Not that I cared.
Myles grunted and widened his stance. “Samantha–”
“STOP CALLING ME THAT, OHMYGOD!” SS yelled as she tried to break Myles’s hold on the boxset.
I knew he wasn’t usingallof his strength on this, but just enough to make the girl give up on what should have been mine to begin with.
I would have taken his place, y’know, but to be honest, if Ihad, I wouldn’t have gone this easy on Samantha-whoever. It would’ve gotten messy, loud, and probably bloody, so I’m glad it’s Myles in front of her, and not me.
Anyone who says being an avid reader and book nerd is easy – yeah, they’re fuckin’ liars. They don’t know what it’s like being in our world. Shit ain’t easy, especially when certain sources are limited or next to impossible to get our hands on.
Myles pulled again, and SS stumbled forward a bit. “Give. Itttttt!”
Okay, I was getting a bit worried, because if he managed to accidentally trip SS, and she broke her nose or chin or teeth, then he’d be in trouble. The last thing I wanted was for my boyfriend to get dragged out of my favorite bookstore by security. Or cops.
That’s…certainly not how I’d envisioned this date would go.
I took a step towards Myles, ready to ask him to let go, because he was more important to me than this boxset, when…
“Samantha!” came an urgent voice from somewhere ahead of me.
I looked overSamantha’sshoulder, and saw a middle-aged woman walking over to her with a concerned look on her face.
“Honey,” the woman began, “where did you run off to? I’ve been searching for you everywhere in this God-forsaken hellhole.”
Myles let go of the boxset and stumbled over to me. “You think they’ll get me arrested for this?” he whispered.
I bit the inside of my cheek and shook my head, to which he sighed and relaxed. I then quickly signed the wordsNameandHow?to him, because I was surprised at how accurate he’d been in guessing the girl’s name.
He shrugged in a nonchalant manner. “I don’t know…” he muttered. “She just…looked like a Samantha to me, for some reason.” He shifted on his feet. “No offense to those with the same name, of course.”
I pursed my lips to hide a smile, just as the woman looked up at Myles, and immediately, a stark blush creeped up her cheeks.
Her dark hair was tied in a low bun, and she was wearing a black pencil skirt, paired with a lavender silk blouse and black stilettos. With a Gucci bag on her wrist and a ridiculous pearl necklace around her slender neck, she was a mom stereotype which I thought only existed in TV shows and movies, but nope, the world has a way of surprising me.
All the damn time.
“Did she, uh…” The woman swallowed, still blushing. “Did she bother you?”
“Mom,ewwwww,” Samantha said, to which both Myles and I coughed behind our fists.
The woman eyed us sharply, and then turned her attention to Myles again. “I’m sorry if Samantha said or did something harsh. Teenagers these days, you know…”
“Uh huh.” Myles gave her a plastic smile. “It’s all good; she’s just a kid, after all.”
Samantha glared at him.
“Oh.” The woman grabbed the boxset from Samantha and examined it. “Is this yours?” she asked Myles,totallyignoring me, and then offered it to him. “Like I said: teenagers these days. So aggressive and irrational.” She sent a saccharine smile his way.
Myles, with a too-smug look on his face, took the box before grinning at the woman. “Thank you. I appreciate it.” He then handed it to me. “My girlfriend here saw it first and wanted it for herself, but Samantha got to it before we could, so we were simply sorting stuff out.” He smirked at Samantha. “Right?” he addressed her.
She gritted her teeth and clenched her hands. “Right,” she spat, and swiveled on her feet before walking away from us.
Myles’s forehead creased in mock concern. “I’m sorry if I–”
“No, no,” the woman cut him off with another too-sugary smile. “She’ll get over it. They’re just books, after all.”
Right…
