“I’d like to see where this goes too,” she admitted. “Since meeting you, it feels like there’s hope again.”
Silence stretched across the line. Finally, he said, “There’s more I need to say, but not here. Not now.”
The implications were clear. He wanted to talk to her face-to-face, where she couldn’t hide from him, like she could over the phone. He also didn’t want Ezra to hear what he needed to say.
“There are things I should tell you as well, but I’m wrecked tonight. It’s been a rough week for both of us, and I need eight hours of sleep. I have some things I need to do here at the house during the day. The quiet will let me get my head on straight. Process what I need to say. We definitely should talk, but the dance is tonight, and I’ll still be on duty because of Thursday.”
“No, not tonight. What about tomorrow?” he asked. “I still want you to come with me to the trails.”
“I don’t know.” She was hedging. “I need to think, and you need the time with Ezra.”
There was a pause. “Ezra’s not going.”
It felt like her brain stopped working. “Why not?”
“He’s spending the night with friends and staying until Monday morning. Huge group study session. The AP Calculus teacher, in his infinite wisdom, decided to give an exam on the Monday after homecoming.”
“Wow. That’s cruel.”
“Believe me, I thought the same thing. I’ll be paying him a little visit on Tuesday to discuss his lesson planning.”
She smiled. There would be a discussion, and Lucas would present his case, but he’d do it in a way that the teacher wouldn’t feel too badly chastised.
“A coed sleepover?”
“Yeah, I know it sounds weird, but they’ve done it before. Last year, we were forced to hold our prom on the Saturday between AP exam weeks. They decided to host a study ‘zoo’ in my living room. The exam was AP Calculus, coincidentally. Not the instructor’s fault that time. The parents you saw me talking to tonight? They’re the ones hosting this weekend.”
“Pretty progressive sleepover.”
“Swear on my life, they were here, they studied, no drugs except for a lot of iced caffeine, and no alcohol. Kids showed up in tuxes and evening gowns at ten thirty, and within an hour of being here, they were all in animal onesies, camped out in sleeping bags and air mattresses, guzzling caffeine, scarfing down cardboard pizza like it was brains and they were part of the zombie apocalypse. They actually studied. It was the weirdest fuckin’ thing ever.”
“Animal onesies?”
“Yeah, you know, the adult-sized footie pajamas? With hoods?”
“I’m afraid to ask. What was Ezra?”
“A dinosaur. The one with all those round ridge things on its back.”
“I’m not sure if this is the coolest thing I’ve ever heard of or the weirdest.”
“When you figure it out, let me know. I still haven’t recovered from the whole escapade.”
His words were meant as a joke, but she heard the love in his voice, not just for his son, but for the kids as a whole. She felt her heart expand, the spark blossoming into a steady source of heat that radiated throughout her body. “But you’d host it again in a heartbeat, wouldn’t you?”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “I would. I was kind of sad they went somewhere else this time around, but I get it. Ezra’s in an awkward position with his friends. I’m not a teacher anymore, which is weird enough. Now I’m an administrator. He said the kids all talked about it and decided they didn’t want to make it weird for me.”
A silence fell between them. The glimpse into who Lucas really was served as a reminder that this man was trustworthy. That he said what he meant, and he wasn’t someone who had bad intentions. Yes, he made mistakes, but he owned them, and he tried to make up for them.
“You need sleep,” he said. “Rest up for tonight. Think about Sunday. If the trails are too much activity, we could just hang out here. Have dinner. Talk. Or not, if you’re not ready. Just don’t shut me out, please.”
What did she have to lose? Talk was talk, right? It didn’t mean she had to pursue anything further if she found the chemistry was no longer there. Or maybe it would, but she was an adult who could control her urges, and so was he. It couldjust be two friends getting together for dinner—relaxing after the craziest week of their lives.
Yeah. Unlikely on all angles because just thinking about spending time alone with him again made all those delicious tingles start up.
“Okay. Sunday. Let me get through tonight, and we’ll see where things are before I commit to hiking or dinner.”
“I’ll take it. Sleep well.”
