Gravity by M. Leighton Page A

With Trace, I’d take whatever I could get.
    “I’ll give it a shot,” a deep voice called from behind me. 
    All eyes, including mine, turned toward the door.  Standing just inside it, obviously having only recently arrived, was none other than Adam Queen.  My ex.
    “Queen!  What up, man?” Brady exclaimed happily, motioning him forward. 
    With a smile, Adam nodded, moving through the crowd to approach my brother where he stood in the kitchen.  They’d always gotten along well and Brady had been very upset with me when I’d dumped Adam in the middle of our freshman year.  Of course, this guy looked nothing like the first guy I’d ever kissed all those years ago.  This Adam was…grown.
    The two embraced in one of those manly guy-type hugs, which was nothing more than a couple of fisted thumps to each other’s back for five seconds before they moved apart. 
    “You back?” Brady asked.
    “Just until graduation.”
    “Better than not at all, right dude?  Besides, that’s the best part.”
    For a couple of minutes, as others began to recognize Adam, there was a bit of a reunion.  But then Adam’s dark brown eyes found mine where I stood, hovering over every other person in the room.  He smiled, a wide smile that spoke of his pleasure at seeing me.  I fumbled through returning the gesture, not feeling quite comfortable with his reaction since I’d basically broken his heart.  It appeared, however, that Adam was very much over it.  He’d grown up—quite nicely, in fact—and had obviously moved past our break-up.
    “Looking good, P,” he teased with a nod of his head.  He’d always called me “P” as well.  In fact, it was during our brief relationship that Brady had begun calling me that, so I couldn’t really be sure Adam hadn’t been the one to start it. 
    All eyes swung toward me and I blushed furiously.  I thought my face would surely burst into flame.  How I wasn’t incinerated on the spot was beyond me.
    “Omigod, Peyton!  Is that Adam Queen?”
    Thankfully, Lacey had appeared at my side, providing me with a much needed distraction.
    “Yep.  None other.”
    Mouth slightly agape, her eyes bounced between Adam and me several times before they settled on me.
    “What is the matter with you?  How could you give that up?”
    We both glanced back toward the now-drinking Adam.  His hair, though longer, was still the same rich, dark chestnut and his eyes were still the same nearly-black brown.  It was the rest of his face, however, that seemed to have settled into a much more pleasing placement.  His features seemed to have found the perfect shape and spot, raising him from “meh” to “wow” in the space of three short years.
    “Well, partly because ‘that’ didn’t look like that when I gave it up,” I explained.  “But seriously, Lace, you remember how obnoxious he was.  That was the biggest problem.”
    “Well, he doesn’t look that obnoxious anymore,” Lacey noted as we watched Adam laugh and cut up with the people around him.  Charm and charisma practically oozed from his pores.
    The crowd erupted just then and lots of back-slapping ensued.  And the back most being slapped was Adam’s.
    “Well, pull my leg and call me Lucy,” Lacey giggled over the commotion.
    “That can’t mean what I think it means.”
    She turned to me with a devilish smile on her lips and a mischievous gleam in her eye.  “I think you’ve got yourself a winner, Peyton.”
    “No!”
    Lacey shrugged, unconcerned.  “Should’ve thought of the consequences before you offered yourself up like a blue ribbon at the county fair.”
    While it’s true that I hadn’t given my rash announcement a second’s thought, I’d begun to hope that Trace would win and the whole thing would turn out to be a dream come true.  But, as was the case with most everything in life, my plan had backfired.  Horribly.
    “You know I don’t think, Lacey!  Why didn’t you stop me?”
    Lacey