“Oh my gosh, why are you even talking like this? You just pushed me in the snow.”
“Just getting you back for throwing my phone in the snow earlier.”
“Shh. I’m trying to concentrate.”
“Flowers Are for Money Wasters. I Unlove You. And my personal recommendation, Candy Hearts Taste like Farts.”
“Oh lookey, it’s your favorite word,” Lance murmured.
“You don’t know me.” Even thought she was definitely ordering that one, and fart was actually one of her favorite words in the English language. She’d named two of her pet rocks that—one singular, and one plural. She was taking that little gem to her grave though. She couldn’t even imagine how much Lance would make fun of her rock collection. No thank you.
But now that she was thinking of her rocks, something awful happened. She reached into her pocket, unable to stop herself and put the fool’s gold onto the table next to his plate. “That’s for you. It’s an exact replica of your actual wiener size.”
“Oh. My. God,” he uttered, picking up the micro-pecker. “You just carry stuff like this around with you?”
“If you aren’t going to appreciate my gift, I want it back.” She grabbed for it, but he snatched it away.
“Not on your life are you doing a take-back now.”
“I have regrets. I actually like that one. Give it back.”
“What’s its name?”
“It doesn’t have a name.”
“Liar.”
“If you must know,” she said, grabbing for it and missing again. “It’s Gary.”
“Can I keep it for one day?”
“Are you going to lose it?”
“I’m very responsible with stuff in my pockets. I had that half a package of peanut butter crackers in there for like four hours and it wasn’t even that crunched up.”
She was trying to look stern right now, but the stupid smile kept creeping across her lips. “You can keep him for one day, but if you lose him, you owe me four new rocks, and they can’t be lame ones. I mean they have to be uniquely shaped and well-thought out.”
“Any kind of rock? Not that I’m planning to lose Gary.”
“Something purple.”
“Purple is your favorite color, isn’t it?”
Roberto was to their table and ready to take their drink orders.
Lance wore the stupidest most handsome smile as she ordered the candy hearts drink and he ordered a boring beer.
“Purple is not my favorite color.”
“Then why did you come here looking like a grape soda threw up on you?”
She glared at him for a full four seconds and then explained, “Because purple was my ex-boyfriend’s least favorite color.”
“Oh. Dressing to spite him, huh. I bet he feels super burned.”
“He actually probably does, since he and all of his dumb friends still follow my social media pages.” She held up her phone and took a selfie, smiling brightly with the hearth behind her. She narrated her post as she typed out the caption. “Happy and thriving and having the time of my life in snowy gorgeous Colorado. I’m not wearing a bra, L-O-L. Post.”
Birdie noticed Lance had his arm around her chair and she pushed it off the back. With a little gasp, she checked the picture and yep, sure enough, a big muscular arm had made it into the picture behind her.
