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“If you’re not comfortable, you don’t have to. We can say no.”
Archer clenched his fists, then cracked his knuckles. “Are you comfortable?”
She shrugged. “Only if you are.”
He wasn’t comfortable with any of it. The owners standing close. A public bar. A global pandemic. The girl he’d thought he was in love with sitting next to him after all of these years.
But he wanted to get her to stop looking at him like that, like he was broken and needed fixing. He didn’t need fixing. He was fine.
Archer hopped up and reached out his hands. “Give me your things. I’ll drop them in the office.”
She hesitated, some sort of thought flashing before her eyes. But then she smoothed out her features and handed him her notebook, laptop, extra agendas, and pens.
Twenty minutes later they sat in the back seat of Rhonda and Steph’s Hatchback, the four of them masked up with windows down as they pulled away from the gravel driveway of Wild Pines.
Steph dragged the sunshade down in her front seat, then examined herself as she pulled her cropped hair into a small bun at the top of her head. “So, Tea, how does it feel to be back?”
“Odd.”
“You’re going to have to shout, I can’t hear you with the windows open,” Rhonda yelled.
“Odd,” she repeated louder. “Most days I feel like it’s all a dream.”
“A good dream, or a bad one?” Steph asked.
“Both.”
Archer turned his head a fraction so he could see her in his periphery. Her legs were tucked close again, her dress draped over her thighs. She pinched the skin at her ankle with her thumb and pointer finger. It was the first time she admitted to how she was really feeling. Up until then, Archer had to pretend that everything was fine with her. He knew it wasn’t. How could it be after everything?
Steph turned around in her seat to face Tea. “You know you can talk to us, right? We’re always here for you.”
She nodded. “Yeah, I know.”
Rhonda lifted a finger, her other hand on the steering wheel. “But we understand if you would like us to keep our mouths shut until then.”
Archer watched with bated breath as color flooded Tea’s cheeks. “I appreciate that. Thank you.”
They didn’t say anything for the next fifteen minutes, not until they pulled into the dirt lot of a shit-colored shack in the middle of the woods. Music blared from speakers hanging at haphazard angles along the awning, and the place was packed. His chest tightened as he read a message painted in blue on the side wall.
Save yourself from the heat and get a drink!
“This feels like a bad idea,” he grumbled low.
Rhonda parked and pointed to a picnic table on the lawn, far from the crowd. “We can snag that spot over there.”
He unbuckled slowly. “And we get drinks…how? Do we have to go in there?”
A crowd of people spilled from inside the bar and out onto the patio underneath the awning, fans blasting cool air on their faces. The lawn was dotted with picnic tables, giving people enough space in case they wanted it.
“There’s a walk-up bar on the other side for people who don’t want to go in.” Steph unbuckled and opened her door. “I’ll grab the first round.”
“Are you sure? I can—”
“Archer, we watched you get fed to the wolves for two hours. Seriously. Drinks on me.”
“I’ll help you,” Rhonda declared. “You guys grab the table.”
Archer followed Tea across the lawn, distracted by the number of people around him. How does anyone find this safe? he thought. When he was in Minneapolis during the first few months of the pandemic, he measured every action he took, weighing the pros and cons and if it was worth putting other people at risk.
