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Wiping his hint of a smile with the back of his hand, he said, “Only sometimes.”
Her internal temperature spiked, and while some old country song she couldn’t remember the name of but had always liked started playing on the jukebox, she crossed her legs tightly and asked, “Are you single right now?”
He looked at her like she’d brandished a cream pie she intended to smoosh into his face. “That’syour first question?”
“What?” she asked, laughing. “It’s a fair question. I’m not trying to devise an elaborate wedding date scheme with someone else’s man.”
“I just figured you’d ask me something easy first, like what’s my favorite color or do I like ponies.”
“Do you? Like ponies?”
“Are you switching your question?”
She pinched her straw, stirring her drink. “No.”
Looking up from her fingers, he said, “I’m single. I’ve never been married. In recent years, I’ve had a few short-term things, two boyfriends, a girlfriend. But as far as serious, long-term relationships go, there was only ever one.”
“Nancy Hayes?” she guessed. When he raised a wary brow, she winced. “Along with stalking your socials, I may have googled you. Also, I used to love Asyd Nancy.”
“Yes, Nancy Hayes, you sneaky googler,” he scolded, and she probably shouldn’t have liked it so much. “And so did I. Great fucking band.” He took another sip, his forearm muscles flexing, his long throat bobbing through a swallow. Setting down his glass, he leveled a look at her and said, “Your turn.”
“I’m ready.”
“What drew you to Paul?”
The question was as jarring as the blare of a car horn when she spaced out at a green light.
“Mira?” he asked, amused lines inching from his eyes. “Did I break you?”
“I’m just wondering what happened to ponies.”
“You can always pass. Although I think it might help me understand what you’re into.”
There was something about the wordwhat. Notwhoshe was into, butwhat. Like there was some menu out there of all the different things a person could want, desire, need, and Cole was trying to figure out what she might order. “It’s fine,” she said. “But the whole thing is kind of embarrassing.”
He only waited, his head tilted like he was already listening.
“I had one of those intense can’t-eat, can’t-sleep crushes on Paul in high school. Back then he was this tall, brooding, quiet boy who journaled in the courtyard and listened to Joy Division. I didn’t just love him. I loooved him,” she said, drawing out the word. “I drew sketches of him. I made these horrible abstract sculptures inspired by him and titled them things likeThe Depths of his Eyesor justPain.”
He covered his mouth, at least trying to hide his amusement at her expense.
“I wrote poems about him. Lots of poems.”
“Do you still have them? Can I see one?”
“God no,” she said with a laugh. “Nobody ever did or ever will see them, because I burned them all like any self-respecting emo chick. But no matter how many balls of clay I tortured or how many overdramatically sad ashes I collected in my wish jar—”
“You had a wish jar?”
“Still do,” she admitted. “Somewhere. In my closet maybe. Either way, it didn’t matter. Paul wasn’t into me.”
“Too much woman for him?” he guessed, and she wasn’t sure if his gaze flashed to her throat, across her collarbone, dipping down to the curves of her breasts, or if she only imagined it. It was dark in Jimmy’s, and he did have very long lashes.
“When Paul went off to college, I figured he’d be like most of the kids from Red Falls, gone forever, never looking back. But a few years ago, he left his special effects business in Bozeman and came back to help his dad sell their house after his stepmom died. I’m not a religious person, but I’d been single for a while and pretty much thought I’d stay that way. So the first time Paul walked into the bakery, I’d thought for sure some divine force had intervened, putting all my teenage dreams into a pretty little box, tying a bow around it, and telling me, ‘Don’t say I never did anything for you.’”
Cole grinned, then took a sip of his beer.
“Turned out, it wasn’t divinity. It was only that Paul had been too shy in high school to tell me he actually liked me. We got serious pretty quickly, and things were really good with him at first, and I thought…” She laughed at herself, at the way things turned out. “I thought maybe we could make it, beat the odds, live happily ever after. I actually believed it.” Even though she knew better. Even though she knew exactly how easily things went wrong, how quickly really good could become really over.
