10. Becca #2
“You’ll be cold,” I argue.
He leans in close and drops his voice down to a gravelly rumble, making my breath catch and my stomach dip. “And you’re in last night’s clothes. Wear the jacket, Reba.”
I whip around to argue, but the look in his eyes gives me pause. I slide my arms into the jacket and he squeezes my shoulders before jamming his hands into his coverall pockets.
“Okay, Ellie. Let’s go.”
I take her hand again and notice the cute clip holding her hair out of her face. I wonder if Tyler put that there. “Can I show you my classroom?”
I’m stunned. I’ve been around this girl a handful of times and she just trusts me. She likes me. She wants to show me things that are important to her.
“Maybe another time,” I say. “We’ll have to get Miss Kristen’s permission.”
“Okay. Maybe you can bring T-Bone then!”
I look behind me and Tyler trails us, hands stuffed in his pockets and with a ballcap shading his eyes. “Sorry,” I mouth. He just purses his lips and shakes his head. A dismissal.
I crouch in front of Ellie in the dawning light and straighten her backpack straps. “Hey, you have a good day now. Thanks for letting me walk you in.”
Ellie hugs me and Kristen catches my eye. “Becca? What are you doing here?”
“Nothing! I mean, my special friend here asked me to walk her into school so . . . here I am.”
I can’t read her expression, but it’s not good. “I’ll say. Tyler, good to see you too.” Her eyes travel over Tyler, top to bottom and back again. I’d make some comment about the loss of the art of subtlety, but I’ve never been subtle a day in my life. Who am I to talk?
“Yep,” he says, almost inaudibly.
Kristen moves along, her pace disorienting. “That reminds me, Becca, did you ever get those coupons printed for this weekend at your farm? I know some of the families would love to come back. I might even stop by.”
I want to die inside. What I need is for thousands of people to attend my festival and for each of them to pay full price.
But half price ticket vouchers get people in the door, and right now, any people beats no people.
“Right, yes. The coupons. I’ll bring them by before the weekend.”
“The sooner the better,” she says placidly, looking past me and directly at Tyler. “Will you be there this weekend, Mr. Davis?”
“Haven’t planned that far ahead,” he grumbles so low his lips barely move. How does he do that? Is he good with puppets or something?
“Oh, well if you don’t have plans—“
“I actually need to get to work,” I cut in.
Tyler flicks his chin toward the truck. “Let’s go.”
His hand touches my lower back as we walk away and I feel that flash of butterflies I get from him.
Or got. That one time. And that other time he hauled me over his shoulder to get me away from some guys I had no business hanging around with.
And then the butterflies I got again this morning.
He shocks me by opening my truck door and holding out his hand. “After you.”
I eye him suspiciously. “Thank you?”
He replies by gnawing on his lower lip and giving me a quick nod before getting in on his side and starting the truck.
“God, does she ever quit?” he grumbles.
“Kristen’s got a crush,” I tease, burrowing down in his jacket. A cloud of his scent wafts from the fabric, and I hope I still smell like this when I take it off.
“Yeah, well, it’s one-sided,” Tyler states, and I get a flash of that personality he keeps tucked away for most people. But with me, he shows it. Every once in a while anyway. I guess I should feel honored.
“Oh come on, she wants to test your DILF status.”
“My what?” he snaps.
“You can’t tell me you don’t know what DILF means.”
“I know what it means. But that’s not me.”
“Oh, quit with the humble routine.”
He scoffs. “You think she’d really go for the guy who lives in a one-bedroom over his auto shop and lets his daughter have the bed while he takes the couch?”
I know he’s trying to say how uncomfortable he is. How self-conscious he is. Maybe he just needs to be gassed up.
“Ellie thinks the world of you. She’s happy. That’s the most important thing.”
“Doesn’t feel like it,” he says quietly. “I can’t afford full-day preschool. And anyway, it’s damn near impossible to get into.”
“They don’t do the vouchers?”
“I make just a little too much, but I’m paying off CJ’s rehab bills. Which is ironic, considering.”
Considering that she’s gone now, and as far as anyone knows, she’s still alive? We haven’t really touched the elephant between us.
His baby’s mom. His ex. My ex-best friend.
“Yeah. Considering.” I agree. I try to sound airy asking about CJ. “You heard from her?”
“No,” he sighs. “You?”
“Nope. Somebody told me she was working at a resort down South. I thought maybe she’d try—”
“She doesn’t try,” he snaps. “I gotta get gas.” He cuts the wheel to pull into a gas station. He walks in to prepay and my stomach drops with each step he takes. I don’t know why I expected him to commiserate over the person we mutually lost. My hurt is great, but I know his must be greater.
Though, as Ernest always says, there’s no winning in the Suffering Contest.
Tyler emerges with his hands full and his eyes cast down. He opens the truck door and slips a Red Bull into each of our cupholders.
“You didn’t have to get me one,” I say.
He holds out two paper bags. “Blueberry or banana bread?”
“Blueberry,” I say, and with a glance down into the paper bags, he hands one to me.
“Good. I wanted banana bread.” A tiny smirk hooks his lips upwards. Is this an olive branch after he snapped at me? Whatever, I’m not one to turn down a blueberry muffin.
“Thank you?” I ask. “You really don’t have to get me anything.”
He just shrugs. “They were two for one.”
When he gets back in after pumping gas, I pull out a thick wad of dollar bills. “Let me pay for your gas since you’re going out the creek for me.”
I count off $10 in ones and he scowls over at me, the skin on his neck turning red.
“You were gonna ride your bike with a pocket full of cash and wearing Daisy Dukes?”
“I mean, a passerby wouldn’t know about the cash,” I try.
“What do you got all that cash for, anyway?”
“I cleaned house at poker a few nights ago at the hall.”
He chuckles. “’Course you did.”
He cracks the top of his Red Bull and hovers his hand over mine while he raises a brow for the go-ahead. “Thank you. What a gentleman.”
“Don’t tell Miss Kristen,” he jokes as he pops my can open.
This has been such a strange morning. Tyler’s so hot and cold that if he were turning knobs on a sink, I think the thing would just shut off altogether out of protest.
Something in the road makes me gasp and my mouth can’t catch up with my brain.
I put my hand over his chest. “Stop!”
Tyler slams on the brakes, my bike lurching forward in the truck bed.
“What?” he asks. “Should I pull over? Are you about to get sick?”
“No, don’t go any more forward!”
“Why?”
“Park the damn truck!” I demand before jumping onto the gravel road that eventually leads to my house. The gravel is a bitch to ride on with my bike but I make it work.
I run around the front of the truck and catch sight of Tyler trying to peek over the wheel to see what I’m doing.
“Come here, little guy.”
I scoop up a red-eared slider turtle who’s not feeling shy at all, his legs searching for land. I hold it up so Tyler can see and raise my voice so he can hear me in the truck. “Is this one of those degenerates you were talkin’ about?”
I shuffle to the side of the road to let him down and pat the back of his shell. “There you go, buddy. Have a good day!”
Tyler shakes his head when I get back in the truck. “You’re a nut.”
“Would you have rather run that sweet little thing over?”
“Well, no,” Tyler objects. “But you acted like it was an emergency.”
“It was! For him!”
He shakes his head again but his lips twitch. “Now can I go?”
“Yes, driver. Drive on please.”
We bump along the gravel road and approach one of the entries to my farm. “Turn here.”
He turns in and points to my guest cottage. “That place yours too?”
“Yes,” I say. “Supposed to be my money maker but it needs work.”
“How much work?” That quiet, critical eye passes over it, what he does when he’s calculating, figuring something out.
I grimace. It’s more than I care to detail. “New floors. Had a flood last winter that set back the schedule. And then some stuff started happening with the big house too. I’ve got projects coming out my ears.”
“I know something about that,” he agrees.
We arrive at the big house and he parks, but doesn’t turn off his truck. Right. This is my cue to go.
“Well, thanks for the ride. And the treats.” I hold up the paper bag and Red Bull. “If you want to bring Ellie out this weekend, it’s on me. I’ll put you on the list, okay?”
He cuts me an annoyed look. “I can pay admission to your pumpkin patch.”
“You and Ellie don’t pay.” I smirk. “But if you bring your girlfriend, Kristen, full price for her. She loves her Big Daddy too much, that grumpy DILF vibe you’ve got going.”
He rolls his eyes. “You gonna get out my truck, or do I have to boot your ass out?”
“I’d like to see you try,” I say with a big grin. “Call me when my truck’s ready, Big Daddy.”
“You’d better not call me that,” he warns, but there’s no heat behind it.
“Why? What would you do to me, Big Daddy?” I bite my lip and delight to find his cheeks turning pink. He fidgets with his ballcap again.
“You don’t want to know,” he mumbles.
“What was that?” I ask while unbuckling my seat belt and shimmying out of his jacket. “I hope you have a good day, Big Daddy. Thanks for the jacket.”
I lean over and wiggle the bill of his ballcap before scooting out the door.
He sounds so hassled, but I hear the amusement in his voice when my boots hit the gravel. “Bye, Reba.”