I tuck my feet under myself and turn in my seat to face him. “So, how did you end up in astronomy?”
“Promise not to laugh?” he asks, a small smirk on his lips like he knows I might not be able to stop it.
“I don’t know if I can ever make you that promise.”
“Fair enough.” He sighs. “It started when I was ten and watchedStar Warsfor the first time with Clara.”
A strangled laugh bursts out of me. “Wait, wait, wait.” I hold up my hand. “Did you fall in love with astronomy or Princess Leia in the sexy gold bikini?”
His deep, heavy chuckle rolls over my skin. “Is it that obvious?”
“That outfit was hot,” I agree.
He shakes his head with a grin. “Well, from then on, I was that kid with their room covered in everything space related—constellation posters on my walls, sheets with astronauts, planets hanging from the ceiling in my room. My mom hated it. It didn’t fit the aesthetic of her house, but my grandparents kept buying me anything they found. My nonno Lorenzo moved here from Italy around that time, and he barely spoke English. He couldn’t even read the books he got me, but he could tell they were about space.” He smiles wistfully. “He would bring me to the museum at least once a month. It opened my mind to all the possibilities out there and gave me something to be excited about.”
“Your grandfather sounds wonderful.”
He takes a big swig of his beer to finish it off. I try not to get distracted by the way his Adam’s apple rolls with his swallow. I also try not to notice the way he licks his lips after he pulls the bottle from them.
But I fail miserably.
He sets his empty bottle on the table and turns to give me a small grin. “Thanks for dancing with the girls tonight. It was great to see them smile and laugh. You even got Ave out there, which is a feat.”
“I had a blast,” I say as the girls run toward us.
Avery slides a plastic box of cookies on the table to Finn. “Can we have a cookie now?”
“Definitely,” he says, prying open the grocery store bakery packaging to pull out a chocolate chip cookie for each of us.
I try to take a bite as the girls run off with theirs, but the cookie is way too hard, so I move it to the side of my mouth and use my molars to break through.
“I have to tell you something,” I say around the inedible chunk of dessert. “You know, because friends are honest with each other.”
He looks over at me with an eyebrow raised.
“These cookies suck.”
“I worked hard on these,” he jokes, his brows pinching as he surveys his cookie.
“Well, you need some help, then. I don’t know how the girls are eating them.”
Finn huffs out a laugh. “Guess you’ll have to teach us how to make some better ones.”
My brain stumbles on his words. Is he inviting me over again? I’ve been hanging on by my fingernails to the appropriate side of the friendship line tonight, fighting as hard as I can not to enjoy this eveningtoomuch. But there’s still an invisible thread attached to my heart, yanking me over the line every time our eyes connect.
I cross my arms over my chest and give him a stern look. “That depends on what kind of cookies you like. Because if you want oatmeal raisin, this is officially the end of our friendship. I’ll never make those atrocities.”
Finn narrows his gaze. “I’m offended. You thinkIseem like a person who eats oatmeal raisin cookies?”
“Maybe that’s why you scowl all the time,” I say with a shrug, and his glare darkens. But that expression from him doesn’t seem so ominous anymore, and it makes my heart skip for an entirely different reason than it used to. “What kind of cookies do you and the girls like?”
“Chocolate chip, obviously. Snickerdoodle, and the girls love anything with icing.”
“Oh, I can teach you to make all of those.”
His brows perk up. “Next Friday, then?”
The words catch me off guard, even though our conversation has led us right here. He’s really inviting me again, all on his own. It’s not Eloise bringing me over to their breakfast or Lena shoving me into their pizza night.He’sasking, and it feels more significant than anything else he’s said to me.
