I look back at my computer. The screen has gone to sleep, but I look at it anyway, as if it has something interesting on it. I refuse to look anywhere else. A hundred bucks says the crew is glancing my way after my exchange with the contractor, and I’ll be damned if I give them something to support their worry over my presence.
For the next hour, I search the internet for landscaping ideas, sketching out different concepts. I want something clean and pretty, but not too manicured. Something that looks lived in but not abandoned. I don’t look up again until the crunch of tires draws my attention.
A truck with the HCC logo on the side pulls up alongside my car. My heart beats double-time until the driver’s side door opens and legs that definitely do not belong to Wes hop out. A breath of disappointment slips from my lips. I’ve seen Wes every night this week, and somehow it doesn’t feel like enough. These pesky jobs of ours are really getting in the way.
Jessie steps back from the door and closes it. She shields her eyes from the sun and looks around until she spots me waving at her. She starts for me, and the crosswind pushes her sundress around her thighs. The construction workers try like hell not to make it obvious they’re checking out her long legs. I bet they’d cast their gaze back to the job if they knew she was seventeen. And a Hayden with three older brothers. At least, most of them would.
“Hi.” Jessie walks under my tent and stops, looking around.
“Hey there,” I stand up so she doesn’t feel uncomfortable. There’s only my chair, otherwise I’d offer her a seat. She shifts her weight from one flip-flop wearing foot to the other, and I get the feeling maybe she’s reconsidering her choice to drive out here.
“Everything okay?” I ask, hoping to urge her on.
She glances around the jobsite. “Yeah. You wouldn’t be free for lunch anytime soon, would you?”
I keep my surprise from showing on my face and nod without checking my watch. I don’t know the exact time, but I wouldn’t turn Wes’s little sister down for lunch even if it were midnight.
“I’m free now,” I tell Jessie. A relieved smile stretches her cheeks.
“Good. I’ll follow you into town. You pick the place.”
Before I leave, I ask Scott if he or anyone on the crew would like me to bring something back. He tells me the wife of someone on the crew made everybody sandwiches. I make a mental note to pick up cookies for them.
Jessie climbs into the HCC truck, and follows my car into town.
* * *
“Thanks for meeting me,”Jessie says when we’re seated at a Mexican place. I decided on it solely for the chips and salsa.
“Of course,” I respond, dipping a chip in the spicy salsa and popping it into my mouth.
Jessie takes a chip, holding it over her plate and snapping off the corners. “It’s just…” she sighs. “I need someone to talk to.”
“How many people live at your house? Twelve?” My tone is light, joking.
She musters the saddest looking half-smile. “Seven, unless you count Charlie and Peyton, but that’s only every other weekend. And technically it’s only Mom, Dad, Gramps and me at the homestead. Everyone else is in their cabins.”
I take a drink of my water. “That’s still six to eight more people than I live with.”
Her smile grows. “True. But you don’t live with my big brothers.” She stirs the straw around in her drink. “Or my mother.”
“Your grandpa seems like he’d be a good listener. And give some interesting advice too, probably.”
Jessie laughs once. I feel proud for already having made her feel just the tiniest bit better.
Our server comes over, we order, and I lean forward, tucking my cold hands between my thighs. “So, what’s going on?”
Jessie runs her hands through her blonde hair, gathering it in one hand and pulling it over her shoulder. “I’ve been seeing this guy. Eamon. I really like him, like”—she looks at me with intense eyes—“a lot. Like, maybe I love him.”
I smile indulgently, and I hope she doesn’t see it as patronizing. I remember that feeling in high school, and I don’t think there’s anything like it. Heady and overwhelming, it was all-encompassing. Of course, when I felt that way I was forbidden to go near the boy I liked. Which only made me want him more, and drove my dad crazy.
“Okay.” I nod, dropping the smile and adopting a serious expression.
“Well, it’s mid-April. Prom is in two weeks.” She implores me with her eyes, willing me to arrive at her problem using context clues.
And I do. It’s an easy leap.
“He wants you to sleep with him on prom night?”
