.

  “You what?” he prodded.

  Tears began to fill her eyes as the words refused to leave her throat, clinging tightly to her lack of courage. She closed her eyes and said, “Nothing. I’ll be home soon.”

  When Melissa opened her eyes, Lance was gone.

  Chapter Seventeen

  For Lance, basketball had always been easy, his body moving through the court with ease and the ball moving through his hands like it was a part of him.

  Not today, though.

  Today, basketball refused to cooperate.

  As Jace managed to steal the ball from him for the nth time that day, Lance could feel Coach's eyes sinking deeper into the back of his head like claws. He knew he was in for the lecture of a lifetime after the practice session ended, and there was nothing he could do about it.

  "Head in the game, Ordonez!" Coach shouted from the sidelines, unable to control himself anymore. The red ball cap perched on his head couldn’t hide the shock of salt and pepper hair underneath.

  The sound of sneakers squeaking and thudding against the court filled the gym. Fading afternoon light from the upper windows streamed down on the playing boys.

  Lance's hand flew up to wipe away some of the sweat dripping down his face. He tried to internalize Coach's words. It wasn't working. His head was somewhere far, far away, probably still at the party where Melissa flat out refused to stand up for him.

  He hated that he'd become the person he swore he'd never be, someone who walked away when things got tough. He wished he knew how to toe the line between walking away and holding on, wished the line between the two was clearer. Right now, it was fucking invisible.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Melissa walk into the gym, Cam trailing after her. Her hair was up in the messy bun he missed, her Big Dipper moles drawing his eyes in. She was radiant today, freaking effervescent, and nothing had been more difficult in his life than sitting behind her in class the whole day and not saying or doing a thing. His entire body turned into a rigid line, and he forgot that he was supposed to be blocking Jace from making another one of his annoying three-point shots.

  Don't look at her.

  If only the words were as easy to follow as they were to think.

  The truth was, he'd been miserable after Melissa failed to tell her father about them, and he walked out of the party like the sort of broken-hearted loser he used to laugh at. He spent the entire Sunday dodging calls from Jace and his sister, listening to a The Weepies album Julianne left behind before she left for Australia, and checking Melissa's profile like a pathetic stalker. Not his proudest moments.

  But Melissa was in the gym now, a place they'd agreed was entirely his territory.

  Unable to stop himself anymore, his arms loosened their guard around Jace, and he glanced in her direction. Melissa sat on the bleachers with Cam next to her, and they were watching something on a tablet.

  A furrow formed between his brows as his whole body turned toward her, like she was the sun and he was a dumb plant straining for a bit of light. She was in the gym, his territory as previously established, but she wasn't even looking at him. In fact, she was pretending he didn't exist. Was this some new method of torture he hadn't heard about?

  "Ordonez, this is a basketball court, not a goddamn park! What the hell are you doing?" Coach's furious voice snapped him out of the depressed fog he’d been sucked into.

  The hope Lance had been nurturing all weekend snapped and morphed into something ugly at that moment.

  He wasn’t the guy who chased after a girl who couldn’t even tell her own father about him, like he was dirty laundry she was ashamed of airing out in public. It pained him to think of the numerous girls who’d begged him to let them introduce him to their parents, to show him off proudly to their friends. Maybe this was karma. He’d said no to all of them, and now he was the one begging.

  This wasn’t him. He was Lance Ordonez, and he was done waiting for Melissa to come around.

  He was done. With all of it.

  Lance walked off the court, ready to apologize to Coach but found him talking to the principal’s secretary. Glancing down at the slip of paper in his hand, Coach said, “Ordonez, go to the principal’s office. He wants to see you. I’ll talk to you afterwards.”

  “Why?”

  “Ask him when you get there,” Coach replied, focusing on the players still on the court. “Get back here as quickly as you can.”

  On his way to the locker room to grab a towel, Lance passed the bleachers. It was obvious Melissa heard Coach say her father wanted to see him, because her eyes followed him all the way to the locker room entrance, pleading and wide. He knew what she was asking, and after everything, he was willing to do it for her as a last favor.

  He even changed into a spare T-shirt, because he didn’t want to face the principal with the man’s daughter’s birthdate emblazoned all over his jersey. As he walked toward the principal’s office, he tried to figure out what Mr. Ortiz wanted to talk to him about. He hadn’t done anything particularly heinous lately that would warrant another epic lecture.

  The principal’s voice ushered him inside. When he closed the door behind him, Mr. Ortiz sat behind his desk, glasses over eyes that were so similar to Melissa’s it was almost painful.

  “Take a seat, Mr. Ordonez.” The principal motioned to the empty chair in front of his desk.

  Lance took the offered seat, a strange hurricane of emotions swirling around inside him. He had known Mr. Ortiz since he first became a student at Saint Agnes Catholic Academy at the age of seven. The man had been a constant figure in his life, summoning him whenever he did something disruptive in class which was often and presenting him with sportsmanship awards during school ceremonies.

  But now,
it was like he was seeing the principal through different eyes. Melissa was so in awe of her father and did everything in her power to please him, including crushing her own personality to fit into the mold of Perfect Daughter. He saw Mr. Ortiz through her eyes, and he became furious. The anger flared up inside him, and he had to clutch the edge of his seat to stop himself from lunging.

  “How are you doing today, Mr. Ordonez?” The principal pushed his glasses further up his nose, his eyes on Lance the whole time.

  Lance wasn’t in the mood to play nice, not when he was this close to exploding. “Why am I here?”

  “I respect that you want to do away with pleasantries, so we can get straight to the point.” Mr. Ortiz leaned back and reached for the framed photograph on his desk, the one containing a photo of a smiling Melissa during their elementary school graduation. “I wanted to speak to you today not as your principal but as a father.”

  The words ignited Lance’s anger even more. He swallowed, trying to keep his face carefully blank. “With all due respect, Mr. Ortiz, I have no idea what you’re saying.”

  “I think you do.” Mr. Ortiz studied him with a calm air, but his eyes glittered with unexpressed anger. “Apparently, you and my daughter went to the same party this weekend, and certain sources saw you chasing after her.”

  “You mean people gossiped about us?” Lance said, even managing to let out a little laugh.

  “I understand that you have to get back to practice, so I’ll make this quick.” Mr. Ordonez twisted the framed photograph in his hands until it faced Lance and laid it on the desk. It stood between them, representing a divide that he could never hope to cross if this conversation was any indication. “My daughter has a bright future ahead of her, and I would highly appreciate it if you stayed out of it.”

  “You think I’m not good enough for her? Is that it?” The utter rage inside Lance burned brighter than ever, every syllable out of the principal’s mouth adding fuel to the fire.

  “Yes, I think you’re not good enough for her.” Mr. Ortiz’s collected demeanor was gone now as the temper he held in check began to lace through his words. “My daughter is beautiful, intelligent, and kinder than you could comprehend. As her father, frankly, I don’t think anyone’s good enough for her. But more than that, Mr. Ortiz, I disapprove of you, because you’re going to hurt her. Greatly. I’m sure of it.”