“Hey. Sorry, I just got out. Where are you?” I asked.
“Break room. I’m finally eating my lunch. I’m almost finished, though, so why don’t I meet you at security?”
“Okay, see you soon.” Yeah, this was definitely going to be a talk about him needing space. Shoot. I texted my mom that my shift ran late but I’d be there as soon as I could.
At security, Officer Holland leaned over as I separated the bells from the back of my boots to go through the metal detectors, then fastened them on again.
“What are those for?” he asked.
“Fun.”
“Oh, right.” He raised his brows and glanced away.
Did people forget about the concept of fun? I leaned against the wall, hugging myself, and only stood up straight once Harvey came in.
He jerked his chin at me, his tone flat. “Hey, Sugarplum.” At least he was still semi friendly.
“Hey. Hi there.”Two greetings?I rubbed my forehead, tempted to hide my face.
Officer Holland glanced between us as he did the manual wand scan on Harvey, then gave him the okay. “Are you two going somewhere?”
“No,” Harvey said.
My shoulders sagged. Did talking to each other not count? Was he going to cancel all our plans? Cookie baking was tomorrow. His dismissiveness made me question if we’d even make it to a new year’s kiss.
“Have a good night,” I told Officer Holland.
“Will do,” he said.
I held the door open for Harvey, who in turn held it for me. Were we still going to hold hands? Link arms? I had to ease into our normal routine. “How was your day? Besides my family," I said.
He sighed, a silver cloud of mist pushing into the cold. “Fine. But if I hear one more complaint about not having cinnamon twists in stock or what it costs to reserve them, I’m going to throw flour in someone’s face.”
“So they can learn to bake?” I teased.
Harvey let out a humorless laugh. “Yes, exactly. How was your day?”
I chewed my lip, my boots crushing salt and gray slush in the parking lot. “My boss yelled at me.”
He narrowed his gaze. “Why?”
“My family was being loud, calling me ‘Shelby,’ and he was mad I took off to stop my mom from…whatever she was doing.”
“Inviting me baking,” he said, almost mocking.
I sniffled. “Are you still coming?”
“I think so. But Shelby,” we stopped at his car, and he turned to me, serious, “I’m datingyou, right? Not your whole family.”
I scrunched my shoulders to my ears. “Yes.”
“So, why do they keep crashing our dates and showing up at our workplaces?”
“Because they have no sense of boundaries.” I pawed at the snow on his back windshield.
Harvey swiped the sides of his car with his arm. “Then, you need to set them. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to make a bad impression with them or anybody deciding if I should be manager, but next time they do something like that, there are gonna be consequences.”
I crushed some ice in my palm. “For me or for them?”
