Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 125257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 418(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 418(@300wpm)
She wings them his way, and he catches them. Seconds later she’s gone, and Lake is holding a sleeve of protection and I’m wearing a mask.
He gestures to me. “Are you sick? Do you need anything?” It’s asked with genuine concern, but I don’t need help.
I rip off the mask. “Just a precaution. Since she says she’s over her cold, but you never know. I don’t want to get you sick. As then you couldn’t play and…”
The sentence dies as the awkwardness expands. I’m explaining my germaphobe excuses while he holds condoms we won’t use. “I’ll just grab my bag.”
He gives a tight nod, and I hustle inside, snagging my overnight bag—well, for two nights—then roll it out.
I’m locking the door, ready to wheel it toward his car when he snags it from me with the kind of stealth he’d use when snagging a puck.
“Lake, I can roll my own suitcase.”
But it’s a futile argument, since he’s already carrying it in one hand like it weighs nothing. It’s only when we get to the car that I realize he’s still holding the condoms too.
“I can put those back,” I stammer.
“Right,” he says, glancing down, like he’s just remembered he was holding them.
He hands them to me, and this is the most awkward game of hot potato I’ve ever played. Do I take them back to my house, which might imply I’d use them there? Or give them back to him? Pack them away with a saucy wink and ‘That’s for later, big boy’? I spot a pair of big blue eyes staring at me from the back seat, so I jam the condoms in the side pocket of my suitcase. “Thor looks like he’s ready to go.”
“He sure is,” Lake says, and he’s a little inscrutable.
But maybe that’s what happens when you tell a guy the new rule of fake dating is no real touching. This is going to be the longest short road trip ever.
I slide into the passenger seat, greeted by a hearty meow from Thor. “Hey, cutie,” I say, stretching around and offering him a scratch on the chin.
Once Lake slides into the driver’s seat, I pull my hand back, like if I can’t touch him I shouldn’t be touching his cat. What are the rules now? My chest is taut, like there’s a steel band around it, and I wish I knew. I reach for my necklace, fiddling with the sun charm. Yes, be sunny. Be upbeat.
I fill the uncomfortable silence with words as he pulls away from the curb. “Is Thor coming with us?”
“No, I need to drop him at home. In Cozy Valley. That cool?”
“Yes,” I chirp. “Of course.”
If I’m agreeable, that’ll smooth over the new tension I created, right? Maybe it will help to acknowledge my sister’s wingwoman-ing. “That was awkward timing, right?” I ask, pointing my thumb behind us as he weaves into traffic.
He shoots me a curious look before returning his gaze to the road. “What was?”
He’s not making this easy.
“The condoms,” I say uncomfortably.
He stays quiet for a long, painful beat. Finally, he breaks the silence with, “And the ambition. She thought we’d need so many.”
I laugh, high and forced. “But wrong. Especially since we decided we’re not doing it.”
He hesitates before he answers with a casual, “Yep.”
Hmm. He seems content with our decision to pull back. He went along with it easily the other night. Maybe he was thinking the same thing—that we shouldn’t do anything again—and I simply said it first.
I breathe a small sigh of relief. Yes, that has to be it. And for a while I don’t worry about the silence as we cruise over the Golden Gate Bridge. But when the wonder of the modern world is in the rearview mirror, he says, “Do you have a fear of getting sick?”
“Yes, but it’s not because my mom didn’t take good care of me when I was sick. Or my dad. I know that’s a question that therapists ask to figure out if you were unloved—who took care of you when you were sick.”
“Whoa, I wasn’t saying that.”
I close my eyes. I overreacted. Because he hit a nerve when he saw a part of me I rarely show others. “I don’t like being helpless,” I admit, even though it makes my chest ache to say it.
“I hear you.” Then he drums his hands on the wheel and says thoughtfully, “I didn’t realize that was something therapists ask.”
“Mine did. I think she was surprised when I answered that my parents did. Take care of me when I was sick.”
“Why did that surprise her?”
“Because I probably seem like someone whose parents don’t like weakness,” I say with a shrug, maybe a slightly defensive one, maybe because it’s a little true. My mom does prefer it when everything works out, like with her wedding planning, like with her marriage, like with my dad. She was determined to help him when he struggled with depression. Falling apart was not an option.