For the last six months, shy, nerdy, English teacher Carter Bennett has been crushing on the brand new PE teacher.
It doesn’t matter how many months in the school year there are, Carter knows that cool, laid-back, college baseball star Nolan returning his feelings is hopeless.
Until they’re both called in front of the Principal and given an impossible task: take over the spring musical from the MIA choir director.
Carter knows all about literature and plays, but had to give up his college theater major because his shyness was too crippling. Nolan knows even less. But despite lapses in choreography, terrible acting, a complete lack of sets, and costumes from the eighteenth century, they’re going to have to hit all the right notes, together.
CHAPTER ONE
“Really?” Lucas, Carter Bennett’s best friend and fellow teacher, shot him an incredulous look. “You didn’t do anything on summer break but sit on your couch, eat chocolate-covered pretzels, and binge-watch Star Trek?”
Carter shrugged self-consciously. Maybe he should’ve prepared a more interesting, less accurate story of how he’d spent the last three months, but he’d thought Lucas—the only teacher here who’d ask and actually want an answer—wouldn’t judge.
After all, it was a significant achievement to watch the entire Star Trek collection: the original Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek Voyager, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, and Star Trek: Enterprise.
“That’s a whole lot of episodes,” Lucas said with a shake of his head as they headed down the hallway towards the staff room. Lucas taught biology, which was partially why Carter, who was part of the English department, had believed he’d appreciate Carter’s achievement.
“Six hundred and ninety-seven,” Carter said proudly. Lucas just shook his head.
“You need a boyfriend,” he pronounced. Sadly, not the first time he’d ever said that to Carter, and it definitely wouldn’t be the last.
“Yeah.” Carter didn’t know what else to say. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to date anyone. It wasn’t like he hadn’t tried. But the whole self-professed nerd and bow-tie thing tended to put men off, especially on apps like Grindr. Guys there wanted some hot hookup, not to discuss which Jane Austen novel was his personal favorite.
“I know you hate the hookup apps,” Lucas said, his voice dropping as they neared the staff room. “But there are other ways to meet guys. And it’s not usually by sitting on your couch, watching every Star Trek episode in existence.”
Lucas was probably not wrong.
And Carter was just about to say so when a guy rounded the corner, head buried deep into his phone, paying zero attention to where he was going with his long, lanky body. And Carter, who wasn’t very coordinated on the best of days, had admittedly been spending way too much time on the couch, and reacted about a half second too late, moving but not quickly enough to avoid a collision.
“Shit!” the guy exclaimed, “I’m so sorry!”
Carter looked up into new guy’s deep blue eyes, framed with a fringe of unfairly lush sandy brown lashes, and everything he was about to say—namely, “why don’t you watch where the hell you’re walking!”—died in his throat.
This was another reason why he wasn’t dating some cute guy he’d met at Starbucks or at the frozen custard place down the street from his condo. Anytime he was even the slightest bit attracted to a man, his brain took an immediate hiatus and every available word dried up.
“Uh,” Carter said helpfully.
“He’s fine,” Lucas said, putting a hand on Carter’s shoulder. He was very familiar with Carter’s inability to talk to anyone even remotely attractive or available.
“Fine,” Carter echoed stupidly.
“Well, I’m glad to hear it,” the guy said, grinning, short-circuiting any remaining brain cells that Carter possessed. He was going to walk around the rest of the day in a complete daze, just from the aftereffects of this guy’s smile.
He was tall and rangy, wearing a blue polo shirt that did unfair things for his blue eyes, and a pair of khakis that probably did even more unfair things for his ass.
“I’ll see you around?” he asked, leaving the question hanging, but when Carter only nodded, he finally turned and walked away.
Yep, Carter thought as he walked away, definitely unfair.
“Now that’s the kind of guy you should be dating,” Lucas said.
Carter wasn’t entirely sure the guy was out of earshot when Lucas said it, but it really didn’t matter because, even if he was actually attracted to men, he was completely out of Carter’s league.
“Yeah, okay, sure,” Carter retorted sarcastically.
“No, I’m really serious. I think that’s the new gym teacher. Nolan Ryan Washington.”
Carter raised an eyebrow. “You really think I should try dating someone whose name is Nolan Ryan Washington?”
“Just because his parents like baseball doesn’t mean he likes baseball,” Lucas pointed out. “Besides, it’s not good to date someone exactly like you. Remember . . .” Lucas paused, like he was searching mentally for the name of Carter’s ex-boyfriend. And frankly, that wasn’t all that surprising, because Dave, Carter’s ex-boyfriend, hadn’t been the kind of guy anyone remembered.
They’d eventually broken up because, even though Carter had liked him initially, even he had hit his limit on the nerdy minutiae that Dave had enjoyed talking about.
“Dave,” Carter supplied helpfully. “And you aren’t wrong. But this guy? Nolan or whatever his name is? I couldn’t even talk to him. How am I possibly supposed to start dating someone if one, I don’t know if he’s even interested in men, and two, I literally can’t speak a word in front of him.”
Lucas smiled. “The school year is very long, my friend. Maybe you’ll get used to seeing him around and it won’t be so hard to strike up a conversation.”
Rolling his eyes, Carter didn’t bother to correct his friend of his misassumption.
Those eyes? That face? That body? And a gym teacher to boot? There was no way he was ever going to be able to say even a single word to Nolan Ryan Washington’s face.
It didn’t matter if the school year lasted five million years; it wasn’t happening.
A lifelong Oregonian, Beth Bolden has just recently moved to North Carolina with her supportive husband and their sweet kitten, Earl Grey. Beth still believes in Keeping Portland Weird, and intends to be just as weird in Raleigh.
Beth has been writing practically since she learned the alphabet. Unfortunately, her first foray into novel writing, titled Big Bear with Sparkly Earrings, wasn’t a bestseller, but hope springs eternal. She’s published twenty novels and six novellas.
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