“Omg,” Nina raises her hands to cover her face. “We said we weren’t going to speak of that again.”
“You said you weren’t going to speak of it again,” she points a strip of bacon in her direction. “I, however—”
“Callie,” Payton scolds in a warning tone. “Sex, and you two having that—” she cuts herself off, shaking her head from the thoughts I knew came to mind. “We’re not discussing anything related to sex over breakfast.”
“Why not?” Callie tilts her head to the side.
“Yeah, P,” I try to hold in my smirk. “Why not?”
“Maybe because it’s 8 a.m.” Payton deadpans.
“It’s 5 o’clock somewhere,” Callie shrugs, sipping her cranberry juice. “But for you, P…sure.”
“Thank you.”
Callie starts singing the chorus of “let’s talk about sex” by Salt-N-Pepa, making Payton lean across to try and stop her.
“Stop!” Payton can’t hold her laughter in as Callie moves side to side,dodging Payton’s hand that’s trying to clasp her mouth shut.
She continues rapping the lyrics, laughing as Payton manages to place her hand over her mouth. And even though it’s now muffled, you could still faintly hear her continuing, which has me holding in my laughter as I bring the mug of coffee to my lips.
“Callie!” Payton tries to scold her, but she bursts out laughing.
“Fine,” Callie huffs, her brown eyes sparkling with mischief as she removes Payton’s hand from her mouth. “I’ll shut up.”
“Than—”
“Let’s talk about—”
“Callie!”
Callie bursts out laughing before taking a huge mouthful of hash browns and smirking at Payton as she chews. Shaking my head at their antics, I scoop some scrambled egg onto my plate, grab a few more strips of bacon and hash browns before placing a little dollop of ketchup on the side—Nina gives me a questioning look at this, but I shrug. You can’t have hash browns without a side of ketchup to go along with it.
I needed as much energy as my body could muster up because today is the day research for the article starts, which means I’ll officially be meeting the hockey players. Sitting in on their practices, games, and interviewing them to gather as much information as I could to make this article worthy enough for a place in the Riverside Gazette.
Once I’ve demolished my breakfast in a world record breaking time, I lean my back against the chair and rest my hands on my stomach, further proving my point of feeling full. Glancing around the table, I see the girls are almost done too. Nina’s on her phone, her cheeksflushing as she types away.
“What’s got you smiling?” I smirk at her.
“Would it happen to be because of a certain hockey player?” Payton teases.
Nina’s cheeks tinge pinker as she tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. “Shut up.” She grumbles, chewing her lip, trying to hide a smile.
Last week when we went to Jinx—the local bar slash grill in Riverside—Nina bumped into Hunter, a guy she knew in high school who happens to be the co-captain on the hockey team.
He invited us all to the first game of the season Saturday just gone, and afterward, they threw a party to celebrate their win and Hunter asked her out on a date, but she’s scared of commitment, so she told him she’d check her schedule.
She’s always been persistent since the minute I met her that she never wanted a relationship in fear of them abandoning her like her dad had done. But it’s clear as day, even if it’s early days, that Hunter is going to be the one who changes that.
“She’s totally texting him.” Payton grins.
“So, what’s on everyone’s agenda today?” Nina changes the subject, placing her phone face down on the table as she glances at us.
“You’re not changing the subject,” I give her a pointed look and she groans. “Have you decided if you’re going to say yes to that date?”
Her cheeks flush more. “Maybe.” She mumbles over her mug.
When I’m about to respond, my phone alarm goes off. Reaching my hand out, I click stop before glancing at the time. “Fuck,” I hiss, scraping my chair back and standing up. “I need to head to hockeypractice.”
