If facial expressions could talk, this woman would be screaming. The way her eyes roll, and her cheeks puff out, fully exasperated, she looks ready to strangle Bryn. Or me? Maybe it’s me. I’m starting to wonder if I should have done more, but then I remind myself what I saw on her face. I can argue with Brody, but I couldn’t argue with Bryn.
Am I this bad at firefighting too? Is that why my dad always tells me I’m no good at it? Maybe he’s right.
Fuck. The beer might be starting to go to my head.
“Yes, she does. And they’re noble and wonderful priorities, but that girl needs to do more for herself,” Savanna sighs, playing with the end of her braided blonde hair. “She drives me crazy. I’ll talk to her.”
“No,” I tell her, shaking my head. “I need to figure this out. We’re working on a plan.”
“He’s working on a plan,” Brody corrects.
“Let me guess,” Savanna kicks back in the chair, a grin on her face. “You’re telling him if it’s good or not?”
Brody lets a genuine smile slide across his lips, then raises his beer to take a drink. It’s all the confirmation Savanna needs because she turns to me, snorting.
“Good luck finding something he’ll think is a good idea.”
“Yeah, I realized that five ideas ago.”
Granted my first few ideas weren’t great. Flowers were lame.She wasn’t going to agree to another date where I’d wow her out of her priorities. Brody didn’t think me mowing the grass every other day would do me any favors besides getting the cops called. And he vetoed me hiring a plane with a message trailing behind it.
“As a female who knows Bryn, what would you suggest?” I ask Savanna, blinking a few times to clear some of the beer fog from my eyes.
“Maybe just give her some space,” she suggests. “Bryn is a hard one to crack, but you were doing a good job. She might just need to settle in after everything with Gran.”
Sighing, I pick up my beer and take a few gulps. While that was my initial assessment, it feels like I should be doing more, because doing nothing feels wrong. I just wish I knew exactly what to do.
“I’m sorry, Wyatt.”
“He’s been on this same loop all night,” Brody mutters to Savanna, but it’s loud enough for me to hear. “Hope, excitement, realization, despair. It’ll come back around.”
Bringing my glass back to the table, I lean forward and feel a crease forming between my brows. “Hope. That’s it. That’s what I need to do.”
“What?” Savanna asks. “What do you need to do?”
Brody meets my eyes, but doesn’t say a word, just waits for me to spit out my newest idea. But it’s not just an idea. It’s exactly what I’m going to do. I don’t know if it’ll get me anywhere with Bryn, but it’ll give me something to remind myself not to give up hope. And that is somewhere.
“Brody, you’re tatted up—you know a guy?”
Surprise flickers in his eyes. His head cocks a degree to the left. Then a smile lifts the corners of his mouth. “Now that’s a plan I can get behind.”
Showtime Dalton
Takingmybackwardbaseballhat off, I stare at the camera. No smile. No creases in my forehead or laugh lines around my eyes. Sullen.
Leaning forward on my knees, my face getting closer, I hang my head for a moment, the video capturing my curls plastered to my head.
When I lift it again, my Adam’s apple bobs as I swallow. “Friends are good. I like friends a lot.”
MeredithsBookNook:
This is fine. It's fine. Now we can have a Buddie situation with the big one. Look it up.
DearDiaryWithLoveKloe:
Wait, did they break up? I'm invested. They can't.
Kittrina.Reads.Books:
