I’m already standing in front of his chest, so I lean my head back and let it rest on the hard planes. Klein’s chindips lower, the bottom of his face hovering above the top of my head.
“Say,fake dating,” he singsongs, making me laugh.
He takes the photo.
“Ugh,” I groan. “I hate pictures of me laughing.”
The skin between Klein’s eyebrows pleats. “Have you seen yourself laugh?”
“Only about one hundred thousand times, give or take.”
“If you really hate it, I’ll delete it, but I promise you the sight of you laughing is beautiful. And in case anybody has ever told you otherwise, let me be the first to disabuse you of that belief.”
Something warm and heavy settles in my chest. Emotions, to be sure, but I can’t put a name to them. They are a bit dodgy, these emotions, desiring to not yet be known.
“Keep the photo, but I appreciate you offering to delete it. And for the other stuff you said.”
Klein slides his phone into his pocket. “Dinner will be ready soon.” He wraps an arm around my shoulders, turning me in the direction of the beach house. “You’re not very good at receiving compliments.”
“I’m not used to it,” I clarify.
“Do you know how somebody gets used to something?”
“How?”
“Repetition.”
“I guess it is a good idea for you to compliment me in front of my family.”
We reach the stairs that lead back to the beach house.
“And kiss you,” he points out. “Something sweet and small, a little more than a peck but not too much.” He smirks, looking proud to repeat my sentence verbatim.
Sliding my shoes on my feet, I pause on the first stair and look back at him. “The clockis ticking, Wordsmith.”
Do I throw a little extra side-to-side motion into my hips as I go up the stairs? Possibly.
We might be fake dating, but the enjoyment I get from taunting him is genuine.
CHAPTER 22
Klein
Cecily texts totell me she posted my airplane photo. It reminds me to add the photos from mine and Paisley’s walk on the beach. I do as I’m supposed to, then switch my phone to Do Not Disturb for the remainder of the night.
“Alright, Klein,” Lausanne says, “people tend to be opinionated about chicken noodle soup, so let’s hear it. What did you think of mine?”
I sit back in my porch seat and pretend to think. My standards for chicken noodle soup are astronomical. I can’t recall a childhood sick day that didn’t carry with it the aroma of chicken broth and sage. My mother, inexplicably to my immature brain, always had on hand the ingredients.
“It ranks up there with my mom’s,” I answer, and Lausanne beams.
She goes on to claim it’s because she took the ferry to the mainland and shopped at a farmers market, where the carrots had been pulled from the ground the day prior.
It might be that, but my money is on the third beer I had. Everything tastes better after you pop the top on beer number three.
Paisley and Lausanne polished off a bottle of white wine at dinner, and uncorked a second on the way out to sit on the porch.
“Klein,” Lausanne says, staring dreamily at the dark sky with her glass pressed to the front of her light sweater. “Did Paisley tell you I once kissed Bob Barker?”
