Ramona stepped forward and clapped me on the shoulder. She wasn’t the type to dole out cheer and smiles, but I could feel the suggestion of one by the way she looked at me.
“You’re almost okay,” she said. “Not just a beefy jock.”
“Careful,” I replied with a short laugh. “I bruise easily.”
And even with nothing more than a sideways glance at Sage, I could tell the color in her cheeks had deepened. Was it the mention of me being a jock, or the implication that I had more than one skillset to be proud of?
For me, it was the sudden, uninvited memory of her thighs gripping my waist as I drove into her a few nights ago.
“You just saved our asses,” Melvin said, eyes bright with an idea forming as he stowed his guitar away. “We owe you.”
“You don’t owe me anything.”
He ignored that. “Nah, dude, you’re coming to the gig. You can just follow the van and fall in with us when we get there.”
Sage stiffened next to me, that flush draining from her face. “He can’t.”
“I want him there,” Melvin insisted. “VIP access.”
Ramona snorted. “We don’t have VIPs, but we’ll let you sit at the band table for lunch.”
“And free drinks,” Melvin added. “Non-alcoholic, but I don’t think an athlete like you would mind that much. Watching that calorie intake, or whatever.”
I wiped my hands on a rag from the tool bag. “That’s generous, thanks. What kind of gig happens this time of day, though? It’s just about time for brunch.”
“Don’t you have practice or something?” Sage looked at me, shaking her head slowly.
“I can handle my schedule,” I said, meeting her eyes. The others seemed to enjoy that, and it gave me extra grit in the stand-off.
“You don’t even like their music.”
Gasps of mock-horror and insult rippled through the band, but Ramona gave a low chuckle. “Some days I don’t even like our music. He’s coming. Quit being a killjoy.”
The look on Sage’s face made me feel better about the sudden change in my plans, and I shrugged. “I guess I’m going then.”
“Fine,” she said, flicking her hair in a way that was supposed to be nonchalant, but totally wasn’t. “Do whatever you want.”
“Okay, everybody, pile in.” Melvin went over to the driver’s side, while Ramona and Sage slid in on the other. The other two guys who I was yet to have introductions with jumped into the back of the van.
I slung the tool bag over my shoulder and stepped out of the way. Melvin effortlessly executed a tight three-point turn, leaning out his window to point at me as the van rolled by.
“Don’t you dare bail on us.”
Ramona sat in the middle, but I looked past her amused smile to Sage who was pressed tightly against the passenger door. She rolled her eyes, then stared straight ahead. Totally not fine with how things had unfolded.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I told Melvin, and waved them off.
14
Sage
The van coughed whenever Melvin pulled away from a red light, the radio turning to static mid-guitar solo. Classic rock was the only station it picked up, blasting through speakers that crackled if you nudged the volume too high. The old tape we shoved in there four years ago still lived in the deck, hostage to a machine that refused to play it or spit it back out. Classic rock radio or nothing. Those were our options.
I usually punched the thing when I was in the van, but today I needed the noise. Mike and Big Rich arguing in back, Melvin singing along up front. Ramona’s thigh vibrated with the bass line thudding through the seat, and she absently tapped one foot to the beat.
“I call that side going back,” Big Rich said. “You always make me sit on the cymbal case, when you know it’s torture with the way Vinnie drives.”
“Don’t bring my driving into this,” Melvin piped up, then went back to whining out the instrumental section of a Guns n Roses favorite.
