Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 108862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Diego on one side of me. Connie on the other.
None of us talking.
A server walks by with a plate of stacked steaming hot crepes, as chipper as they come. Connie watches him stroll along, her eyes surely yearning for those crepes to enter her mouth.
If it was just us here, she’d be launching into a story of every time she’d drop in here after choir practice. (She did a zillion clubs and activities and sports back in school, even our own parents had trouble keeping track.) But the woman sitting next to me is full of ire and fire, and I suddenly don’t know how to talk to her.
Not to mention Diego, with whom I’m owed (or perhaps owe) a conversation about one or two things. But if there’s something I know, he wouldn’t be here if he didn’t want to be. He answered my SOS. That says something, doesn’t it?
“Why do people keep lookin’ over here?” grunts Diego.
It isn’t the first question I thought he’d ask. “What?”
“I keep seeing people staring.”
I look out at the restaurant.
Six pairs of eyes flick away.
One of them lingers. A frequent customer of mine. She adjusts her glasses, gives me a wiggle of her fingers for a hello, then goes back to her coffee and conversation.
Then I remember last night. And where we live. “The town … sort of thinks we’re a thing now,” I explain with a wince.
Diego looks at me. “A thing?”
“It’s Connie’s fault for being nosy,” I quickly blurt, “and then announcing it to everyone at the party last night.”
“Nosy?” cuts in Connie with half a laugh. “Nosy about my own brother who suddenly keeps things from me?”
Diego huffs. “He has a right to his privacy, y’know.”
Her face goes cold. Then she tilts her head. “Y’know … I’m still tryin’ to figure somethin’ out …”
“Here we go,” grunts Diego, sitting back.
“You’re dating my brother. But went on to me at the church earlier about lettin’ people go and mowing over flowers … which I’m starting to gather was not a metaphor.”
“No shit,” he mumbles.
“Then,” she goes on, ignoring him, “after my brother calls you over, first damned thing I hear outta your mouth is that you two aren’t boyfriends. So which is it?” She looks at him across me. “Are you with my brother, or are you taking off on him?”
I sigh. “Connie …”
“Simple question,” she says, voice light. “I’m not armed with my pliers right now. Not gonna take him to the ground, either. I mean, I could, but I won’t.”
I rub my eyes fiercely.
Diego leans forward to get a good look at her. “I’m just stating facts. He and I aren’t boyfriends.” Then his eyes flick to me. “Your brother was fast to point that out the other night.”
I shoot him a wounded look. “That’s not what I meant.”
His face scrunches up. “The hell else could you’ve meant?”
“Wait,” interjects Connie, looking at me. “You’re the one who pushed him away?”
“I-I wasn’t—” I turn to her. “He was just trying to tell me how to run my business. Thinks I’m a doormat.”
“I never said ‘doormat’,” grunts Diego.
“You kinda are a doormat, though,” says Connie.
Now it’s her I’m shooting a wounded look at. “Hey!”
Then Diego comes back with: “I just think you’re too damned nice to people who don’t deserve it.”
“Oh, he’s doing that again?” asks Connie.
“This arrogant jerk-off who keeps going to his shop making all these stupid demands—”
“He’s my top-paying client!” I fire back. “And without him—”
“Uh, Mom and Dad had more than just one high-dollar client,” says Connie. “They wouldn’t hinge the success of their business on one. Don’t you still service the Strongs? McPhersons? Miss Cassie?”
“Of course! … Sometimes. Most of—I mean, it’s …” I’m looking anywhere but at her. “They have a lot of needs, and … I guess I—”
“You’re letting them use our competitors??” cries Connie. “If you say any of them are going to Brighthouse for their flowers …”
I cradle my head in my hands. “It’s … c-complicated.”
“Mom and Dad would never have let that happen! What’re you doing to the shop? Who’s this jerk-off guy?” she demands Diego to tell her. “What’s his deal?”
“He’s a jerk-off in a golf polo and shades,” answers Diego.
“Eww, I hate the jerk-off already.”
“Please stop using the word ‘jerk-off’ …” I cut in.
“And he expects Wyatt to take it up the ass and thank him.”
“Could have done without the visual,” says Connie, “but that’s horrible. Wyatt, how’d you get into this mess with this guy? Is he a new client? One word of this to Queen Nadine, and I’d bet you my left tit she’d throw twice as much money at you than this guy does just to spite him. Spite is Queen Nadine’s middle name.”
“Please stop calling her Queen Nadine,” I groan.
“It’s what I’ve always called her. Mom, too. Even got her a big sparkly tiara and a scepter at the last Strong Halloween party I went to before I left for college. Joke might’ve gone over her head, but—” She leans in toward Diego, practically talking over my lap. “How bad is this guy? Do I need to take his ass to the ground?”