The only other person I’ve ever known with that particular skill wields it like a shield. Or a tax he’s paying you, a cut of him just big and bright enough to guarantee you won’t ask for more.
“I just think,” I say to Miles, “you like people almost as much as they like you. And it makes being around you feel like—like standing in sunlight.”
His mouth softens. Briefly, he studies the space between our feet. “You feel like sunlight too.”
I snort. “No, I don’t.”
“No,” he agrees. “You don’t. You’re more like Lake Michigan.”
“Cold and bracing,” I say.
His voice drops: “Cool and refreshing.”
“Shocking and painful,” I say.
“Surprising and exciting,” he counters, now close enough that I smell the postshift glass of red wine on his breath. Close enough that I become the moth to his irresistible glow, trying to resist the pull to move closer.
I tip my head toward the living room, the mess, mine and Julia’s. I seize the opportunity for a distraction from this heady feeling. “Have you managed to talk to her? About what she’s really doing here?”
He exhales heavily with a half step back. “I’ve tried. She’s still pretending there’s no big reason other than scraping me up off the floor.” He forces a smile that makes my heart feel like it’s folding in half. “You ready to kick her out?”
“I like having her here,” I promise.
He nods.
“Can I do anything?” I ask.
Now his smile softens. He touches my chin again. “Nah,” he says. “This is enough.”
“I’m not doing anything,” I point out.
The corner of his mouth twitches. “Then why do I feel better?”
The moment swells. Now I step back, the floor chilly beneath my soles. “Thanks again,” I say, “for lubing my zipper.”
“Anytime,” he says.
23
WEDNESDAY, JULY 24TH
24 DAYS UNTIL THE READ-A-THON
Aside from THE radio silence about my Ocean City library application, I’m having a streak of uncommonly good luck.
On Sunday, Miles surprised me and (a less than thrilled) Julia with a drive down to a little town called North Bear Shores for a bookstore event with a romance writer Sadie had turned me on to years ago. After the signing, the shop owner and her geology professor wife ended up falling in love with Miles (obviously) and making a donation toward the Read-a-thon.
On Monday, two children’s book authors agreed to send videos for Read-a-thon prizes, while a third offered to do a live video call with the kids.
Tuesday, our monthly Fortnite tournament kicked off with our highest turnout ever, and today, when Maya dropped by the desk to pick up her holds, I’d finally managed to convince her to come to next week’s YA book club.
Mom screams with excitement when I tell her on our call as I walk home.
That or she accidentally drops some free weights close to her toes.
“That’s great, honey,” she says. “I know that kid’s been a tough nut to crack.”
“She’s just so shy. But the other kids in the group are really sweet,” I say. “And a couple are homeschooled, so she’s probably never met them, which could be good. A clean slate.”
“God, once, when you were having a hard time at a new school, I remember asking you if you wanted to be homeschooled,” Mom says.
I snort. “When would you have had time to homeschool me?”
“I wouldn’t have,” she says. “But you were so unhappy at school. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to just rescue you from your misery. Do you remember what you said to me?”
“I never even remember homeschooling being on the table,” I say.
“You said you’d miss your teachers too much.” She bursts into breathless laughter, which turns into a groan of exertion, followed by the clank of weights hitting the floor. “You were shy, but you were brave.”
“I was a little nerd, you can say it,” I say.
“Back then they used to call it ‘a pleasure to have in class,’ ” she tells me.
My phone beeps and I step under an awning. “Hold on a second,” I tell her, blocking the glare to read the screen. “What the hell?”
“Is everything okay?” Mom asks.
“Yep!” I say too brightly.
Everything’s great except that my dad’s trying to call me, and it’s not two weeks after a major holiday, when I’d normally hear from him.
I fire a text his way: Sorry, on the phone.
He replies immediately, an extreme rarity: Gimme a call when you get a sec. Fun news.
Anxiety corkscrews through me. Fun news, in Jason Roberts Speak, is usually: Hey, I’m dating a twenty-six-year-old! (Not for long.)
Or, I made a friend who owns a catamaran, so I’m going out of the country for a while. Send you a postcard when I hit dry land! (He won’t.)
“Daphne?” Mom asks.
“Everything’s fine.” She and Dad aren’t mortal enemies or anything, but she stopped having contact with him pretty much the moment I turned eighteen, and as good as my mom is at empathizing, laughing through the shit storms in life, she’s always gone out of her way to not trash Dad. For my sake, I know, but sometimes I just want her to stop being supermom and just agree with me that he’s the worst. So mostly we just don’t talk about him.
“Well, look,” she says. “I’m happy for you, and I’m proud of you, and I love you.”
“And you have to go?” I autofill.
