“What’s that?” she asks.
I lay it down. “Field guide.”
She reaches across and—God, she’s got pretty hands—picks it up. Her fingers touch the same place mine just did. It makes my heart beat sideways. She sets it down, bending the spine where I bent it earlier. Her eyes skim over the page, and by some strange coincidence, it’s on the page about bitterns.
“Huh,” she says.
“What’s that?”
“This is your namesake,” she says. “I don’t know why, but I was expecting them to be…different.”
“A little flashier?”
She shrugs. “Maybe, yeah. Is Bittern a common name back in Kentucky?”
I’m trying to pretend I’m eating, picking at my food with my fork, but it’s distracting to sit so close to her. The hair on my arms is standing on end.
“Nope,” I say.
She smiles, setting aside the book. “You’re not too talkative, huh?”
I check myself—I’m being a little bit standoffish, but only because my entire body is going off like a car alarm. My palms are definitely sweating, goosebumps on my forearms. There’s a slight, uncomfortable tightness in the front of my pants, and I’m glad to be sitting at the table with my groin hidden. God, I don’t know how I’m going to get through tomorrow night. Maybe I should cancel.
I glance up. She’s smiling, just a little.
Fuck that. I’m taking this opportunity and running with it. For years, I sat on the porch steps and watched the world spin around me without being part of it. This is my chance. I’m finally feeling good. I’ve started sleeping through the night. I have a home, people who like me, care about me. And, if I’m not imagining things, I think this girl is interested.
“I’m just used to being quiet,” I say. “But I can talk, if you let me.”
“Good,” she says primly. “Because I’m assuming you’re taking me out tomorrow.”
“I am,” I say firmly.
“Alright then. Where are we going?”
I consider it, shoulders relaxing. “You like that little bar in West Lancaster?”
Her brow furrows. “Jack Russell’s bar?”
“Uh?” I take a second. After everything that happened in the mine, my memory isn’t what it used to be. It gets me every now and then, completely erasing recent conversations or events from my head. The doctor said it was post-traumatic stress from growing up the way I did or something like that. I believe him—that shitwasstressful.
“The Brass Terrier?" she asks.
“No, it's…it’s in South Platte.”
She thinks, pursing her lips. I like that. It kind of scrunches her nose up. “Maybe the Left Boot Saloon?”
“I don’t know. It’s on the main drag, right where the street makes a T.”
She nods. “That’s the Left Boot. You ever been?”
I shake my head then remember I’m trying to be more talkative. It’s just really hard when she’s sitting so close, it’s distracting.
“I don’t go into town too much,” I say.
“By choice?”
I shrug. “Deacon’s been keeping me pretty damn busy. I go there to pick up from the feedstore. You go out a lot?”
