“It’s going to be a while,” the hostess said. Everyone in the diner had stopped talking as soon as Harrison walked in, and you could hear their entire conversation.
“Not for me, sweetheart,” Harrison said, his voice unbelievably arrogant.
I cringed inwardly. It seemed as if his sense of entitlement had gotten worse in the weeks I’d been home.
The hostess laughed nervously. “What do you mean?”
“I’m Harrison. The quarterback for the football team.”
“He doesn’t have to wait anywhere on campus,” Aubrey Seeks strode in and spoke up. She tried to put her arm through his, but he pulled away from her. I narrowed my eyes, trying to assess what was going on between the two of them. At least it looked like he wasn’t happy to see her.
“Well, he does here,” the hostess said, obviously thinking Harrison was being a douche. Which he was.
A manager came over, whispered something in the hostesses’ ear, and moved a couple onto the patio to accommodate Harrison, the other football player, and Aubrey.
Harrison winked at the hostess and strolled across the restaurant as if he owned the place. He waved, gave high fives and fist bumps to the guys, and flirted with several pretty girls. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
If he hadn’t looked just like my boyfriend, I would never have thought that could be him. Fame had gone to his head in the worst kinds of ways.
“My God.” I turned to Drake. “What the hell happened?”
Drake shrugged. “I’m not sure, but it’s not good. He’s had a personality transplant over the last year, it seems.”
That’s when I made eye contact with him, and he stopped dead in his tracks. “Sunshine? Why didn’t you say something? I could have just sat with y’all.”
I gave him a half-hearted smile and a little wave. “Hey.”
He hurried over, leaving Aubrey and the other guy behind at their table. “Hey!” He grinned down at me and pulled me out of my chair and into his arms to swing me around. “I missed you so much!” he put me down. “Why didn’t you call me when you got to town? And it took you forever to text me.”
“I just got in today,” I hedged. I didn’t want to have the conversation we needed to have in front of others.
“Still, you could’ve called.” He looked hurt. Was he serious? He’d left so many of my texts and phone calls unanswered all summer. Nowhewas the one with hurt feelings?
“Can I sit with y’all?” he asked.
“Sure,” Drake moved closer to Melinda so Harrison could fit at the table. He took up a lot of space. If anything, his muscles had gotten bigger over the summer, though he looked thinner.
He settled in after he’d ordered, and soon things felt more normal than they had in a while. It was as if we’d all slipped back into old habits, and soon we were laughing and talking like no time had passed since the previous fall. It was the most fun we’d all had with him in a while, and I was starting to think I’d been hasty to think there was something wrong in our relationship. Maybe he had a good excuse for ghosting me this summer.
The guy he’d come in with came over to the table and talked to him for a while. He was apparently a freshman on the football team, and Harrison had been assigned as his ‘buddy’ for the first couple of weeks of school.
He jerked his thumb back in the direction of Aubrey’s table. “She wants you to come back, man.”
Harrison got a dark look on his face. “Yeah, I didn’t come with her. I’m not worried about what she wants,” he said. A look passed between Harrison and Aubrey, and I saw her face change from flirty to angry very quickly.
I wasn’t sure what had happened between them, but I was glad he seemed to be done with whatever friendship she’d tried to strike up with him.
“Can I get an introduction, man?” the freshman football player asked, looking at me.
Harrison frowned. “Are you talking about Sadie?” he gestured to me.
“Yeah,” the guy said, smiling and showing off a nice set of dimples. He was very handsome.
“You’re kidding, right? She’s my fucking girlfriend.”
The guy’s eyes widened. “Thisis your girlfriend?” He craned his head to look back at Aubrey who still had her eyes trained on our table. “What about her?” He pointed to Aubrey.
Harrison’s face turned red. “What about her?” he growled.
