Chapter Five
Iploppeddown on the sofa and sipped my peppermint hot chocolate Avery had made me. The aroma filled me with the holiday spirit, and I relaxed into the pillow. It had been a long and grueling day. Not from the work. I enjoyed assembling equipment and helping fix small issues with the building, not to mention hanging out with the therapist and patients a few times. It was Kevin’s presence that twisted my words around, making me the court gesture of clumsiness in the therapy room, that wore meout.
Avery settled in beside me, wrapping her feet under her and leaning in to me. “I’m sure you didn’t act like a fool. You’re justoverreacting.”
The warmth of the drink lifted my spirits a little. “It’s worse. I was the middle school girl who couldn’t even put a few words together to form a completesentence.”
“Please, you’re a strong, independent, educated woman now. Not to mention a total babe.” She changed positions, hoisting her fluffy pink slipper-covered feet onto the coffee table with a thump. “Besides, he can’t make you that nervous unless you likehim.”
“Don’t start that again…” I rolled my eyes. “Kevin is the last man I’d want to bewith.”
She looked at me with bows that nearly reached her hairline. “Why? He’s hot, handsome, available, and a goodman.”
“He’s the type of man who everyoneloves.”
“So?”
“The type of man who wins everyone over andthen—”
“Leaves?” Avery set her hot cocoa down and sat forward, looking at me as if she were psychoanalyzing me. “Sweetie, Kevin’s not Dad. He won’t take your heart and then run off with it. Kevin’s lived here his entire life. Except when he went to college for ayear.”
I heard my sister’s words, but they weren’t real. “Kevin is exactly the type of man who would do that. Dad lived here his entire life, but that didn’t stop him from running off three times and then finally for good.” I didn’t want to dig up old stuff. Avery had gotten over so much to be with Dylan, but he was a strong, loving type who would never leave her. “Let’s just enjoy this time together. Besides, we’re behind on our Hallmark Christmas movies. We better dig into themnow.”
“Nice deflection, but I get it. I only have one question, and then I’ll leave yoube.”
“What’s that?” I snagged the remote and turned on the television, settling in for a sweet, romantic Christmas movie that would make everythingright.
“Does Edward make you forget how to speak? Make your heart beatfaster?”
I didn’t look at Avery. Instead, I set the remote down and studied the television as if there would be a final exam after the movie. “Don’t be silly. I’ve been with Edward for a long time. It’s not as if we justmet.”
“My heart still races every time I see Dylan walk into the room. He’s the only man who ever made me trip over my own feet and makes me warm inside with just asmile.”
“It was different for you and Dylan. You were a couple. Kevin and I have never been and will never be anything except tutor and student, football player and geek. I studied Faulkner; he studied football. We have nothing incommon.”
Avery gave up and settled in for the duration of a Christmas movie, where the girl meets a man who is all wrong for her, yet it all works out in the end. It was fiction, nothing more. I abandoned my sister and headed to our room for some privacy. I retrieved my laptop from my backpack and sent a call request to Edward. His face popped on thescreen.
“Hello.”
“I’m in. We can take a vacation together in a couple ofweeks.”
“What?” Edward looked up from his desk and lowered his glasses. “Oh, right. Sounds good. Listen, I need to get back to work. Let’s work out the detailstomorrow.”
“Actually, I’ll be volunteering at a rehab center tomorrow. Can I call you around thistime?”
He removed his glasses and looked at me as if noticing I was even on the screen for the first time. “Volunteering? Is this some small-town Christmas projectthing?”
“No, I had to cover for Sadie today, and they need more help. Besides, I kind of like it. Maybe I’ll give up literature and study medicine,” I said in a teasingtone.
His brow furrowed, and lines formed at the bridge of his nose. “Don’t beridiculous.”
“Why is that ridiculous? Don’t you think I’d make a goodtherapist?”
His lip curled into an incomplete snarl, leaving him looking like he had a hook caught in the corner of his mouth. “You don’t know anything about medicine. Besides, you have a solid future in academia. You wouldn’t throw thataway.”
“Actually, I have enough physical science courses to get a minor, and if I took two more, I’d have a double major in literature and life sciences. Besides, it doesn’t matter what my undergrad is in, as long as I have the grades, test scores, and volunteer hours.” I wasn’t serious, but part of me wanted to argue the point that I would make a good therapist if that was what I wanted todo.
“This is insane.” He shook his head and leaned back in his chair with a squeak. His eyes roamed over the desktop, and then he sat up and put his glasses back on. “You said that you’d be finishing up your graduate degree in literature and then taking a faculty jobhere.”
