“I’m attending a college graduation in Manhattan,” I grumbled. “You should treat these events with respect.”
“I already ordered,” Alfie announced, coming back over to us. “I bought you your usual—a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit with coffee, and I ordered a sausage, egg, and cheese with orange juice.”
“Sausage, egg, and cheese is the best,” Amy praised Alfie, giving him a fist bump. “Bacon, egg, and cheese can eat dirt.”
“It’s the far superior option,” I said as Sadie, who owned the café, called both our names.
“Are you going into Manhattan?” Alfie asked Amy as she unwrapped her biscuit and took a bite.
“Yep. And my train’s coming in a little bit, so Baxter and I should go.”
Baxter had been given a plain biscuit, and she let the pony have a bite before wrapping it back up.
“You can ride with us,” Alfie offered.
“I don’t want to make you late for your event.”
“It’s just my dad’s fiancée’s graduation,” Alfie said. “It’s going to be long and boring.”
“I hope you brought lots of snacks!”
Alfie glared at his biscuit. “Maybe I should have ordered another.”
“You can have my extra one,” Amy offered, handing him one of the foil-wrapped packages out of the paper sack.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“To be fair,” she said, “I bought two extra, so I think I’ll survive.”
She followed us out to the car. After laying a blanket in the back seat, she shoved Baxter into the car. Alfie giggled as the horse licked his mouth.
I frowned in the rearview mirror.
“Is that sanitary?”
“He’s been eating a biscuit,” she said as I started the car, “so it’s about as sanitary as me doing this.” She leaned over and kissed me hard on the mouth.
“I really wish I weren’t going to the graduation,” I murmured.
“We should just skip it and go to Central Park,” Alfie suggested.
I wished we could, but I would suffer through a thousand boring ceremonies if it gave me even the slightest of chances to keep Alfie.
“Press the party button!” Amy demanded as I swung onto Main Street and headed out of town.
“The what?”
“The last time I was in your car, I told you to save my radio stations,” she said. “Then whenever I’m in the car, you can press the party button, and we’ll have an amazing ride.”
“You let her touch the radio?” Alfie asked, incredulous, from the back seat. “You don’t let me touch the radio.”
“You can have some of my radio buttons,” Amy said, turning around to tickle his legs.
* * *
Amy was still singingthe poppy song about a girl who was obsessed with a guy and kept showing up outside his parents’ house. For some reason, the song had been repeated on multiple stations all through the drive. It was like they had all conspired against me to play the stupid song over and over again.
“And this is your stop,” I announced, pulling up outside of Amy’s office.
