“Yeah, I know the next closest one isn't for another 20 miles…”
“The next closest what? Dealership? Auto Body shop?” I ask, only for Dean to shush me by waving his hand at me.
“Uh-huh…can you—” Dean rolls his eyes at the operator of the other end of the line. “If you can’t get us another van, I want a full refund, here.”
“Yeah!” I agree.
“I’m not trying to be difficult, sir—” Dean argues with the customer service representative. “I would be fine with a tow truck and getting it fixed but?—”
“But we’re not paying for it.” I say.
“Madeline, be quiet.” Dean says, removing his mouth from the receiver end of the phone. “Sir. Okay, sir—” Dean keeps getting cut off by the other end of the line, and then all of the sudden he hangs up.
“They’re getting us a tow truck. But it won’t arrive until the afternoon. It won’t be for another 4 hours, at least.”
“Oh, shit.” I say. “Are we just supposed to wait here?” I ask.
“We could walk back,” Dean suggests.
“Are you crazy? It’s freezing!” I’m shocked at the suggestion.
“It’s like a 30-minute walk. We’ll be fine. I’ll walk back on my own when the tow truck is on its way.”
I stare at Dean blankly.
“Why are you acting like this is the silliest idea you’ve ever heard? You don’t have a license, you walk everywhere back home.” Dean laughs over my distraughtness, but I guess he has a point. I do walk practically everywhere, even in our small town where sidewalks don’t always exist. “Get out, let’s go.”
I begrudgingly get out of the van again. Dean inserts dollars worth of quarters into the meter, and we turn back towards where the inn is, about two miles across town. I mentally prepare myself for what is sure to be a long, exhausting walk. I empty out Dean’s books and record into the van, keeping my own smutty novel for later.
If it really is only a 30-minute walk, I’ll still have plenty of time to get some work done, read a little bit, and to get ready for the concert tonight. I wonder if Dean plans on eating dinner with me tonight.
“Are we eating dinner together tonight?” I ask. We walk side by side on the wide sidewalk, my scarf whipping in the wind again. Dean steps in front of me to tie it for me/
“Do you want to?” He asks, his voice quiet and low.
“Yes, I’d like to,” I say nonchalantly.
“We’ll eat together then. I’ll come back and pick you up after the van is fixed. They said the autobody shop in town should be able to take care of it today.” We walk together in silence, but it feels like Dean says so much. His body language has completelychanged from when he first met me. He’s facing me and he’s looking at me as we walk.
We stand at the corner, getting ready to cross probably the busiest road in the whole town, and when the light changes from yellow to red, just as I’m about to take a step, a car whizzes by, about to swipe my left side, as Dean yanks my sleeve, startling me and pulling me out of the way.
“Sheesh!” I exclaim.
“Madeline, you need to watch where you’re going!” Dean exclaims back, clearly exasperated.
“I saw the car!” I shout. “It’s fine.”
“It’s only fine because I pulled you out of the way,” Dean shakes his head, pulling on my coat sleeve, pulling me closer to him, away from the edge of the sidewalk, so close my back almost touches his chest again. Even though there’s thick layers of down feathers between us, I can’t help but feel butterflies fluttering again, reminded of how we were in the bookstore.
As soon as the light turns green for us, he releases me and I’m forced to take a step as he starts walking again. “Come on, now,” Dean tells me, stepping to the side so as to not trip over me. I look down at his feet, and he’s wearing dress shoes or loafers or something totally hipster and they’re much bigger than I expected.
“You have big feet,” I tell him. “They’re like, clown feet, almost.”
“You’re annoying,” Dean smirks. “And you have small feet. And no filter.”
“Sorry, I didn't mean it in a bad way, I apologize. “You know what they say about big feet.” I start laughing, thinking about the penis diagram from earlier.
“Just keep walking,” Dean deadpan. The wind is cold against my face, even though at this point, the only thing that is exposedare my eyes. Still, the wind kicks up ice and snowflakes that land on my face and coat.
