Elouise
With our order taken,the waitress grabs our menus and walks away.
“Well…” Maddie twirls one of her long black curls around a finger.
“Well, what?” I reply, fighting hard against the urge to grin.
She rolls her eyes, “You’ve been avoiding me ever since you got back from that little camping trip.” She lets the curl spring free so she can point her finger at me. “A trip, I might add, that you were dreading. And, you said you’d text me every night. Which you didn’t do.” I open my mouth, but she wags her finger to stop me. “What you did do was leave me a frantic voicemail about seeing your old crush Beckett. Which, I still don’t understand how that’s possible. And then proceeded to ignore my calls, leaving me with freaking nothing.”
I wait a beat to make sure she’s done, “Want me to talk now?”
Maddie crosses her arms, “Not yet.” Narrowing her eyes, she gives me her best attempt at a glare, but on her pretty heart-shaped face it’s the furthest thing from intimidating. Giving up she huffs, “Ugh, fine. I’m done. Now spill.”
The waitress comes back, setting down our drinks. A hard cider for Maddie, and water for me since classes start back up tomorrow.
I take a sip of my water, giving myself another moment to gather my thoughts.
The restaurant, Darling Bites, is noisy, but it’s a staple in this small town, and has been here for as long as I can remember. During the day it’s the perfect place to grab breakfast and lunch, but once the evening hits, the lights dim, the voices ramp up, and the bar opens.
I let go of my glass and twist my napkin between my fingers, “I didn’t call you those other nights because I wasn’t alone in the tent.”
“Yeah- but didn’t you say that Rebecca lady was cool? I can’t imagine she’d care about you making a phone call,” her brows furrow as she takes a sip of her drink.
“Right. Well…” how do I say this, “it wasn’t Rebecca in my tent. It was Beckett.”
Maddie tips her head forward, letting her mouthful of booze spill back into the glass.
“Classy,” I laugh.
She ignores me. “I’m sorry, what?! Are you telling me that you slept with your Beckett, and you didn’t even tell me!?”
The way she says your Beckett sends a warm possessiveness flowing through my body, but I shove it away. He’s not mine.
“Well, we didn’t… you know.”
She shakes her head. “No, I don’t know.”
I look around, making sure no one can hear us. But we’ve snagged a high-top table in the back corner of the bar area, and everyone else is deep in their own conversations.
Leaning closer, I whisper, “We didn’t have sex.”
Maddie blinks, “Okay… but you did something.”
I almost ask her how she knows, but she’s my best friend. Has been since she cheated off my math homework in the first grade. If anyone could tell something’s different with me, it’d be her.
My chin dips down, “We did something.”
Memories of Beckett - behind me, touching me, above me - flicker though my mind.
“My oh my,” Maddie fans a hand in front of her face, “I can feel the lust from here.”
I roll my eyes, but I don’t try to correct her. Because she’s right. Just thinking about him is making me all sorts of hot and bothered.
“Okay-” she takes a sip, not spitting it out this time, “details. I want all the details.”
Considering we share everything with each other, this shouldn’t be difficult to do. But I still reach across the table, grab her glass and take a large drink of cider.
Maddie listens quietly as I go through the events day-by-day. But she throws a fit over Creepy Dad trying to crawl into my tent, losing it as any best friend should. Then I explain Beckett coming to my rescue and Maddie flips straight to swooning.