If I Forget You by Michelle D. Argyle

hands — only the thumbnails were chewed. This had to be the same guy who had told her to try the cream cheese the first time she’d come — the guy she thought was Jordan/Kent. But he wasn’t Jordan or Kent. He was someone completely different.
    “I think I’m addicted,” she answered as she met his blue eyes. What was with her and blue-eyed guys lately? Three had to be it. She was going to lose it if any more of them stumbled into her life.
    A smile lifted the guy’s lips as he studied her face and fiddled with the strap of his backpack. “Do you have to run to class after this?” he asked.
    Wait, did she have class? Who was this? Why did she keep thinking of the letter O? That had to be him … the O guy.
    Someone cleared their throat behind Avery, and she turned around to see a wide gap between the food truck and her. She was next in line and the girl taking orders was glaring.
    “Oh, sorry!” Avery said, and rushed forward to order her meal. When she had her hot dog, potato chips, and drink, she stepped to the side and waited for O to get his hot dog too. He ordered the exact same thing as her.
    “Good taste,” she laughed as she started walking across the plaza toward the quad, her favorite place on campus.
    “So, where are we headed?” O asked, keeping up with her.
    “The cherry trees,” she answered, slipping her drink into her messenger bag so she could start plucking potato chips out of the flimsy cardboard food tray. “I know they’re not in bloom or anything, but I like eating over there as long as the weather’s nice.”
    “I like it over there too.”
    There was something about this guy that made her smile. He’d talked to her in line. Twice. Then he’d ordered the same food as her, and now he was assuming he could tag along with her to eat lunch. Maybe she liked him because he was so obviously interested in her. High school had been so much the opposite of what college was turning out to be that Avery felt like she was floating half the time. The feel of Kent’s mouth on hers flashed through her memory, almost making her trip over her own feet. She caught herself and kept walking.
    “I’m guessing you don’t have a class right now,” O stated as they crossed a road and headed into the quad. “Lucky us, I don’t either.”
    Finally, she stopped to face him. His hair was darker than Kent’s or Jordan’s. It was still blond, but more brown, like hers, and he kept his sideburns long. A hint of a goatee shadowed his chin. How had she mixed him up with the other two?
    “What’s your name again?” she asked, feeling confident that she could ask such a question now.
    Juggling his food and drink in the crook of his arm, he reached out his free hand and she shook it, amused.
    “Owen,” he answered. “Sorry if you think I’m stalking you. I take it as a sign we should be friends since we like the same food and keep running into each other.”
    Not literally, though, like me and Jordan, she thought to herself as she popped another chip into her mouth. But Owen seemed nice enough, and eager. Three guys might be interested in her, but she wouldn’t let it go to her head. As she looked into Owen’s charming blue eyes rimmed with a darker blue, she decided that this was what college was about — meeting new people, taking chances, opening yourself up. High school had been almost the complete opposite for her. Maybe that was why she was meeting so many guys now. Maybe subconsciously she was putting herself out there more than she ever had in her life. So far the results were exciting and horrifying at the same time.
    “I’m Avery,” she said. “I moved from Spokane. You?”
    “Guess we’re even more alike,” he laughed. “I’m from Spokane too. What high school did you go to?”
    “Shadle Park.” She wanted to say that she wasn’t from Spokane, but it didn’t matter at this point.
    “Ah, that’s why I don’t know you. I went to Rogers.”
    Her stomach flipped upside down