11. Put Your Records On
CORINNE BAILEY RAE
11
PUT YOUR RECORDS ON
Dakota Remillard.
Standing in her kitchen. Eating her mama’s biscuits. Smiling his smug smile. Wearing another damp t-shirt.
“Why are you wet?! Again…?” she asked, finding it hard to take her eyes off him. Too worried if she did, he might investigate the house and her life further.
“I washed my… I mean, your car… if you still insist on calling it that. I call it a giant hunk of junk, but whatever. I want it in some semblance of presentable form when I win it. Plus, I needed those points.”
He ran a hand through his damp hair, looking strangely embarrassed. “Sorry, I’m kinda gross, but your mama fed me refreshments and provided some very compelling conversation.”
They’d talked. Because her mama—a born and raised, hospitable Southern woman—could definitely talk, and she’d had a desperate hankering to meet Dakota since the first time Sadie came home blabbering her big mouth about the gorgeous son of her new employers.
And now, he’d talked to her mama over biscuits and lemonade. And met her daddy. And… was asking her about tattoos.
Dakota stepped closer. So close, she could nearly smell the lemonade on his breath.
Lemons. Dang it.
He took her tattooed arm in his hand and began inspecting it. Delicately tracing a finger with a whisper-soft touch over the sunflowers and various drawings permanently written across her skin. As if he were memorizing them. As if he wanted to know more… to know her more…
“You’re avoiding, Edwin,” he said in a near whisper. Sadie felt it pass across her skin. An echo of his touch. “Do you have a kangaroo tattoo hidden somewhere?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She pulled her arm away and wrung her hands together, feeling anything but comfortable. And swearing an oath to never, under any circumstances, tell Dakota about her very real kangaroo tattoo.
No, Sadie felt far too exposed.
Nekkid, as her Dad would say. She wanted to shrink into one of the corners of the house filled with boxes and hide until Dakota left the premises. All of the careful boundaries she’d drawn over the years were becoming dangerously smudged. Because, despite the shock it gave her that Dakota was her surprise visitor, she actually liked seeing him in her home.
Home being a loosely knit term given the fact that the house had sold faster than her parents anticipated. She had one last week left with her parents there before they officially moved to the retirement community, and Sadie would officially take up residence on Ginny’s couch until she found an affordable apartment.
Regardless, Dakota filled the space. Filled her space. With his questions and interest, his kindness and his touch…
Suddenly, entirely too overwhelmed, she took a step back then rushed to the kitchen table, pouring herself a large glass of lemonade and chugging it down in a single breath.
“Whoa. You okay?”
There he was again, pressing his palm into the small of her back and probably singeing his handprint there for all eternity. Like a wildly, hot sorcerer with the power to burn but not break her.
She’d read that book for sure…
She scooted out of his reach and backed herself around the table. Dakota looked at his guilty hand like it had in fact hurt her and shoved it in his pocket, genuine concern written across his face. “I’m sorry, Sadie. I didn’t mean to… well, I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable again. That’s why I came today, to apologize for… well, for stepping over the line…”
Poor Dakota looked far more uncomfortable than he had only moments before. She almost felt bad for him.
Almost.
But she’d certainly hate to interrupt what was sure to be a beautiful apology. So she demurely lowered her head, preparing to listen intently. To let the sound of his voice roll over her—a comfort, like someone reading a favorite book aloud.
“I shouldn’t have kissed you last weekend. I mean, if you can even call it a kiss,” he stammered. “It was more like a kiss between cousins. Man, that sounds mighty Southern… What I meant to say was that you’ve seen me smack my sisters with a big wet one on their cheeks a thousand times. Not that you’re my sister. You’re definitely not my sister. Obviously.” He raised his hands and ran them in the air, from Sadie’s head to her toes.
She raised her eyebrow and pitched her hip. “Kota… you’re babbling.”
“Oh. Uh.” He rubbed his bicep and then through his hair, leaving it in a disheveled, adorable mess. “Okay. Seriously.” He blew out a fortifying breath. “I am sorry. I don’t ever want you to feel uncomfortable around me or like you can’t trust me. Because you can, ya know? You can trust me, Sadie. But maybe me comin’ out here was the wrong move, too. There’s a reason you’ve never invited me over, right? Don’t wanna mess up what you’ve got goin’ on here.” He said half jokingly, looking around the mostly bare room. “Anyways, I just came to apologize, deliver a message, and then I’ll take off and get outta your hair.”
Don’t wanna mess up what you’ve got goin’ on.
It struck a chord. Her own words the first time she’d turned him down, and ones he’d echoed back to her during one of their more epic arguments. That phrase had engraved itself into Sadie’s heart, making her wonder if she was the reason it was so difficult to maintain a friendship with Dakota. If her reasons… her cowardice… was why they had all that so-called tension straining between them.
Maybe she could be just friends. Maybe… she allowed herself a moment to consider… they could be more.
“What’s the message?” she asked, suddenly desperate to hold him hostage in her home a little longer. “If ya came all this way, I’d like to hear it.”
“Well, I’ve got two messages, really.” Dakota leaned onto a tall stack of boxes, seeming more himself. “It looks like the supply chain out of Perdido can’t get our beans delivered in time for next month. They’re having some sort of manning issue with drivers or contractors or something like that.”
“Okay…” Sadie answered, tentatively, and fixed herself a biscuit.
“So, my folks want you and me to drive to Perdido next week and pick up the shipment ourselves.”
She pointed at Dakota. “You?”
“Yes, Edwin.”
“You and me? Driving together? For ten collective hours?”
He smiled mischievously and with far too much enthusiasm. “That’s where the second bit comes in. We could do an additional sixteen hours in the car round trip. Doesn’t that sound like a good time?”
“We’d kill each other.”
“Nah. I think we’d do just fine. And, my sisters want you to come to Tybee Island for our family vacation over the Fourth of July.”
“Me?”
“Yes, Sadie Edwin. Daughter of Edward and Edwina.” He winked. “You.”
“I’m not family, Kota.” She deflated. “I’ll get the coffee from the supplier with you, but I should be back here for the shop. I can’t go on your family’s vacation.”
She bit her biscuit in half, avoiding saying more, and willed herself not to cry.
You cannot cry in front of Dakota Remillard, Sadie. There’s no crying in baseball! she shouted internally at herself, hearing Tom Hanks’ voice instead.
And there’s no crying with Dakota or while eatin’ your mama’s buttermilk biscuits. Zero tears.
She suppressed the tears but not the heaviness beginning to pass over her. After next week, as her parents settled into their new place, she would need somewhere to stay, and she knew she’d want to be near family. Her second family. The Remillards. The thought of being left in Sugartree alone nearly paralyzed her.
Dakota lowered his voice again, emotion scratching his throat. “Sadie, I shouldn’t have ever said that the other night. I’m sorry. Truly. You don’t know how much I regret throwing those words at you… hurting you.” He came close again, lifting her chin and staring intensely into her eyes. She might have considered it single-handedly the most tender—possibly even romantic—moment of her life, if she weren’t near an emotional breakdown, or her mouth hadn’t been full, and if she wasn’t positive honeyed buttermilk biscuit crumbs were stuck to her lips.
“You are our family. Okay?” he said graciously, not acknowledging her mess. “We want you… I want you there.”
“You do?” She hated the hope ringing through her words. The thought that Dakota might actually want her to tag along. With his family. To be with him.
She’d been praying for peace, and the idea of being on the beach with some of her favorite people certainly sounded peaceful. As peaceful as any week with the Remillard gang could be.
“‘Course I do, Edwin. It’s just this thing between us…”
“The tension,” she said, and took a microstep closer, angling her head up to meet his gaze better.
He nodded. “Yeah. It’s um… Well, it can be a little distracting sometimes. Especially when…”
“When we’re actually agreeable to one another? And having fun and… kissing cheeks?” she finished his sentence, feeling the same.
He sighed, almost a relieved sound. “Yeah. That’s it. All this amiability has really shaken me up.”
He leaned in closer, studying the curves of her face the way he’d studied the tattoos along her arm. He passed a wayward thumb across her bottom lip and…
WAS DAKOTA REMILLARD GOING TO KISS HER? On the Mouth?
After just apologizing for this very thing?
“Dakota? What’s happening?”
He searched her eyes and then narrowed in on her lips. “I don’t know. I… uh… maybe you’re confusing me a little, too.”
She froze, perfectly still. Unsure of what she should do with her hands or her body or her face. And utterly shocked to find herself wanting to be kissed by Dakota Remillard.
Dakota shook his head, closing his eyes and seemingly pulling himself from the daze he’d been in. “I’m sorry… again,” he said, sheepishly, and then all too suddenly, he stepped back into a tower of boxes, toppling with them as they all crashed to the floor.
Sadie jumped forward, kneeling down where Dakota had fallen. “My word, Dakota, are you okay?”
She inspected the damage around them. A box of mugs was on its side, broken bits scattered across the floor. The rest of the boxes had been filled with books upon books and most of them, thankfully, well-taped off.
Dakota sighed, eyes closed, laying back onto the pile of books that had freed themselves in the fall. “Like I said, Edwin… you’re just a little distracting.”
He pulled a book from where it was wedged beneath his back, and his eyes lit up with undiluted excitement. “What is this? Twilight?”
Sadie grabbed for the book, but he hugged it to his chest. “Sparkling vampires, Sadie? Really? Is this what a guy needs to be to get your attention?” He giggled, not even slightly embarrassed by the sound in light of the book in his hands, and said through the giggles and a definitive snort, “Spider Monkey…”
“It's literature! And I was a teenager once!” she defended herself, lunging for the book again, but failing to free it from his hands.
“Nuh uh. This is mine now. Gotta brush up on all that vampire lore.” He nodded to the mess surrounding them and sat up. “What is all this? What’s with all the books packed up and the boxes everywhere? I tried to ask your mama, but she just said, we’re all goin’ somewhere.”
“How very existential of her.”
“More like, evasive. Something her daughter is pretty well versed in herself.” He nudged Sadie’s knee with his knuckle. “Come on. What’s going on here?”
She took a deep breath. “My parents are moving to a retirement community. We had to sell the house…”
“Whoa. That’s a big deal. Are you okay with that?” His hand twitched, and Sadie thought he might reach out for her but then thought better of it, settling it on his knee. “Where will you go? Wait… is that why you wanted to play for the loft? Sadie, do you need somewhere to live?”
“Kind of. Yes,” she admitted but then pointed her finger in his face and felt her jaw tightening. “But don’t you dare offer me that loft, Dakota Remillard. I’ll win it, or I’ll find somewhere else to stay. Do you understand? Fair and square or nothin’ at all. Don’t start goin’ all soft on me now. I don’t need your pity. That’s not what I want from you.”
What did she want from him?
He put both hands in the air in surrender. “I hear you. Good gracious. I don’t pity you, Sadie. I…” He hesitated.
“What?”
“You’re important… ya know? Not just to my family, but… you’re important to me.” He repeated his earlier words, as if saying them again wasn’t as monumentally life-shifting as the first time. “Do you have a plan?”
She shrugged, rubbing her finger along the spine of a book. “I’ll keep working and find a place I can afford on my own. I don’t really know past that…”
Sadie hugged the book in her hands. A security blanket. “I keep thinking about VBS,” she confessed. She wasn’t sure why, but she wanted to share with Dakota, in that moment, that she really did believe she’d be okay. She was confident in God’s plan, even if she had no idea where she would end up next.
“VBS?”
“Yeah. About the lesson Georgia told the kids.”
“Oh, during Sprinkle Gate. Got it.” He smiled and nudged her knee. “Go on.”
“I sometimes… a lot of the time… have a hard time trusting… that everything will work out when things go awry. But I know God isn’t surprised. I know He has a plan for my life. For my next move. He’s known it all along.” She felt herself believing those words the more she said them out loud. Speaking the truth always did that for her. “It was nice to be reminded, even in such a simple way for the kids. We don’t have to have everything figured out. Even when… things are a little confusing.”
She bit her lip, hoping Dakota understood he was included in that list of confusion.
“I may not know the purposes behind it all, but I do know and trust His promises.”
Dakota’s eyes widened, looking like he could cry. His hand seemed to involuntarily wrap around Sadie’s ankle in a warm cuff of heat. “What did you just say?”
Sadie looked around, clinging the book closer to her chest and feeling more vulnerable than she before. “I…” she stumbled, shakily, “I said I don’t know God’s purposes, but I know and trust His promises.”
Dakota sniffed, rubbing his nose with his forearm, then pinched his eyes once. The only other time she’d seen him overcome with emotion was when Georgia announced she was pregnant. “That’s… that’s a really grood reminder, Sadie Girl.” He smiled, tears shone unabashed.
“Kota…” she put her hand on his.
“You’re, um… You’re just… Thank you, Sadie.”
Before Sadie could ask him what affected him so suddenly, Dakota released his hold on her and pulled another book from beneath his butt, inspecting it.
“Look! Around the World in 80 Days… It's like the Lord is trying to give you a message now.”
“That I should become an eccentric socialite who seeks adventure but secretly longs for deeper connections?
“No, Edwin.” He smiled wide and flirty—her secret favorite. “That you need a good summer road trip. With me.”
She rolled her eyes but didn’t stop her responding smile and definitely couldn’t control the warmth flooding her veins. She wouldn’t be alone. She’d be with the Remillard family… and with Dakota.
“Okay,” she agreed but drew her battle lines once more. If they were going to do this, she needed to be clear. “A friends only roadtrip. Just friends, Dakota. No tension. No cousin cheek-kissin’.”
“Cheek-kissin’ is definitely not what I have in mind.”
“Kota!” She swatted him with the book in her hands. “I’m serious,” she said through a smile.
“Alright, alright. Aaaasssss yooouuuu wiiiissshhhh,” he whispered-yelled in slow motion.
Dang it. She loved Princess Bride. He was good.
“I’ll be so friendly… So friendly it’s gonna drive ya batty.” He held up his hand like the Boy Scouts’ pledge. “I said it would be better if we weren’t friends, not that I didn’t want to be.”
“Did you just quote Twilight?”
“Yeah, Edwin. It’s literature.” He shrugged. “I was a teenager once. And, also, my sisters were obsessed with that vampire junk for forever.”