“I asked her to pick me up.” Oswald holds up his hands in surrender. “You don’t have to say it. I already know.”
Memphis’ lips twitch like he still wants to say something, but he just places his laptop bag on the island. I have the urge to tell them both to stop worrying so much, but if Memphis can drop it, so can I. I already told Oswald it wasn’t a big deal anyway.
“Still no power.” Memphis looks around.
“Not yet.” I sigh.
“Bates went to get his generator,” Oswald informs his brother with his brows raised high on his forehead. They exchange a glance that makes me feel like I’m missing something.
“I told him not to bother,” I offer, continuing to watch their reactions.
“No, it’s good. You said your computer is dead. I’m surprised your phone isn’t.” Oswald digs through one of the bags he brought and brings out a plastic takeaway box. “I got food.”
“I have a portable charger I’ve been using, but it’s almost dead now. I’m all caught up on class work though.” Oswald flips the box open. It looks like a mess but smells good.
A loud beeping noise interrupts the quiet of the house, and Memphis walks over to the door to peer out. “Looks like they are finally here. I’m going to see if they need me to move the truck.” He steps outside, and I hear some muffled speaking.
“I didn’t think they would actually come tonight,” I confess.
“They should have been here earlier.” Oswald unwraps a napkin on top of the pile of food, revealing a few chocolate chip cookies. I do a little swooning on the inside when he lifts one up to my mouth to give me a bite. “Good?” he asks while I’m still chewing, so I nod.
He steps a little closer with the cookie still in his hand and feeds me the entire thing slowly. It’s adorable, even though he’s watching me so closely, I feel like I need to cover my mouth while chewing.
After giving me the last bite, he plants a kiss on my lips, then backs up and motions to the box of food. “I didn’t know what you would want, so I grabbed a few things.”
“That’s super sweet, but I ate a little while ago.” I have to admit the stir fry with noodles looks pretty good though, at least I think that’s what it is, since there’s a slice of pizza on top of it.
“What did you have?” He crosses his arms over his chest as if he doesn’t believe me.
“A Nutella sandwich.”
“Christ, that’s not dinner, Waylynn. Find something to eat, or tell me what you want and I’ll go get it.” Memphis enters the house in the middle of Oswald’s insistence.
“What did they say?” I direct my attention to Memphis, ignoring his brother.
He moves over to the sink and washes his hands before answering. “That the power should be on in an hour or two, but we’ll need to take care of the tree limb ourselves after the line is untangled.” He pulls a couple of plates out of the cupboard and walks over to the island, where I’m still standing with Oswald. “Do you want this?” He motions to the pizza.
I shake my head, and he plops it on one of the plates. “The sub?” I shake my head again, which leaves the stir fry and what looks like a burger wrapped up in white paper. “Which one?” he asks, not giving me much of an option to say no.
“The noodles.” I sigh.
“See how easy that was?” He scrapes all the chicken, vegetables, and noodles onto the other plate. “Go sit down and eat,” he instructs.
It’s on the tip of my tongue to say, “Yes, sir,” but I stifle the urge, because it would be mocking this time and I don’t want to do that.
MIXED FEELINGS
Waylynn
“Shouldyou text Bates and let him know not to worry about the generator?” I ask after I eat most of the food Memphis put on my plate.
“He’s probably already on his way back… What the hell?” Oswald is looking down at his phone with his lip curled up.
“What’s wrong?” I lean to the side, not even hiding the fact that I’m looking at his screen.
“My phone is blowing up.” Even as he says it, messages start to pop up so fast, I can’t read them. Several are texts, but most of them are from his social media app. “Jesus Christ,” he curses after tapping the notification. There’s an image of him taking up the entire screen.
“Oh my gosh.” I cover my mouth with my hands but still read the caption.New star player injured—what happened at practice today, on and off the field.They make it sound so ominous.
