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“Just a little scratch,” Riley said as he examined the front bumper. He looked underneath and frowned. “Nothin’ major. You lucked out there.”
My cheeks burned.
Now there were more people playing in the water on the sidewalk.
A firefighter came with a toolbox, and I stood dumbfounded, dripping wet, and feeling like something in my life had strangely, inexplicably, but also fundamentally shifted.
Riley turned to face me and smiled.
Ding. Warmth and magic zinged around my chest, wanting to explode like fireworks.
Yeah. I could save myself for a guy like this. I could sacrifice even more than a van for him.
A guy who holds the door for a little old lady who is moving slowly? He didn’t show an ounce of impatience.
A guy who helped me when I did something stupid. Who was then smiling at me.
A guy who called me darlin’ in a way I felt. I felt it like warmth spreading through my veins.
A guy who lives in a community of people that help one another, that are there for each other, unlike the community I was trying to make myself part of where they were all competitive, backstabbing, and opportunistic – itching for the next bit of gossip to spread and only looking for their next dopamine rush and nothing of any true substance whatsoever.
Not like this guy. This guy? A guy who lives in a world of magic.
A world where I could probably be myself instead of hiding who I am and what I come from.
If only.
“You need help getting somewhere?” he asked. “You all right?”
I shook my head. “I’m okay. Just a bruised ego. Thank you for your help.”
“You sure?” He eyed me from head to toe and then back to head again. “You want a towel?”
I took stock of myself. Dripping wet, my dress pale pink and pretty dang see-through.
I covered my chest and watched his eyes sparkle with mischief as he scratched his jaw.
“You carry towels in your back pocket?” I asked.
His shoulders shook with silent laughter. He patted his backside with both hands. “Not today. But I could nip into the diner and ask if they’ve got something.” He jerked his thumb toward the restaurant.
“I’m not going far. I can leave my bus parked here in fact. Thanks for saving me the trouble of parallel parking on this street. Wasn’t looking forward to that.”
He laughed. “Innovative way to get yourself a valet.”
The water was shut off and people were grumbling.
“It’s hot. C’mon, sir! Turn it back on!” a kid called out.
“Yeah!” the old man that had run through the water chimed in.
“Sorry folks,” the firefighter apologized and looked at me and Riley.
“You okay, little lady? That you that hit it?”
“Guilty. It was an accident. I’m so sorry about that,” I called over. “Do you need my insurance information?”
How much was this little blunder gonna cost me?
“No harm, no foul. All hydrants on this block were slated for flushing on Monday, anyway. You just let us check this one off our list first. Don’t concern yourself. You cooled these folks off, too.” He shrugged and then waved before heading down the street.
Weird. That was it? No fines? I guessed I lucked out.
A familiar song played, increasing in volume. The ice cream truck. It pulled up beside us. The wet elderly man, the wet kids, and the wet dog trotted over as the window opened.
And until now, I associated the ice cream truck song with the death of my parents. Because I’d heard that song just moments before they died. But now I had a new memory to link to this song.
“You want one?” Riley asked, gesturing to the truck.
My eyes landed on the graphics on the side. On the banana split. I really, really did.
I felt like I was in the middle of a meet cute romance movie.
But suddenly something hollowed out in my chest, and I got a dark and foreboding sensation. And the sudden urge to get to Aunt Lyrica.
I don’t have the vivid clairvoyance gift Vivi does, but what I do have is a finely honed sense about my family, about people I care about. Many times since my eighteenth birthday when I got this sensation, something was wrong with someone I cared about. Aunt Lyrica told me she and Aunt Mimi had often discussed my connection to all of them, similar to the gift Aunt Lyrica had with all her relatives. They said they believed I’d have similar gifts to her and had believed it for most of my life.
I knew something wasn’t right and needed to get to Aunt Lyrica.
“I can’t. But I really wish I could.”
He looked disappointed. “Sure you don’t want a banana split?” he tried, as if he knew what my eyes had landed on, though the whole side of the truck was filled with graphics. “Who can turn down a banana split?”
