“No. The Warehouse frowns upon them.”
“Huh?”
Hunter grinned a little. “I’ll rent one.”
“Make sure you do. We all want this party to be perfect.”
Like Payne was. And Kirk. And his parents.But not me.“Don’t worry. I won’t mess this up for Father.”
“Make sure you don’t.”
And then there was silence. He stared at the blank screen and leaned back in his chair.One big happy family.Theyhadbeen, at one time. Before he was a teenager and had gone off the rails. But even when he was a kid, he knew he didn’t measure up to his older brothers and his parents’ expectations of him. And maybeit was a self-fulfilling prophecy, or rebellion, or just his nature at the time, but between the ages of thirteen and twenty-eight, he’d reinforced every single doubt they had about him.
A chime rang from his computer. He glanced at it and saw there was another message notification from Britt. He clicked on it.
I don’t want to pressure you about the challenge. I probably shouldn’t have said anything about it. Don’t feel like you have to do it if you don’t want to. B.
Quickly, he tapped out his response.
No pressure at all. In fact, I think
He paused, mulling over his decision.
it’s a great idea. I’ll send it to you when I’m done. H.
He hit Send. Now he was committed. And maybe this was what he needed to try his hand at something new—a challenge. He clicked on the video and made a mental note of the supplies he would need to pick up tomorrow before work: paper and some crayon-looking things called pastels. There was an art store in Plano—K&B Art Supplies—where he could stop by and get what he needed. They had sponsored a few of her videos.
At the end of the video, she was on camera again. “If you’re a beginner artist, this is the perfect project to practice your skills. And you don’t have to use pastels. You can use colored pencils, charcoal, even markers if you want to. The point is to challenge yourself. I sure did with this seashell.”
Her seashell was perfect, and as familiar as he was with her artistic talent, he knew she was being humble. Another point in her favor.
She signed off with her usual shy little wave. And as usual, he smiled back. He couldn’t help it—she was too cute when she did that. He was about to shut down the laptop, then froze. K&B Art Supplies. InPlano.
Did she live in the Dallas area? Why else would a Plano art shop sponsor her videos? Then again, any art store in the country would, particularly the ones who had online shopping and shipped their supplies. He worked in a shipping company warehouse, but he rarely paid attention to the boxes he moved around and organized, other than their shapes and quantities, so he couldn’t say if he saw K&B Art Supplies’ name on any of the packages.
Hunter closed the laptop and headed for the shower. There were over six million people living in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Even if she did live here, the chances of running into her were almost none, other than hanging out at K&Bs to see if she showed up. She might not even buy anything from there, although she did use and recommend supplies from her sponsors. K&B was only one of them.
Shaking his head, he turned on the water and stood under the spray. It didn’t matter if she lived close by. He never intended to try to meet her. He was just killing time, watching videos.
Then again, he never intended to contact her either.But I did.
He finished his shower and slipped on a T-shirt and boxers, then played a few video games on the TV in the living room. But his curiosity about where Britt lived was piqued. There was a simple way to find out. I could just ask her.
“No.” He switched to another mind-numbing game. From his very first message, he took great pains not to come across asweird, creepy, or stalkerish. And now that he’d made the decision to do the ten-minute challenge, he didn’t want to do anything to give her cause to shut him out. All the hours spent learning from her would go down the tubes.
Funny how up until now, he’d only considered watching her channel as a time waster. For sure he was no artist, but he could have some fun and do something more productive than play video games.
His leg jounced as he engrossed himself in the game. But no matter how much he tried to get into it, he couldn’t stop looking at his closed laptop.
***
Britt shut off her computer and went downstairs. She’d spent more time working tonight than she’d intended to, but she was eager to upload her ten-minute challenge video. She thought it was one of her best ones, and she planned to do at least one challenge every three months, if not more often. Even if she didn’t get an enthusiastic response from her viewers, she had enjoyed the project.
She went downstairs to fix a snack of celery and carrot sticks with hummus and headed for her bedroom. When she passed the living room, she saw her mother conked out in the recliner again. School ended last week but there was still one more day of meetings and professional development before she wrapped up the year.
Britt paused, wondering if she should wake her, then decided not to. Anytime Mom fell asleep in the chair, she always got up and went to bed soon after. There was no reason to disturb her.
Once Britt was in her room, she settled into a vintage chair from the seventies, complete with brown and yellow plaid upholstery. She’d fallen in love with it years ago when she and Savannah had gone to a thrift store looking for an old dress for a costume party Savannah was attending. It took some elbow grease to clean it up, including shampooing the fabric and polishing the wooden arms. When she finished, it looked like an odd mix of dated and brand new. It was comfy, it was hers, and she loved it.
