Page 23 of Somebody To Love

“I’m Danny Schultz’s uncle. Call me Ty. And I didn’t catch your name?”

“Piper.”

“Cool name. It fits you.”

Mrs. Schultz found her way to us and said, “Ty, do me a favor. I have a code red.”

I didn’t know what code red was, but clearly Ty did. “It was nice meeting you, Piper. Maybe I’ll see you around.” And with that he was gone.

I must have looked disappointed because Mrs. Schultz gave me a furtive smile and said, “Don’t worry, he’ll be back.”

“Oh, I’m not worried—I mean—It’s fine.”

“You like him.”

I opened my mouth and closed it.

“Don’t worry. He’s single. I’ll put in a good word for you.”

Before I could say anything, she went marching towards another table and I wanted to call out to her when Meredith appeared next to me. She didn’t look so good.

“My stomach hurts.”

Uh oh. Stomach flu.

“Let’s get you home.”

I caught up to Mrs. Schultz. “Sorry to leave like this, but Meredith isn’t feeling well.”

Mrs. Schultz took one look at Meredith and said, “Yikes. Yeah, she needs to go home stat. Feel better, sweetie,” she said kindly to Meredith who looked ready to be sick.

I placed an arm around Meredith’s shoulder and led her out. I ran into Ty on the way.

“Leaving your post already? I didn’t figure you for a quitter,” he joked until he saw Meredith.

“Sick kid, let me get out your way.”

“Yeah, sorry to ditch you.”

“No problem,” he said, and I hurriedly rushed past him. I had to get Meredith home. But as I loaded her into the car, I couldn’t help but look back at the school and wonder if I would see Ty again.

Chapter Five

“Gooooooood morning,” said the voice on the other end of the phone.

I didn’t know who it was because I had answered the phone by knocking it off the nightstand next to me. Somehow it had landed right side up and on speaker.

Good thing, I didn’t use Skype or FaceTime. I was sure I looked horrendous.

“Who is this?” I said with my eyes still closed.

“Sylvia from Infinity Connections.”

“Hey, Sylvia.”

“Hi, Piper. You have a match. He’s very excited to meet you. Would you be open to meeting him this weekend?”

“This weekend? What day are we on?”