I didn’t mention that I did the lessons so it would look good on my résumé, and that I lifeguarded mainly for the great tan. It wasn’t a lie. Andy was a cool kid and I wouldn’t mind spending time with him and Lucas.
But Lucas was also right—it was more than I had bargained for when I got into the back seat of Stick’s car that night.
God, that night seemed like months ago, not just last week.
“You took the choice away from me,” I said to Lucas.
“Yes,” he said, no guilt in his voice.
“Look, I don’t want to confuse Andy any more than he probably is with all that’s going on. And I know between him and working the shift you do, you’ve got a lot going on.”
“Yes?”
I took a deep breath. I could be going out on a very thin limb here, but the fact that Lucas had shown up here this morning gave me the courage to slowly ease my way onto it.
“But we could still find time for just you and me to…hang out.”
A small, tentative smile played across his face, then died. “It’d be at weird times. And occasionally we’d do stuff with Andy. And I would totally understand when you wanted to do stuff with your friends.” A cloud of uncertainty passed through his eyes. “I’ll try not to be a dick about it—when I know you’re going out and I’m at home with Andy. But…”
I didn’t say it, but I knew I’d rather be with Lucas at his small apartment, even with Andy sleeping in the next room, than at a kegger with Jane and Syd, trying to get with some guy for the night. I couldn’t imagine wanting to hook up with anyone else when I knew Lucas was just across town.
I kept quiet on all that, of course. I’m not stupid. I wasn’t going to give Lucas any more ammunition than he already had to stomp on my heart.
Speaking of which…“So, the dick move of not calling me? And blowing me off yesterday?”
He held up his hands in surrender. “Never again. I thought I was doing what was best for you. For all of us. But yeah, I screwed that up.”
“Big time.”
“Yeah, I know. I thought it would be easier to just shut it down before it got out of hand. When I saw you yesterday, with Andy, it just kind of reinforced to me that the kid thing was a part-time gig for you, a couple of afternoons a week. That’s all itshouldbe for you.”
“So you bailed.”
“Yeah. Like I said, dick move, and it won’t happen again.”
“What happens the next time we hit a rough patch? Or you get twitchy and start thinking about what you think is best for me.”
“Umm…”
“We talk it out,” I finished for him.
He smiled, a wide, genuine smile that made my breath catch in my chest. So, so gorgeous when he smiled. “Stick’s more of the talker. I just sit there and look pretty.” His grin was infectious, and I smiled back at him.
“Well, pretty as you are, you’re going to have to talk to me. You blow me off like that again, and that’s the last you’ll see of me.” I was still smiling, and my voice had a joking, teasing tone to it. But he knew I meant it.
His smile faded a little. “I know. And Lily, I’m really sorry that I handled it so badly. This is kind of new for me.”
That stopped me. Gorgeous Lucas, football star Lucas, must have had tons of girls coming on to him.
“What, exactly, is new to you?”
He waved a hand between us. “This. Us. You. Being…caring…about how a girl’s feeling.”
“You didn’t care about other girls’ feelings?” Maybe my radar about Lucas being a good guy really was off.
“Well, yeah, sure. But there was never any girl that I went out of the way to… Listen, I’m not great with words, and I know I’m going to screw up what I want to say.”
“You’re right. I don’t want to talk about other girls in your life.”
