Soul mates.  Did Hadley Harper just tell him that he was her Soul Mate?  Joel stared at her, blinked, and bit at the smile forming on his face.  He clamped hard on his lower lip, but he just couldn’t stop it.  He’d been leaning closer and closer to her, leveraging his weight on his forearm, which was propped on the desk between them, struggling to hear her tiny little voice.  She smelled good, like something warm in the springtime, but she was calling him her Soul Mate.  There was no way to take that with a straight face.  He looked away, glancing desperately about the room for something very unfunny to sober him up.  The girl with a blue nose over there wasn’t helping.  Tucker was working with Mae and he couldn’t catch his brother’s eye.  And Hadley said he was her Soul Mate.  

“I mean, it doesn’t mean anything. It’s just…no one is a perfect match…but us, and all the girls know.”

It all sort of fit now . . . the giggling and the squeaky whispers, Hadley’s supreme discomfort with his presence . . . she was being forced into a conversation with her one true love and it was overwhelming.  Okay, Joel couldn't even think like that without making himself giggle, which he did, and covered his mouth, hard, composing himself right enough, but waiting a moment to be sure.  

When he lowered his hand, Joel leaned back in, close to Hadley, so that he could whisper.  He gave T.J. a knowing look before he focused on the blue pebble on the desk and leaned even closer to Hadley.  “Should I order a diamond ring now?” he asked her.  “Or would you like to pick it out yourself during the holidays?”


JOEL WATKINS