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I know I’m being crazy—maybe it’s all the advice I’m giving him, or maybe it’s the purple shirt Itriedto give him... But I swear Owen has been more disagreeable lately. Not really disagreeable. Just not agreeable.
I don’t know.
And weirdly, I don’t hate it.
“Fine. Grammy said we can use her place, but I’m telling you, it’s not going to be as spooky.”
“I’m okay with that.”
I sigh out a laugh. “Fine. Have a good day at school. And I’ll have a new girl for you by the end of the week.” I silently revel in the joy I felt when Owen told me that he wouldn’t be seeingBelle again. I didn’t feel right inside when it came to that girl. She was… too perfect.
“Not for the party though, right? That can just be us being us and not a project. Right?”
“You’re never a project, O. You’re the prize. But no—not for the party.” I don’t think I could stomach that.
He laughs. “Gotta go, Annie. We’ll talk later?”
“Of course.”
I hang up, my cheeks swelling with a grin, then jolt to life at the scene in front of me. In fact, I might have peed myself a little. But my five-foot-one, gray-haired Grammy stands directly over me, a plate in one hand and a knife in the other.Yikes.
“You like that boy too much.”
“Owen?” I hold my hands to my chest. “It’s Owen, of course I like him.”
“No,” she spouts, setting the plate in front of me and setting the steak knife across it. “You like him too much.”
“He’s my friend. You have nothing to—”
“He’s a nice boy. A good man.”
And now I am officially offended. “I don’t deserve a nice boy?”
“You would take a nice boy and crush his soul into a million little unmendable pieces.”
“What? Gram!” I sit up taller. “I would not.”
“You would. You are like me. A man-eater.”
I scoff. “A man-eater? I—”
“We chew them up and spit them out.” She shakes her head. “Until we meet the man who can handle us, and then we marry him in two-point-five seconds.”
I blink, the chicken fried steak in front of me coming in and out of darkness. “I am not a man-eater, Grammy.”
“If Owen were right for you, Little Dove, you would have married him by now.”
“In two-point-five seconds?” I say, setting aside her offensive words to mess with her ridiculous logic.
“Yes.”
“So, in the third grade? I would have married him while nine years old?”
“Exactly.” She nods, both hands on her hips.
“Gram. Do you hear yourself? Married at nine?”
She bends, though she’s so tiny she doesn’t need to go far to meet me at eye level. She shakes a single finger at me. “I know about you breaking another heart, Annie Archer. You think I don’t, but I do. You had a man. And you broke his heart. Just like you have a dozen times before.”
