When the song ends and the slow one begins, all three of us move in. Jesse’s still got her in his arms, Wyatt steps forward with clear intent, and I’m not about to be left out.
“My turn,” Wyatt says.
“You had your turn,” Jesse lies.
“No one’s had a turn, you’ve been hogging her,” I point out.
We all step forward at once. Jesse won’t let go of her hand. Wyatt’s got her other hand. I’m trying to cut between them. We end up in this ridiculous group huddle with Callie in the middle, all of us trying to lead, none of us succeeding.
“This is—” Callie starts.
“Ridiculous,” Wyatt finishes.
“I was going to say hilarious, but ridiculous works too.”
She extracts herself from our weird group tangle,stepping back with her hands up. “You three need to figure this out. I’m returning to my friends.”
She walks away, leaving us standing there in the middle of the dance floor as a slow song plays, three grown men looking like idiots.
“Nice job,” Jesse mutters.
“You started it,” I point out.
“You creeps ruined it,” Wyatt adds.
We trudge back to our booth, where we sit in defeated silence, watching Callie rejoin her friends. She’s telling them something that has them all looking our way and laughing.
“We need a system,” I finally say.
“We need to not act like morons,” Wyatt corrects.
“Same thing,” Jesse says.
But we all know we’ll do it again the next chance we get. Because when it comes to Callie Thompson, none of us can help ourselves.
An hour later,Callie and her friends decide they’ve had enough of the bar. I watch from our booth as they gather their purses and say their goodbyes, calling it a night.
“She’s leaving,” Jesse observes.
“Good,” Wyatt says, but he doesn’t sound like he means it.
“We should just let her go,” I add.
“Absolutely,” Jesse agrees.
“Definitely the smart thing to do,” Wyatt finishes.
None of us moves.
Callie hugs her friends goodbye and heads for the door, and without discussing it, all three of us follow. We leave money on the table and push through the crowd, emerging into the parking lot just as Callie’s fishing keys out of her purse.
“Callie,” I call out.
She turns, and when she sees all three of us walking toward her, something flickers across her face. A kind of awareness. Like she knows something is about to happen.
“Heading out?” Jesse asks, his voice casual but his posture anything but.
That’s my brother, Captain Obvious.
