Page 86 of Worth the Trip

I pulled away. “You were watching?”

She stared at me.

“You knew we were watching.”

“Nana?”

Nana lifted her teacup. “I glanced.”

“You opened the curtain.”

“I needed a clearer glance.”

I covered my face.

Nyla laughed.

“So?”

I looked through my fingers. “So what?”

“How was lunch?”

I lowered my hands.

My attention moved toward the front window where Landon’s taillights had disappeared several minutes ago, then down to my purse.

The phone remained inside it.

Untouched.

I smiled.

“Lunch was hours ago.”

Six days was enough time to establish a pattern. Nolani called after Crème & Chill closed, and I called when I finished film. Some nights, we talked twenty minutes. Wednesday stretched past an hour because she got me started on book adaptations that had disrespected the source material, and somewhere around midnight, I realized Hershey had strong opinions, excellent recall, and no intention of allowing my advanced degrees to make a bad argument sound better. Thursday, she fell asleep on the phone.

I didn’t mention it Friday because I valued my peace.

By Saturday morning, hearing her voice had worked itself into my week without either of us formally approving the schedule. I liked her texts between meetings, the pictures of experimental flavors with questions attached, and the books she’d started recommending before threatening to test me later like literacy required accountability. None of it felt like we were rushing intimacy to catch up with attraction. We were learning each other in real time, and so far, I was enjoying the hell out of the process.

The whistle left my mouth sharp enough to cut through cleats scraping turf, boys calling for the ball, and the early-morning breeze moving across Self Springs Athletic Park. Three receivers broke from the line at once, each of them convinced speed could compensate for ignoring the route I’d drawn five minutes earlier.

It couldn’t.

The pass sailed over Malik’s shoulder and struck the grass several yards beyond him. He threw both hands into the air like the football had betrayed him personally.

I lowered the whistle against my chest. “Bring it back.”

A chorus of groans followed them toward the line of scrimmage. Malik retrieved the ball and jogged backward, still looking offended on his own behalf.

“Coach, I was open.”

“You were also supposed to run a slant.”

“I improvised.”

“You abandoned the play.”