“Can we get a deer next?” Winnie asks.
We.
Tanner ruffles her hair, then we get to work. We roll out dough, put on way too much cheese and a terrible combination of toppings, and laugh. Boy, do we laugh.
After we bake it (for a little too long) we sit around the table and Winnie puts her hands out for us to hold. “Grace?”
“Yes ma’am.” Tanner nods and takes her hand then slips his hand into mine.
“God, thank you for my sheep, my mom, and her boyfriend Tan. Thank you for pizza and my Grampy. Tell him I miss him. Amen.”
“Amen,” Tanner says all too happily, and I dart my eyes from her, to him, and back to her.
“Winnie, honey. Tan isn’t my boyfriend.”
She sighs with deep exasperation, then puts her hands back out for us.
“God, I pray you make Tan my mom’s boyfriend. Amen.”
Tanner whispers an amen below his smirk while I hit his knee with my own.
“So. Fred.” Tanner turns to the smirking child. “Update me. How’s camp?”
I watch the two talk as she happily babbles about swimming and open gym. She tells him how they were practicing football, and she only hit one kid in the head.
“Oh, and the boys stink so bad.” She scrunches up her nose. “I need a fresher.”
“Air freshener?” Tanner’s mouth twists into a smile.
“Yeah, they make the whole gym stink.” She nods seriously.
Winnie talks until she’s decided she’s done, then scrambles outside to seeheranimals.
“Beer?” Tanner asks me once the screen door claps shut behind her.
“Please.”
He grabs a couple bottles from the old creaky fridge, hands me one, then sits across from me. His body leaned back in the chair as his eyes settle on mine, making my blood cells trip over themselves. I take a long sip from the bottle.
“So.” I set my beer down with a sharp bang, louder than intended, but it gets the point across. Tanner's eyes go wide, and he cocks his head to the side, amused at my outburst. “Since we arebest friendsand I will be here for the rest of the summer…”
He laughs with that damn tilted head. “Hannah.”
“Nope.” I hold my hand up to shush him. “We need to set rules. Like actual ones. Not these pretend ones we make up on the go. For now.”
“For now?”
I let out a breath. “For now.”
He pauses and sighs. “Okay.”
“Okay?” I question and shove the disappointment at his lack of argument.
“Okay.”
I sit straight. “First, no touching.”
He opens his mouth to argue, but I give him a quick look, and he lets out a little displeased sigh. “Fine.”
