Five
Maya
After Leigh leaves, I’m trying to decide whether to try to do more homework or just give in and take a nap, when my phone rings. I expect it to be Miranda calling to tell me that I should take a chance and call Kevin.
Kevin Collins, the caller ID says. I don’t know any other Kevins, but he’s the one who put his number in my phone, and I suppose he didn’t know that.
He’s calling me. He must be at the airport by now. He said his flight was before noon. I stare at it long enough that I’m afraid the phone will stop ringing, and hurry to answer before it does.
“Hey,” I say, hoping he can’t hear how breathless I feel.
“Hey,” he says back. “I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“No, I was already up. Speaking of which, shouldn’t you be on a plane right about now?”
“Fairly soon,” he says. “Our flight got pushed back an hour. Which was good, because these duck-fat-cooked hash browns Shane made us all eat made Lando sick—probably due to the amount of alcohol still in his system—and though he puked mostly out the window,mostly, JT insisted we get a whole new cab immediately orhewas going to be sick, and also still wanted to stop for donuts.” I can practically see him smiling and rolling his eyes to the ceiling. He did that a lot last night, talking about his bandmates’ escapades.
I laugh. “What a glamorous life you lead.”
“You have no idea.” I can hear the grin in his voice, and I can’t help but grin along with him.This doesn’t feel awkward at all. It feels . . . safe. And while that might not be a word that Miranda would apply to the guys she wants to date, it definitely is for me.
“So duck-fat hash browns and donuts? No airport Cinnabon?” I ask. He told me last night all about how that was pretty much his favorite food ever. Growing up in Everett, Wyoming, the closest one was hours away, in Evanston—but the first thing he’d done when he got his license was to make the drive out there with his little brother, just to gorge on cinnamon rolls. His brother still gives him a Cinnabon gift card every year on his birthday.
“Tragically not. I’ll have to hit one up in LA to make up for this. Bring some back home, watch the rest of thoseParanormal Activitymovies.”
I’m more than a little happy about this—he did seem to really like the movie. “So it didn’t give you nightmares, then?”
“I don’t know that I slept long enough to have nightmares,” he says, and there’s a teasing hint in his voice that makes me warm all over. “But we’ll see if I can handle the others on my own, or if I need to make one of my friends watch them with me.”
“You can always Skype me in,” I say, probably too eagerly. “I’ll watch it with you.”
There’s a pause, and I cringe. How pathetic did that just sound? Who watches movies with someone over Skype?
But he said he might want to watch it with a friend, and given our situation, that’s all we can be. And he’s calling me, so that has to mean he still wants contact with me. Doesn’t it?
I am a little too desperate for that to be the case.
“We should do that,” he says. It sounds like he actually likes that idea. Or maybe I’m just being hopeful.
Because I do like him. And I’d much rather be his friend than nothing at all.
I find myself pacing nervously. “So you guys aren’t currently getting mobbed in the airport?”
He chuckles. “We’ve been in a few selfies, signed some autographs. One for aTSA agent’s daughter. But no, it’s pretty low-key right now. No one begging to join our harem.” I can hear the smile in his voice, and I groan.
“You’re never going to let me live that down.”
“Yeah, no. Never.”There’s a pause, and then: “You weren’t totally wrong about that, though. I mean, I always kind of found that whole thing a little on the skeezy side.”
“Inviting girls to parties?” I tease, though I know what he means.
“Inviting specific groupies backstage like that,” he says. “Though I think it was pretty obvious even from up there that you weren’t a groupie.”
“Because my shirt remained on?”
“Which is even more tragic than the lack of Cinnabon, I assure you,” he says, and he’s joking—mostly, I think—but his flirting tone makes my body heat up all over again.Then he clears his throat, his voice more serious. “But I don’t really do that very much, not like Shane and JT.”
“Yeah?” Having spent the whole night talking with him, this doesn’t surprise me.
