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“She said she’d mentioned that I’ve moved back.” Her expression shifted slightly when I didn’t answer. “My son wanted to go to school here, so…”
I nodded, pressing my lips into a thin smile.
“My ride is here, Lucas.” Emily hopped up and gently squeezed my arm. “I’ll talk to you soon, okay?”
Just my luck. The girl I wanted kept me in the friend zone, and the one I couldn’t run away from fast enough wanted me.
Here and now.
Before I had the ability to say anything, Emily was out the door.
Chapter Five
Emily
My grandma’s frail body didn’t match the fiery words coming from her mouth.
“How can a Seattle hospital not have lattes?” She frowned at my grandpa as if he had the answer. “How do they expect me to recover without caffeine?”
“I can run down the street and get you one, Mimi,” I offered.
“That’s why you’re my favorite.” She grinned dopily.
Clearly, the meds had taken over. “And what the heck is that contraption doing here? How, in God’s name, am I supposed to get up and walk using that thing? It will roll me right onto my ass.”
My mom snickered as her mother-in-law’s gaze snapped over to hers.
“What’s so funny?” Mimi scowled.
Mimi never swore, so we all knew that whatever was pumping through her veins was doing the talking.
Yeah, this wasn’t the crowd I’d be sharing my poetry with.
“You have to use the walker before they let you out of here,” my mom explained.
My grandpa nodded and reached for his wife’s hand. “Doctor told me so himself.”
“Use it, and then what? We have stairs at home.”
I knew my parents dreaded this day. My grandparents lived in a mid-century modern that was as flat as a pancake once you got into it. The problem was that the house was perched on one of the steep hillsides that made Seattle famous. There were at least thirty steps just to get into their house.
Mimi always said that was what kept her youthful and looking better than most forty-year-olds.
But now, those steps seemed to be what kept her from going home for a while.
“Just have someone carry me in. Problem solved.” Mimi looked around the room as if she’d figured out world peace.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” my mom started, but Mimi ignored her and looked right at me. “You can’t move your leg in certain directions. It could pop out, and all sorts of things could go wrong.”
“This is why you need a husband,” Mimi said, her eyes sharpening right on me. “Then you could get him to carry me up.”
“I’d need two husbands and a stretcher,” I pointed out.
Obviously, what my mom just told her went in one ear and out the other.
I chuckled, biting my bottom lip to keep from saying anything.
Mimi’s gaze landed on Mae, who'd just opened a bottle of water. “Same goes for you. I don’t know what you girls are waiting on. It’s not like there’s Mr. Perfect out there.” Mimi looked at my grandpa. “I got the last perfect model sixty years ago.”
