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Star ran up ahead to look for pretty rocks, her tutu fluttering as she moved, and it made me smile. When our hands brushed once, then again, I got daring and reached for Lark’s fingers.
“Is this okay?” I asked hesitantly.
“Yeah, but you know this is not…”
“I know. But I’ve never held a guy’s hand before.”
“To be honest, neither have I,” he said, and I didn’t know why that surprised me. Along with his admission that he hadn’t been with many guys. Still, more than me.
I tightened my grip on our fingers as my stomach trembled. When Star circled back to us to show us her treasures, he released my hand, and I tried to tame my disappointment. But he was right. We weren’t dating or boyfriends, even if in that moment I wanted to be.
“I’ve never been to a junkyard,” I said in wonder as we stepped onto the property. I didn’t know where to look first.
He smirked. “Lots of firsts for you.”
And most of them involving you.
There were piles everywhere, of everything I could imagine. Some I recognized as car motors and batteries, but other things I had no clue.
“What is that?” I pointed to a pile of what looked like coins.
“You wouldn’t believe what we find in these cars—tons of loose change.”
“Huh, guess that makes sense.”
“Will Pete do the magic thing?” Star asked, clapping her hands, and I chuckled, wondering what in the world she meant.
“I’m actually not sure if Pete—oh, he is here,” Lark said, waving at his friend, who had emerged from inside a wooden structure, which might’ve been the office.
“Hey, what’s up?” Pete asked as he neared us.
“Just taking a walk.” Lark’s cheeks looked a bit pink, so I wondered if he was embarrassed about what Pete might think about me showing up again. But Pete didn’t seem to care as he lifted his hand in a greeting.
“Magic thing,” Star said again, tugging on Pete’s hand.
“What’s the magic thing?” I asked.
“Star, Pete might not be able to—”
“Why not?” Pete said with a shrug, then dug a key ring out of his pocket. He walked over to one of the cranes and hopped into the seat.
“Okay, you know the rules, Star. You have to stand way back and just watch.”
She listened by backing all the way up to a rusted old automobile, and we followed.
By that time, Pete had turned on the machine and worked the controls to swing whatever that attached round thing was toward the nearest pile. My mouth dropped open when I realized it was a gigantic magnet that was picking up whatever was metal in the pile. Thepingsas the stuff was lifted seemingly into thin air made Star squeal. As Pete swung the long arm to make a pile with the new collectibles, I suddenly understood why she thought it was cool.
“Whoa, I didn’t even know those things existed.”
“They’re useful to separate scrap metal worth something.”
“Will it pick up coins too?”
He shook his head. “There’s not enough metal or copper in them nowadays.”
“Interesting.”
“I’ll take useless trivia for one hundred, Alex,” he said, nudging my shoulder.
