“Maybe.”
“Jo,” I warn. “I’m really not in the mood for mind games.”
“Okay, okay. Put me down. I promise to behave.”
When I don’t immediately do it, she adds, “With all this jostling around, I’m likely to throw up pretty soon.”
That’s all I need to hear for me to set her back down on her feet. It takes her a second to steady herself, but soon enough, she’s walking next to me toward Dylan’s.
I pray that we can continue this journey in silence, but I ought to know better with Jo.
Soon enough, she says, “Beau, do you think you’re always going to hate me?”
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “Probably.”
I look at her, and for once, I see something written all over Jo’s face.
Something I have rarely seen before when it comes to her.
Regret.
I know I’m being a dick to her. I get it. But if I’m not, I know I’ll fall right back into her trap. I don’t know if I have the energy to go through that again.
She stays silent for a couple of minutes and has replaced talking with biting her nails. She’s always been a nail biter, but right now, she almost looks like she’s prying her entire nail off.
“What the hell are you doing?” I ask, grabbing her hand to look at it.
“Ronnie insisted we go get manicures, and the crazy bitch doing mine put these damn fakes nails on me.”
“To be fair, I think that’s their job. Did you tell them you wanted fake nails.”
She sighs. “I’m sure Ronnie did.”
“Why didn’t you tell the lady to stop when you saw she was putting fake nails on you?”
Looking down at her mangled nails, she replies, “I wasn’t paying attention when she was doing it.”
You’d think that statement would surprise me, but with Jo? Nope. Not even a little bit.
She pulls her cigarettes from her pocket and takes one out to light it. I think about scolding her for smoking, but what the fuck do I care? She’s grown. She can do whatever she wants.
It’s not like she’d listen to me anyway. I’d tell her she should stop, and she’d probably smoke the whole damn pack just to spite me.
When we get to Dylan’s, I walk her up to the porch—just to make sure she’s actually going to go inside and go to sleep.
“You good?” I ask her.
She nods, and I turn to walk away.
“Beau?”
So close.
I turn back around. “Yes, Jo?”
“I know what you said—about hating me forever. But I really hope that’s not true.”
“Oh, yeah? Why’s that?” I ask, unable to overlook my curiosity.
