What She Wanted (9 page)

He stretched the hem of his shirt to wipe sweat from his brow. Lines of sweat-laced abdominal muscles winked at us in the sunlight. His shorts hung low enough on his hips to reveal the waistband of his briefs.
Oh my Lord, he wears briefs.

A stupid smile stretched across my face. The harder I tried to erase it, the bigger it grew.

Heidi swung the car around and parked on the curb, ten feet from the landscape crew.

“What are you doing?”

She leaned across my lap and waved through the open passenger window. “Hello.”

“Are you insane?” I hissed through locked teeth.

“No, but I think I’m in love. Ask him about the one with the red bandana for me.”

“No.”

Dean dropped his shirt back in place and strutted our way. “Hey, Katy. What are you up to?”

“Hi.”

Heidi stuck her hand under my nose. “Hi, Dean.”

“Hey, Heidi.” Their entwined hands bobbed near my nose.

My eyes crossed.

“We’re just out enjoying the view,” she said, waggling her eyebrows at Red Bandana.

Dean slid his gaze my way. “Is that right?”

I gave Heidi a pointed look. “We shouldn’t keep you from your work. It was nice seeing you again. Be sure to thank your mom for dinner.”

“Will do.” Dean patted the car roof. “I’ll see you tonight.”

I scooted low in my seat.

“Bye!” Heidi drove away with her mouth hanging open. “He’ll see you tonight? What’s this? Are you dating now?” She slapped her steering wheel in complete joy. “The minute you kiss him, I have to know.”

I craned my neck to watch Dean and the crew disappear from sight. “We’re not dating. There’s no kissing. We both eat dinner and he practically lives in my backyard. Why not eat together?”

“Why not?” She wiggled her shoulders in a little dance. “I love this summer so much.”

That made one of us. Aside from sharing pizza with a lifelong crush, my summer sucked pretty hard so far, and I didn’t have high hopes for the rest of it.

She cranked the radio, and I settled in for the short drive home. Sunlight warmed my arm on the doorframe. I inhaled scents of fresh cut grass and sunshine. Laundry bobbed on lines outside farmhouses, and four wheelers raced along paths through the woods.

Heidi pointed to Bob’s Drive-in Burger Joint coming up on my right. “How about food before your nap?”

“Deal.” I was a little hungry after that run in with nearly shirtless Dean.

She parked in the shade, and we ordered two malts and a basket of fries to share.

I pried the lid off my malt and dug in, using a greasy, salty fry as a spoon.

Heidi pumped a straw in the sweaty white foam cup. “Summer is delicious.”

“Yeah, but this week is so weird.”

“Literally anything can happen.”

That’s what I was afraid of.

My appetite vanished, and I covered my cup.

Sweat gathered on my brow. The day was perfect, piping hot with a decent amount of wind to break it up. I sucked my malt and stared at the horizon. Mom’s journal said to embrace my troubles. Be glad to have them.

A mosh pit of emotion kicked its way through my gut. Unlike the breakdown I’d had earlier for a mother I’d never know, these problems were immediate and dangerous. Mark was in a coma, and my alive-and-well father had gotten a job and moved into town. Why would he do that? So I could watch him leave again in five minutes? I needed him to go away. “Maybe we can drive Joshua out of town, like in one of those family movies, but without the happy ending.”

Heidi pointed her cup out the window. “Love it. Should we start now?”

I followed the direction of her straw to a beat-up Chevy across the lot. Joshua leaned against it, laughing and enjoying a big vanilla cone with a group of men his age. A swarm of kids in little league uniforms played tag around their legs. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Small towns.”

He looked youthful and happy from this vantage. “Do you think he just met those guys or he knew them when he lived here?”

Heidi leaned against her steering wheel for a closer look. “I don’t know. Their kids are really young.”

“Most guys his age don’t have adult children.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Oh, right. Well, what do you think? Should we do something? Make a scene?”

Anxiety crushed my lungs.

“We could just quietly roll out of here. He looks harmless and happy over there.”

“Well, I’m certainly glad he’s happy.” The torrent of barely tamped anger roiled in me. “Heaven forbid Joshua not do whatever he wants. He should be happy. He should live a carefree life eating twist cones and laughing with friends. It’s not like he has anything to tie him down or put a damper on his good time.”

Heidi twisted her malt into the cup holder and showed me her palms. “I didn’t mean it like that. I meant maybe he has some redeeming quality somewhere. Like, maybe he isn’t one hundred percent Satan.”

“He is.” I wanted to mean it so badly. “You try to see the good in everybody. Isn’t it exhausting being let down all the time?”

She watched me, unspeaking.

I fought the urge to unload on her, knowing she’d forgive me, too, but she shouldn’t. “Why’d he have to come back? Why now?” I pressed hot fingers to my stinging eyes.

“Uh-oh.”

“What?” I eased my hands away from my eyes.

“We’ve been spotted.”

I popped my lids open. Joshua had honed in on our car. Deep creases lined his brow. He ignored the group around him.

“Shit.”

Heidi fluttered her hands. “What do I do?”

“I don’t know.”
Think, think, think
. “Um. We should go. Yeah. Let’s go. Start the car.”

She obeyed, and we buckled our seatbelts in unison.

Joshua took a step in our direction and halted. He turned his head toward a petite brunette approaching on his right. She looked at him like he was everything, and she was sporting a massive baby bump.

Heidi did some heavy cursing and stepped on the gas.

I craned my head to watch them as we tore out of the lot, tossing gravel behind us.

The brunette kissed his cheek and wrapped her arms around his middle. She laid her head against his chest.

I swallowed bile.

He held her with one hand and waved good-bye to me with the other.

Heidi slowed to the posted speed limit. “Maybe she’s just a friend.”

I wiped uncooperative eyes. “It doesn’t matter. Let’s go home.”

“Katy.”

“Not today, okay. I can’t do any more of this today.”

Heidi adjusted her sunglasses and routed our summer playlist through her phone speaker.

We didn’t talk on the way home.

Dean arrived at eight, fresh from the shower again. I managed to look decent this time, and then I vomited six hundred emotions all over him. I told him every last thing on my mind in rapid-fire succession before stopping to scarf down three homemade tacos.

“Wow. So, your summer sucks.”

“Yes.” I didn’t even care that I’d unloaded on an unsuspecting guest. I was so glad to get it all out in the air and off my mind so I could sort it properly. Besides, Dean would leave in a few weeks and forget all about my drama. I needed this emo dump.

He wiped his mouth and refilled my glass with lemonade. “What’s next then?”

“I have no idea. I went through all the bills Mark had squirreled away. They’re astronomical. I almost understand why he freaked out in recovery. He literally can’t afford to stay there, but what else can he do? Every day he lies there in a stupid coma, the meter’s running, you know? He’ll never make enough to pay it all off.”

“Do they think he’ll come out of the coma soon?”

“They don’t know. They told me to read to him, which is why I now hate Caldwell.”

“Gotcha.” He nodded and piled toppings into another tortilla shell.

Regret wormed its way to the surface of my thoughts and muddied my philosophy on unloading burdens. “I didn’t mean to tell you all that.” I rubbed my forehead. “You’ve been here an hour and I’ve complained for half of it. I’m the absolute worst hostess in the history of hostesses.”

Sincerity pooled in his eyes. “Don’t be sorry. I like talking to you. I like how real you are.”

“That’s me. Real Katy Reese.” I plucked the collar of my shirt. “Seriously. You’ve got to have something better to do with your time.”

“Not really, no.”

I laughed. “Fine. Then I’m glad you’re here.”

“Me, too.”

I cleared the dishes and packaged the leftovers for lunch the next day.

Dean straddled a stool at the island and flipped through my senior yearbook. “Did you date in high school?”

“Why?” I took the seat beside him and read the signatures over his shoulder. “What’d you find in there?”

He turned and caught me staring. “Nothing. I’m just curious.”

“I’m not sure what’s left to know. I’ve told you my entire life story in two days.”

“You didn’t answer my question, though. You’ve only told me the things you wanted to tell me.”

I tapped my thumb against the counter. My dating experience was limited and ridiculous. “That’s how friendship works. You can’t force me to divulge my secrets. I have to want to tell you.”

He turned on the stool, bringing his knees against mine and generally invading my personal space. “So, we’re friends now?” The blue of his T-shirt illuminated his smiling eyes. The set of his lips spoke of promises I’d like to taste.

“Mm-hmm. Friends.” I leaned back. Had he noticed I’d unconsciously leaned in?

Was it my imagination, or was he leaning in, too?

He formed a little smirk. “And you aren’t going to tell me who you dated? Any particular reason?”

“No. There hasn’t been anything noteworthy in my romantic life. That’s all. I went out with Luke Masters and Grant Hutchins last year.”

He stopped leaning. His jaw clenched and popped. A muscle jumped in his cheek. “That was it?”

“Yeah.” I might’ve dated more, given the opportunity, but I’d never know. No one had looked in my direction until senior year when I’d moved from glasses to contacts, shot up three inches, and joined the yearbook committee. “What’s wrong? Don’t like my choices in men?”

“Men.” He gave a dark chuckle. “No, those guys are great. Why’d you dump them?”

“How’d you know they didn’t dump me?’

“Did they?”

“No.”

He made a droll face. “So, what happened?”

Luke had been fun for a while, but all he ever wanted to do was make out. Once that got dull, I’d moved on. Grant only asked me to homecoming to get his parents off his back. We’d shared a bottle of cheap whiskey on the hood of his car by the lake and bonded over a mutual loathing of our parental figures, plus our shameless Netflix addictions. In the end, I think Grant preferred guys. “They didn’t get me.”

He nodded serenely, as if in perfect understanding. “Do you remember Kylie Sweeney?”

His perfect high school girlfriend? Prom Queen? Head majorette? Full ride to Ohio State? “Sort of.”

“She was a bitch.”

I laughed. “What? I thought you loved her. You were going to get married and have photogenic children and become that family that comes in picture frames.”

“She was mean. She put me down all the time. She dictated my wardrobe. Made me get contacts. She even chose my friends. She bullied me and I let her. It was awful.” Embarrassment colored his cheeks. “Remember when I asked why you and I never talked before? I already knew the answer. We didn’t talk before because I wasn’t allowed to talk to you. You weren’t on the Kylie Sweeney–approved contact list.”

“Because I was a dork.”

He snorted. “Because you were nothing like her.”

I tugged my ponytail holder free and rubbed my head. “I don’t see why she’d care. She didn’t know I existed.” No one had, other than Heidi, a couple guys, and a few close friends.

“Trust me. She knew, and she knew I knew. I’m an ass for sticking with her so long. It’s funny how much power a person can have over you if you let them.”

An unprecedented feeling slithered through me. It felt a little like protectiveness, but I couldn’t be certain. How could I protect someone like Dean? He had six inches and fifty pounds on me, but still… “She bullied you.” I loathed bullies.

“Pretty much.” He ran a big hand through his hair and scrubbed the back of his neck. “How pathetic is that? I let a five-foot, hundred-pound baton twirler control my life for two years. I don’t even know why. What was I afraid of? Why did I think I needed her?”

My hand dropped over his on the counter. “People like that are manipulative. You don’t see them coming and, by the time you realize what’s happening, you’re too embarrassed and ashamed to fight back, so you embrace it and tell yourself it was what you wanted.”

Dean’s lips parted.

I jerked my hand away. “Sorry. I read too much, and I’m not the biggest fan of people. Heidi thinks I look for the worst in everyone. She might be right.”

Dean caught my fingers in his and squeezed. “I have an idea. Let’s keep doing this.”

“What?”

“Being honest. It’s been a long time since I didn’t have to fulfill someone else’s expectations. You know?” He dropped my hand and averted his eyes, as if he’d been caught doing something awful. “What if tomorrow we come as ourselves? I’ll wear my glasses and you can wear those shorts from last night.”

“Deal, except no shorts.”

“Sweet.”

“Shut up.” Heat poured through my face. I’d like to see him without shorts. If the view was anything like him without a shirt, I’d never stop picturing it.

“I should go.” He made his way onto the porch. “If I keep leaving here after dark, we’ll get the neighbors talking.”

I waved good-bye and watched him vanish into the shadows.

Dean and I giving the neighbors something to talk about had been my recurring daydream since junior high.

Days went by with no change in Mark’s condition. It’d been more than a week since his heart attack and five days since he’d slipped into a coma. I stopped by his room every morning to read a few pages from Mom’s journal. Somehow, the man I’d spent my life avoiding had become my cornerstone of purpose. I zombied through the days, sick with exhaustion, and switched into obsessive-doom mode when Dean left each night. From midnight until dawn, I researched my father until my eyes crossed. There wasn’t much to go on, but I bookmarked all the sites with pictures or articles mentioning his name and tormented myself with unanswerable questions and worries of every variety. I had the perpetual headache and puffy eyes to prove it.