“Life doesn’t come with a blueprint, which makes it hard to have any plans.”

Nineteen-year-old Darby Duncan is finally on her own. Her boyfriend of six years just left for a high-powered summer internship, though in reality he’s been absent for much longer than that. This newfound freedom wasn’t a part of Darby’s plans, but as she’s come to discover, plans only exist on paper, not in reality.

And guys like Torin Westbrook aren’t supposed to exist in reality, either. But he does, with his disheveled curly hair, irresistible dimples, and endearingly quirky habit of reciting quotes from classic movies and ancient thinkers. When Darby meets Torin as a fellow counselor at the survival camp she impulsively applies to, she’s certain his main goal is to turn her world upside-down.

But Darby’s not sure she can adapt to Torin’s ways of viewing his past and the tragedies he’s faced. Because she’s had her own share of heartache, too, and as much as she wants to believe that it’s all been for a purpose, her grief hasn’t allowed her to get to that point. Yet the more Darby is around Torin, the more she craves the freedom to break out of her carefully constructed routine and mindset and fall into something new.

She’s just not sure that she should be falling for Torin along the way.

Excerpt

“You’ve never flown on a plane?”

“No,” he retorted. “I’ve never had the need, or the opportunity.”

“We need to see what we can do to change that.” I’d flown in planes more times than I could count. I couldn’t imagine being nineteen-years-old and never having seen the earth from a bird’s eye view. Torin was seriously missing out; from what I knew of him so far, flying would totally be his thing. Maybe it was my turn to help him with his unknowns.

“Anything else you’ve never done?” I jeered, intentionally trying to rile him up because I liked what it did to him when he got flustered.

“I’ve never had sex,” Torin shot out, “but I’m fairly certain I’m not afraid of that, either.”

Record scratch.

Wait…what?

I tossed the stare from my face quickly and attempted to reclaim my composure, but it was completely lost. My eyes dropped to my hands, which had totally mangled our poor cootie catcher. It was nothing but a crumpled wad of paper in my clenched grasp. Torin pulled it from my fingers to smooth it out, grinning widely like he was proud that he caught me off guard, like maybe that was his plan.

“Excuse me?”

“Don’t worry,” he smiled, his dimples deep-set, making something deep within my stomach flip-flop. “Unlike the flying, I’m not expecting you to ‘see what you can do to change that.’ ”

I tried to swallow quietly, but I was certain he heard it. Like that awkward moment when you watched a movie with your parents and a full on sex-scene starts up on the screen. It was mortifying—humiliating on a whole new level. You tried not to move—tried not to even breathe—because the last thing you wanted was your mom thinking you were actually alive and watching it. It was like you played dead. Torin’s recent confession sort of made me want to play dead. I was possum-on-the-side-of-the-highway road kill and rigor mortis had already set in.

Megan Squires lives with her husband and two children just outside of Sacramento, California. A graduate from the University of California, Davis, Megan is now a full-time mother, wife, and dreamer—though her characters don’t often give her much opportunity to sleep.

Visit www.theoutlierchronicles.com to learn more about her latest young adult series.

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