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“No. She asked me. And then she said, ‘Me too.’”

“So? What are you gonna do about it?” I asked, looking at him through the mirror.

“Nothing. Not like this,” he mumbled, gesturing to the catheter under his shirt.

My face went soft. “One more month, Benny.”

“I liked his family,” Mom said. “Good people.”

“Speaking of good families,” I said. “Levi Olsen came in today.”

“Levi? Little Levi?”

“Yeah, he moved back. He wants to have drinks.”

Mom eyed me. “Jacob’s letting you go?”

“Okay, first of all, no man tells me what I am allowed to do.”

She crossed her arms. “Why not? You don’t tell him what to do?”

“Uh, no. I don’t.”

“You should not be going there when you have a boyfriend,” she said.

“Levi is not trying to make a move on me. He’s dating Cindy Baker. She will be there.”

“Take Jacob with you,” Mom said.

“Why?”

“So he won’t get jealous.”

I rolled my eyes. “Mamá, he is not going to be jealous. And Jacob is not a let’s-go-have-drinks-with-my-random-friends kind of guy. He doesn’t like stuff like that.”

She tsked. “Men get jealous, mija. At least tell him to go so he knows he can. It’s like you’ve never met a man before.”

I couldn’t explain to Mom that this man wasn’t going to get jealous. That he wasn’t going to care one bit who I had drinks with.

Because this man wasn’t really mine.

Chapter 38

Jacob

When Briana got home from dropping off her family, I came down the hallway to meet her.

“Hey,” she said, letting herself in. “It’s late. I thought you’d be asleep.”

“I wanted to make sure you got home okay,” I said, leaning in the doorway.

She smiled. “I think my brother likes your sister,” she said, taking off her shoes by the door.

“I think my sister likes your brother.”

She set her purse down on the credenza and padded up to me in her bare feet. “Do you want to watch TV in your bed?”

“Yes,” I said, too quickly.