I set my phone on the side table and stretch my arms behind my head, basking in the early heat. I’ll give Sheridan a few more days. I came on pretty strong this morning, though I had no choice. Subtle isn’t going to work on this girl. But come mid-week, I’ll drop the invite in her lap. Front row center tickets to a sold-out show with a backstage pass … there’s no way she’ll say no, even if she hates me.
But for now, I’ll give her some time to miss me … to wonder … what if?
Chapter Eight
Sheridan
* * *
“Is it just me or does August Monreaux always look like he hates life?” Adriana shoves her phone into my hand Wednesday after we lock up the shop.
“Why are you looking up August Monreaux?”
“I’m not,” she says. “I was trying to find that Isaac guy and happened to see him in his pics. They went to high school together.”
We stroll to our cars, parked side by side in the back lot. “And why are you looking up Isaac? I thought he used you to make his girlfriend jealous or something?”
“He did. But I’m nosy. You know that. I just wanted to see what I was up against. I didn’t get a good look at her at the party because he was sucking her freaking face off like a damn Hoover.”
“Ew.” I point my key fob at my car. “Tell me you’re not going to DM him.”
“God, no.” She flicks to another picture. “Look, here he is again. He looks miserable.”
“August?” I inspect this picture. A bunch of guys in football jerseys stand in a half circle, their beefy arms around one another.
Everyone is smiling—except him.
“He’s definitely different,” I say.
“You still have his shirt?”
“It’s at the cleaner’s.” Surprisingly, the cost to dry clean a dress shirt isn’t much different than the cost of a venti vanilla bean Frappuccino—which I could really use about now because I’m dragging. Our AC is still out so sleep has been a sweaty hit-or-miss mess. Dad claims he’s going to fix the unit himself. Mom keeps claiming the heat wave is almost done, reminding me this isn’t normal even by southern Missouri standards. I’m just waiting for the night when I can fall asleep without a rickety box fan blowing warm air on me. “Did I tell you he texted me last Saturday?”
We stand by the front of my car.
“Um, no!” Her jaw hangs. “What’d he want?”
“His shirt.” I laugh and quote the air.
Adriana squints. “Ugh. Why do guys have to be so transparent? I can see through that a mile away. He just wants ass.”
Lucky Adriana is blissfully unaware of our families’ history. While she’s a local, she’s not a local-in-the-know. Some people around here fashion themselves official town historians. Her parents are Rhode Island transplants who moved here when Adri wasn’t even a year old. There’s a lot they don’t know, a lot that they probably don’t even care to know.
“So you going to do it?” she asks. “You going to hook up?”
“Of course not.”
“Dang. I mean … if you want me to take one for the team.” She winks.
“If you want him, he’s all yours.” I lift my palms in surrender.
“Really?”
“Totally. He’s not my type. At all. Not even close,” I say. “I think it’s the long hair.”
And the tattoos. And the nose piercing. And the last name.
“Seriously? He’s, like, every girl’s wet dream.” Her eyes widen and she studies me, as if I’m trying to punk her. “But if you like those clean cut good boys, you do you.”
Yawning and eyes watering, I say, “I should get going.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
“You’re still covering for me Saturday, right?” My parents would be heartbroken if we had to cancel our afternoon shopping plans.
“Eight to four. I’ll be here. ‘Night, babe.” She struts to her driver’s door and ducks inside. The engine of her little blue Dodge fires up with a purr, and she plugs her phone onto her charger before buzzing away.
I stop for a few gallons of gas on the way home. And when I pull into the driveway, I sit in my car, AC blasting, for a solid ten minutes. The second I get inside, I’m going to melt into a puddle. Last night the thermostat read eight-seven degrees at bedtime. I’m about ready to fix the dang unit myself.
“Hey, Mama,” I call from the front door when I finally come inside. I kick off my shoes and head for the living room, where the TV flickers against her sallow complexion. Credits roll on the screen. Another Lifetime movie. I swear she must have seen them all by now. “What’d you watch? Anything good?”
“Dancing with Danger,” she says. Her eyes light the way they always do when she’s no longer alone. “I’d give it an A minus.”