Chapter 18 #2
“I won’t fuck it up,” I said. “Wilder’s special, and he deserves every good thing I can give him.”
Chase’s brow uncreased and something like a grudging smile flitted across his features. “Yeah,” he said. “He does. Just… be a good boyfriend, yeah?”
There was that word again, and the thrill I felt at hearing it had me grinning from ear to ear as I took my flowers and left.
When I got home I took a minute to try and make the flowers look less like they’d been attacked by a goose, and then I walked over to Wilder’s place, my heart beating wildly.
I was as nervous as a teenager picking up his prom date.
Which, for the record, had never actually happened.
Let’s just say I wasn’t a social butterfly as a teenager.
Translation: I’d been too scared to ask my crush to prom.
Instead, I’d gone with a group of friends, all of us pretending it was because we were too cool for bullshit like high school relationships and not because, you know, nobody would date us.
But if I had ever picked up a prom date, I imagined this was exactly as nerve-racking as it felt.
And anyway, I might not have had a prom date, but now I was dating the hottest guy in town. So I was definitely winning. High school me wouldn’t have believed his luck. Actual me barely did.
Before I reached the house, the front door flew open and Gracie burst down the stairs with the speed of a lion chasing down a gazelle. Then right before she collided with me, she suddenly stopped and stared at her feet.
“Hi, Gracie,” I said.
She wriggled and looked up at me. “Hi, Mr. Smith.”
“Is your dad in?” I asked, even though I could see him leaning on the rail at the top of the porch steps.
She nodded, suddenly shy the way little kids were when their feelings got big.
“I bought you something,” I said. Her eyes widened as I plucked the nicest, most intact flower from the bunch and handed the rest to her.
“Daddy!” she bellowed. “Daddy, look!”
Wilder loped down the steps, rubbing the back of his neck the way he did when he was embarrassed. “Hey.”
“Hey,” I said and held the remaining flower out to him.
He took it, his eyebrows raised. “What’s this for?”
I tilted my head and considered. “Tradition, mostly. I bought my boyfriend flowers. Well, a flower. I wanted to do something nice for you.”
His cheeks were red, and he stared at the same patch of ground that Gracie had inspected a few moments before. I could see the curl of his mouth, though, and when he looked up again, it was a proper smile. “Nobody’s ever—I mean, thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” I glanced down at Gracie, who was sitting on the step and counting her flowers. “So, you are coming over later, right?” I asked quietly.
“Yeah.” He swallowed and then nodded. “You, uh, kissed me in the school parking lot.”
My face warmed. “You kissed me back.”
“I guess I did.” He laughed softly, and then his expression grew serious again. “About the other night. You said we could date, and then—and then you said you didn’t want to.”
I thought back to the twins’ birthday party. Had I said that? Or was that just what he’d heard? I winced. “You took too long to answer. I wanted to give you an out. You know, the sort where we could both pretend I hadn’t just humiliated myself in front of you.”
“That’s what was going on?” he asked, his brow creasing.
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed this at all, but I’m a very awkward and uncomfortable person.”
“I think you’re pretty okay,” he said.
“Oh, high praise indeed,” I said, even though I had the feeling that coming from Wilder it actually was.
“I think you’re more than pretty okay,” he amended. “That’s why I took so long to answer. It didn’t make sense that someone like you could be interested in someone like me.”
“I am very interested in you,” I said. “Very.”
Wilder’s face did something complicated, and then he looked at his feet again.
“Hey,” I said, and he looked up. “I think that maybe we’ve hardly scratched the surface of how a bunch of people have treated you in this town.
And I don’t need you to spill your guts like this is an episode of Maury.
I can wait until you’re ready to talk about it.
But I am in your corner, okay? Just like Danny and the twins and Miller, except hopefully I’m the only one who gets to kiss you. ”
“You are,” he said.
“Good.” I took his hands in mine and closed the space between us. Went up on my tiptoes to bump my forehead against his. The sudden smell of chrysanthemums told me we might have crushed the flower, but I didn’t care. “I’m the lucky one here, Johnny, okay? Because you’re amazing.”
“Okay,” he whispered.
I stepped back. “Come and see me tonight.”
“I will,” he said. “Soon as I can.”
I smiled at Wilder, waved goodbye to Gracie, and headed home.
I busied myself doing all my usual tasks—checking I had everything I needed for school tomorrow, answering emails, getting distracted from answering emails by cookie recipes.
The usual stuff. I sent Dallas a text telling him I had a boyfriend now.
Then I sent the family group chat a text because no way could Dallas keep that under his hat for long.
Then I put the group chat on mute because eight people messaging at once was a lot, especially when they were all sending variations on “details!” and “about time.”
I heated up leftovers for dinner and ate at the kitchen counter, where I could glance out the window like the neighborhood busybody and watch the comings and goings next door.
It was all comings. Cash got home first—I only knew it was him because of the dirt bike—and then Danny arrived.
Chase got home later, when it was already dark.
The lights from their house gave it a pleasant glow, and shadows passed the windows occasionally.
I went and showered and changed, and when I found myself in the kitchen again afterward, I had to go sit in the living room with a book to stop myself staring wistfully at Wilder’s house like a sad adoptable puppy on a pet shelter page.
He’d get here when he got here—he was probably having a live-action version of my family group chat right now.
When the knock finally came, I leapt off the couch like I’d had a thousand volts put through me and hurried to open the door.
Wilder stood there wearing a dark V-neck tee that clung to his biceps, jeans, and his cowboy hat tilted down over his face. It was hot as fuck. He gave me a smile—a sexy, flirty thing that set my heart racing—and drawled, “Sooo, I was thinking we could try that blow job now.”
“I don’t know, cowboy,” I said and hummed. “I’m kinda busy.”
I gave him a moment to react—it was jaw-dropping astonishment—and then I burst out laughing and reeled him inside by the belt loops on his jeans.