Total pages in book: 36
Estimated words: 34995 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 34995 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Your tires. Fix them. Or I will.
What does "or I will" even mean? Is he going to show up at my apartment with new tires? Is he going to follow me to a mechanic? Is this a threat or a promise or some weird combination of both?
I start typing again.
You're very persistent.
Delete.
Too flirty.
Am I being flirty? I don't know how to be flirty. I've never been good at this—at reading signals, at knowing what to say, at existing in that space between friendly and interested without falling into the gap.
Let it be for now.
It’s something I learned from Jolie. To step back and mentally and spiritually recalibrate. So I took a shower. Brushed my teeth. Read my Bible. And finally, when I’m back in bed, and I have my phone in my hands once again—
Thank you for following me home. That was kind.
I hit Send, and that’s it. I’m not going to ask him how he got my number. I’m sure I’ll find out how one way or another. But if I ask it now, it’s like I’m asking him to confirm that he’s interested in me.
Right?
I put my phone face-down on the nightstand and roll over and squeeze my eyes shut.
Argh.
I know I’m overthinking this. And that’s not good. Overthinking is never good because it can lead to pointless worries that can devolve into anxiety and depression and everything else.
So...just go to sleep, Thea.
Don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
Chapter Three
I WAKE UP FEELING STRANGELY restless and excited the next day, but this turns into chagrin as soon as I get inside my car and start the engine.
It catches on the first try this morning, which feels like a small mercy, but then I back out of my parking space and hear this sound—this grinding, scraping sound that definitely wasn't there yesterday—and my heart sinks.
The tires.
Of course it's the tires.
I make it to the café without incident, but the sound follows me the whole way, and by the time I pull into the parking lot, I'm convinced my car is approximately three miles away from complete mechanical failure.
Your tires. Fix them. Or I will.
I turn off the engine. Sit there for a second. Then I get out and walk around to look at them, even though I don't actually know what I'm looking for because my automotive knowledge begins and ends with "put gas in the thing with the gas icon."
They look...fine?
I mean, they're definitely worn. The tread is shallow. But they got me here, and they'll get me home, and I'll worry about it later, after I survive this shift.
I walk into the café through the back door. Gail's already there, prepping the kitchen, and she gives me a wave without looking up from the eggs she's cracking.
"Morning, Thea."
"Morning, Gail."
"Coffee's fresh."
“Thank you.” I pour myself a cup of coffee—black, no sugar, which I realize with a
jolt is how he drinks it, and now I'm even copying his coffee preferences, which is a new low—and I take it to the front counter.
Jolie’s already there, like always. She’s a daily fixture at this point, and she even helps out whenever we’re understaffed. Her family’s pretty well-off, albeit not quite like the Foxes. Even so, you wouldn’t be able to tell with her. She’s just so wonderfully down-to-earth—
“You have bags under your eyes,” Jolie declares impishly. “Dare I guess why?”
—but at the same time, so not-wonderfully-persistent as well.
“Don’t start,” I warn her.
“I gave him your number.”
I freeze mid-sip. “You did what?”
Jolie’s grinning now, leaning against the counter with Wuthering Heights sitting next to the register.
“How did you—”
“Another secret.”
Argh.
“Why would you give him my number? Did he ask for it?”
“Sorry, that’s another secret.”
Seriously?
“That’s not funny—”
“Ask him if you want, but for now—” Jolie looks at me eagerly. “What did you talk about?”
“Tires.”
Jolie blinks. “Tires.”
She follows me inside the locker room, and I tell her everything as I change into my uniform.
“That’s so sweet of him,” Jolie remarks. “And very telling, don’t you think?”
I know a bait when I see one, and Jolie laughs when I just hold my silence.
“Even if you don’t say it out loud, we both know what he did means something.”
I shrug.
“Have you thought about what you’re going to say to him when he comes?”
“If he comes.”
“Why wouldn’t he?”
It’s a really good question, and one I unfortunately don’t have an answer to come seven-thirty...and his booth remains painfully empty.
By eight o'clock, I've refilled the napkin dispensers twice, wiped down the same counter three times, and started to accept the possibility that he's not coming.
Maybe he's done. Maybe the tire text was his way of saying ‘fix your life, I'm out.’ Maybe he realized that following a waitress home was weird and now he's embarrassed and he's found a new café, one where the staff don't drop coffee pots and stare at customers for thirty-six