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Realizing how we looked from the outside woke me up, though. I don’t really have a no-friends rule, but Landon and I hadn’t looked like only friends to that woman at the ice cream place. We looked like we were involved,intimate,and Idohave a rule against being those things with a guy. So I put a fast stop to all of it.
Rae noticed, and she didn’t like it. Unfortunately for her, my job is to keep her safe, which isn’t always fun for everybody. Not that I thought it was fun to see the dejected look on Landon’s face when we ran into each other at the store—and, no, I never actually felt like Rae wasn’t safe around him…
…but…
…well, something else I can admit to myself now is that I’d gotten caught up in more than just his personality. Like the curve of his smile. And how his arms don’t seem all that toned until he flexes his muscles for something. And the unapologetic way he laughs when he thinks something is really funny.
Landon is just gorgeous.
Through and through and from head to toe, he’s gorgeous.
So being around him is pretty much asking for trouble, isn’t it? It’s like writing my rules for myself on a piece of paper, then tearing the paper up, then throwing the fluttery little bits into a fire just toreallymake sure they’ve been destroyed.
I can’t do that. I have those rules for a reason.
Yet here I am, waiting for Landon to show up at my house.
But I didn’t invite him over for myself. I invited him forhim, for the sake of helping him with whatever he’s going through. Lolly’s deterioration is a dark storm slowly blotting out his sunniness, and I care about that.
I know what it’s like to be in pain and not have anyone give a damn, and I don’t have it in me to put that back on someone else—not even him, regardless of what complications might be between us.
He’ll be here any second, I’m sure, so I go check on Rae while I can. A couple days ago, she caught a stomach bug from someone at school. She threw up for about twenty-four hours and has since been feverish and fatigued. I’m relieved to find she doesn’t feel as warm as she did earlier, though. The wait to see the doctor this morning was frustratingly long, but the medicine he prescribed seems to be working already, so that’s what counts.
It’s been a while since I refreshed her cool washcloth, so I do that. Then I make sure she’s still got water in the cup on her nightstand. After carefully untwisting the blanket from around her so she’ll be more comfortable, I sneak back out of her room.
I’ve just finished washing my hands in the kitchen when a knock sounds at the front door.
I go ahead and shake off the things I don’t need to think about while Landon is here, like how good-looking he’s sure to be and how Rae has been missing him. Then I go over and turn the locks.
And, to my unpleasant surprise, I findWyatton the other side of my door.
By way of greeting, he raises his eyebrows and says, “Finally! Jesus. I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for forever. You got those notes I left, didn’t you?”
Oh, whoops. I definitely forgot to reply to the note he left several days ago…and I remember now that he wrote a second one yesterday, to which I also forgot to reply….
Well, I guess there’s no time like the present to cancel our date.
I clear my throat. “I did get them. I’ve got a lot going on and I didn’t remember to get back to you. But listen, I’m—”
“Hey, no need to apologize, girl,” he interrupts, his tone changing to one that he must think is charming. A matching smile comes onto his face. “We’re talking now. I gotta say, I was hoping you’d come down to my place to give me your answer, but…” he gives me a wink that makes me feel mildly ill, “…you look good whether you’re on my couch or not.”
I close my eyes in a long blink.
Just get it over with. Cancel the date and send him on his way.“Well, anyway, I meant to do this sooner, so—”
“Right?” he interrupts again. “Been hard as hell for me to wait!”
“Ugh,” I can’t help saying, “no, I—”
“So let’s work this out! You feeling like going now, or is tomorrow better?”
“Would you please—?”
“I get it if you need to wait so you can put your makeup on and all that other shit you women like to do for dates.” He looks me up and down with unabashed lewdness. “Honestly, I like a skirt on a girl, but if I may say so, you still look fuckable in those paj—”
“Shut—” I say loudly now, my temper and disgust soaring into the high heavens, “—shutup!”
For a second, he looks like I’ve slapped him. Then he narrows his eyes at me. “The hell is your problem?”
