Under the Dusty Moon by Suzanne Sutherland

force my heart to beat a normal rhythm. Shaun’s ride was a royal blue department-store mountain bike, and it was definitely too small for him, with the seat raised up as high as it would go. It wasn’t exactly what I’d pictured him riding.
    â€œOh yeah,” Shaun said, laughing nervously. “It’s my little brother’s bike. Mine’s in the shop.”
    â€œOh,” I said, “cool.”
    â€œNah,” Shaun said. “Not really. But, uh, should we go?”
    â€œYeah,” I said, “sure. You wanna lead?”
    â€œYou do it,” he said, “I’ll follow you.”
    I smiled nervously and snapped my pink skateboard bucket to my head. He wasn’t wearing a helmet. His hair was perfectly tousled and slightly spiked; I wanted to roll around in a whole field of it, maybe forever. I could feel my cheeks flushing again, so I turned away from him and mounted PYT.
    â€œAll right,” I yelled over my shoulder. “Let’s do this!”
    â€œYou got it,” he called back to me.
    With Shaun riding behind me I was so nervous I could’ve puked right there on the road. I booked it as fast as I could down the street, my legs straining to pound the pedals as hard as my body would let me. I turned around every so often to make sure that Shaun was keeping up with me, but he made my frantic pace look easy, even on his borrowed miniature bike. I pedalled harder.
    We passed a giant park and a whole row of cute shops and restaurants that made up the trendy part of Queen Street West. Our neighbourhood was poorer, with more immigrant families and broke artists, though the trendiness had also started creeping our way with DIY bike shops and designer vintage clothing stores in between the roti shops and sketchy old-man bars.
    I stood up on my pedals as we rode over a tiny hill that threatened to slow me down, and I gripped my brakes not a second too soon as a car parked on the side of the road chose the instant I was riding past to make a left-hand turn out of the parking space and back onto the road. I paused for an instant and then swerved around the car, just barely missing being laid out flat by a giant hunk of metal and machinery.
    â€œWhoa, that was close!” Shaun called from behind me, as I tried my best to keep the pace. “You okay?”
    I turned my head back to face him. “Fine!” I yelled.
    I could feel the sweat from my forehead dripping down into my eyes and it stung.
    â€œIt’s no problem,” I said, looking back ahead of me at the road, “I just wish these cars would watch where they’re going!”
    â€œWhat?” Shaun yelled.
    â€œI said I wish these cars would be careful of where they’re going!”
    â€œI can’t hear you!”
    â€œIt’s nothing,” I said, giving up on being heard over the sound of traffic, and then, louder, “I’m fine!”
    â€œOkay!” he yelled.
    We managed to make it through a few construction snarls and down to the ferry docks in record time. We dismounted and started walking our bikes and I couldn’t decide which would make me look stupider: wearing my bike helmet for the rest of the day, or revealing just how sweaty and disgusting my hair was underneath. Realizing that I’d have a pretty hard time justifying the former, I chose the latter.
    â€œWow,” Shaun said. “You’re really hot, eh?”
    â€œHeh, yeah,” I smiled nervously and turned away from him to fix my hair. “Gotta love this heat wave.”
    â€œSerious. I’m pretty sure I could fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool with my sweat. My parents’ house is, like, an oven.”
    Change the subject , I told myself. Change it quick or else you’re going to be making dick and fart jokes with this mega babe the rest of the afternoon and he’s only going to think of you as one of his dudes .
    â€œSo,” I said, pointing PYT toward the