Oh, I know.
It’s so weird to hear him refer to Aunt Maggie Mae asMaeand the Evil Joes asthe girls. “She lets you call her Mae?” I ask before I can stop myself. “She’s always made a big deal to the family that her name is Maggie Mae and shouldn’t be shortened.”
His long legs close the gap between us and now we’re walking side by side back through the row of columns.
“I had a speech impediment when I was little. A stutter. I tried to call her Mrs. Messina but got tripped up on them’s ands’s, so she told me to call her Mae. It just stuck.”
God, he makes them almost sound normal.
Time to change the subject. “Are you nervous about tomorrow?”
“Yeah. I’ve got a lot riding on this.” He turns toward me, his face solemn. “Just like everybody else out there.”
We stop near the valet stand but wave them off when they ask us for our ticket.
“How are you getting to the Ev…” I stop myself before I sayEvil Joes. “To Aunt Maggie Mae’s?”
“Oh,” he says, pulling his phone out of some hidden place under his sheet. “I was going to get an Uber. But I got distracted.” He gives me a quick smile before looking back at his phone.
And now I’m probably blushing again. At least Charlie and Wes aren’t here to point it out. “You can ride with me. And then I can drive you to Aunt Maggie Mae’s. I mean, we’re both basically going to the same place. It’s dumb to get two Ubers.”
He agrees quickly. “Yeah, that’d be great. But I can walk from your place. It’s not far.”
I check the app to see how close the car is because now it’s a little bit awkward with just us and the two valet guys out here.
“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t driving me nuts that I’m keeping your secret but I don’t know why.” His voice is a near whisper.
My eyes stay glued to my phone. “I’m okay with you lying.” I have a smirk. I can feel it. I cannot make it go away.
I’m relieved when the car pulls into the driveway, though it’s a tiny little four-door and we are squished in the backseat together.
The driver is not talking and neither are we, and this awkwardness is worse than the one we had going on a few minutes ago.
“Is working the golf tournament a secret from your whole family or just the girls?” he asks.
I take a deep breath. “Everyone.” I hate saying it out loud. “But especially them.”
“Why do you think y’all don’t get along with Jo Lynn and Mary Jo?” he finally asks.
Our track record isn’t good when it comes to talking about them, but apparently we’re going there.
“Because they’re mean?”
He lifts his shoulders and nods his head as if he’s really weighing my answer. “I think they think y’all are the mean ones,” he finally says. “You don’t know them like I do.”
I try to spin around to face him, but it’s so tight in the backseat I end up knocking my knees against his.
“They were mean long before we were. Like when we were little. We only take up for ourselves.”
“I was around back then, so it’s not like I don’t know how it was.”
This has me gasping for words. “What? Are you serious? I know you’re close to them, but you’re blind where they are concerned. If you only knew what they did to Sophie this past Christmas!”
His face scrunches up. “Are we talking about the movie date again?”
“It was drive-in porn!”
We pitch forward when the driver taps the brakes. We both look at him and he’s staring at us in his rearview mirror. “There’s a drive-in that shows porn here?”
