He laughs, and yes, I’m swooning.
“But we should do lunch,” I add impulsively. “In a place. Without any hard things.”
“One o’clock. Ladyfingers.”
“Today?”
“Today.”
“Oh, I—”
“Or I can call Lola.”
“—would love to meet you at Ladyfingers for lunch today at one o’clock.”
As soon as I get these pitch meetings set up with some investors, God help me, there’ll be no more cracking my molars whenever Lola talks about running into “the cutest guy” who would be “so great for socials and to drop in onLola’s School House.”
Which is what I listened to in the four minutes and thirty-six seconds that I was free in the past week, but which thankfully was not about Dylan.
Yet.
He squeezes my arm. “Great. See you then.”
And then he’s gone, stepping out into the morning with a whistle on his lips and a lightness in his step.
I stare for a moment—the mandoeshave the best ass in Tickled Pink—and when I turn back to the counter to try to schmooze my way into a decent coffee, three sets of eyeballs are staring at me.
“So you and Dylan, huh?” Bridget Miller says. “Called it!”
Anya cackles. “We knew he was handsome, but we had no idea he wasworldlyhandsome.”
Ridhi glares at me. “Hurt him and die.”
“She already gave him a concussion,” Bridget offers.
I put a hand to my chest and act wounded. “And here I was going to offer to do mani-pedis with you tomorrow.”
“You don’t have time,” she replies. “You have a school to clean and too much running to do. What’s with the bags under your eyes? Bed too hard? Or are you accidentally asphyxiating yourself because the gas burners in your bedroom are leaking and no one knows it? Oh! Do you know who could check to make sure your bedroom’s safe? Dylan.”
“Or the whole Tickled Pink Fire Department,” Ridhi says. “You know. The one your mother works for?”
“Dylan’s amuchbetter choice. Mom would be all,We already checked this before we let your family move in because we didn’t want accidental deaths in that old school building on our hands. Dylan would be all,Oh yes, Tavi, let me bend over and let you stare at my butt while I check things that don’t need to be checked.”
“I forbid you to continue being a hormonal teenager,” Ridhi says.
“It’s summer. I’m not old enough for a real job, and I’m bored. And seriously, isn’t it better to make up stories about Dylan falling in love with Tavi or Lola than it is to think about him moping away in his house because he can’t havemmmph!”
“I know who hecan’t have,” I tell Ridhi, who’s clamped a hand over Bridget’s mouth. “You can let Bridget go. I’m not telling anyone.”
Bridget twists free. “Like you told her parents about—mmph!”
And now Anya’s muffling the teenager, whose eyes are twinkling like this truly is the most fun she’s had in a week.
I look out the window. Dylan’s climbing into his truck in front of the ivy-draped half-finished Ferris wheel, which the town started and abandoned somewhere between thirty and forty years ago, after national interest inPink Goldfizzled out.
It feels like a metaphor for where my life is headed.Tavi Lightly bursts onto the scene with all kinds of promises of making the community she grew up in stronger and bolder, only to wither and become forgotten and covered in vines when everyone realizes she’s not what they hoped she would be.
“How is it that the whole town knows he’s in love with her, but she doesn’t know?” I ask. “And can wepleasenot talk about my awful slipup?”
