Chapter Sixteen Portland, OR 2009 #2
“You’re the best,” Scarlett said into Chrissie’s hair.
It was in its longest phase right now, a week or two out from being cut and shipped off—a glorious waterfall of silk and strawberry-scented shampoo.
“You always have been. I’m gonna spend all day making Grimshaw miserable.
I hope you warned him, Chrissie. All I want for my birthday is to reduce him to sad, emo tears. I bet his eyeliner won’t even run.”
Chrissie laughed and planted a kiss on Scarlett. “It’s your day, Scarlett. Do whatever you want. Just be back here at five so we can eat bagel pizzas and pretend we’re on a beach in Mexico where we belong.”
* * *
If anyone had told Scarlett that she might not hate eight hours spent in the company of a guy who was majoring in comparative history of ideas (how was that even a real thing?) at the University of Washington, she’d have laughed them right out of the room.
And out of the arcade where they spent two hours in a cutthroat Ms. Pac-Man battle, and out of the frozen yogurt shop where Grimshaw had ironically insisted they eat lunch.
“Spill,” she said, pointing her plastic spoon at Grimshaw as they sat across from each other at a sticky booth in the corner.
She’d purposefully loaded up as many brownie and cookie dough chunks as she could to rack up the price tag, but even that didn’t seem to have affected him.
“What did Chrissie say to get you to be so nice to me?”
He touched an ironic hand to his heart, where the artfully faded image of Miles Davis was emblazoned across his T-shirt. “I’m hurt, Sanderson. What makes you think this wasn’t my idea?”
“Because you’re the most selfish person I’ve ever known,” she replied without any need to think about it. “Except for myself, of course.”
A lopsided grin touched the corners of his mouth in the manner of teenage heartthrobs everywhere. “Then what would Chrissie have to say to get you to be nice to me?”
Scarlett didn’t have to think about this one, either.
“She wouldn’t have to say anything. She’d just look at me with those big, soulful eyes, and I’d have no other choice. She sees the good in people even when it’s hidden under layers of bullshit—both mine and yours—and we’re powerless against it.”
“Then there you go.” His gaze caught hers in a wave of such understanding that it left her feeling breathless. “It seems you and I were meant to be. Now hurry up and eat. We’ve got a few more stops on our road to redemption.”
Scarlett wasn’t sure what she expected their next stop to be, but it definitely wasn’t a high school pickup line on the south side of Portland.
“No way.” She sat bolt upright in the passenger seat of Grimshaw’s ancient Honda Accord and watched as students poured out of the flat, sprawling building. “Is that Mitchell? Blue-vomit Mitchell? And is he cute now?”
“Grimmy Bear!” As soon as he spotted them, Mitchell loped across the parking lot, his long-legged stride making quick work of the pavement.
“Mom said you’d be by to pick me up today, only I thought—” He stopped, his chiseled jaw dropping when he noticed Scarlett in the front seat.
In the past six months, his jaw wasn’t the only thing that had gained definition.
He was almost as tall as Grimshaw now, his body honed and lean in the way that always happened when teenage boys hit a major growth spurt.
He’d never be as good-looking as his older, more deliberately disheveled cousin, but there was something about his wide-eyed earnestness that worked.
“Get in, loser,” she said, punctuating her statement with a smile so he knew she meant no harm.
“It’s my birthday, and Grimshaw is in charge of keeping me entertained until my surprise party.
Only he keeps quoting Catcher in the Rye at me without any context, so I might not make it.
If I hear ‘Life is a game, boy’ one more time, I’m tucking and rolling out of this car even if we’re on the freeway. ”
Grimshaw laugh-grunted, a habit he must have picked up his first year at college. “You just quoted Mean Girls without any context. How is that better?”
Scarlett laugh-grunted right back. “It’s not my fault you’re, like, in love with me or something.”
Mitchell piled into the back seat of the car. The door hadn’t even closed behind him before Grimshaw was flooring it, tearing away from the school at a pace Scarlett felt pretty sure would earn him a speeding ticket from the traffic camera posted at the corner.
Which, good. Even though she knew that Chrissie had given her the ultimate gift in lending Scarlett her boyfriend for the day, she still didn’t like the guy.
Sure, he could be charming when he pulled out all the stops, and yeah, he was being way nicer than he’d ever been before, but he was still just a boy, when all was said and done.
He wasn’t a best friend. He wasn’t someone who mattered.
One of these days, Chrissie would be done with him, and then Scarlett could finally have her friend to herself again.
* * *
Of course Grimshaw took them to Powell’s to finish out the day.
“Why does everything with you have to do with books?” Scarlett grumbled as she and Mitchell trailed him through the massive bookstore.
Crowds of tourists were taking pictures in front of the doors; just as many of them shuffled down the aisles with the wide-eyed wonder of people who apparently had never been to a bookstore before.
“Chrissie told you to entertain me, not yourself.”
“I am entertaining you.” He lifted a huge art book titled Nudes Throughout History from the shelf and flashed it at her.
She didn’t bother to hide her disgust. Beneath Grimshaw’s academic, devil-may-care facade beat the most predictable heart in the world.
“I didn’t get you a birthday present, so you should pick one out. You can get anything you want.”
Scarlett noticed the price sticker on the book—a whopping eighty-five dollars—and pointed at it. “Okay. You convinced me. I’ll take it.”
Grimshaw visibly blanched and hurried to slip it back on the shelf. Behind them, Mitchell laughed. “Scarlett’s got your number, Grim. You’re honor bound to buy it now. For an extra fifteen, they’ll probably even gift wrap it for you.”
“No way. Chrissie only gave me a hundred bucks for the whole day. Pick a romance novel or something.”
Scarlett swiveled to stare at Grimshaw. He’d recovered his color by this time, once again back to endlessly flopping his hair and stopping to catch the flash of his reflection in every passing window.
“I’m sorry. Say that again?”
“What? About getting a romance novel? I don’t know what you like to read. You seem like the type to salivate over some duke rescuing damsels from the back of his horse.”