A Hundred Mile Dating Radius
Sadie
The drive home from Cupid’s Arrow was longer than I remembered. Maybe because Gio seemed in no hurry, he let the car idle at every turn, as if he was determined to wring every minute from the night.
After what felt like an hour, but was only about ten minutes, Gio’s Audi rumbled down the private road to Lockhart Ranch.
The radio played something low and bluesy, and every so often Gio would hum along, off-key and unbothered.
It was almost midnight, the air still thick with the misty cold that never quite left the Oregon coast. I rolled the window down a few inches, letting the wind whip my hair against my face and sting my eyes, desperate for a little shock to the system.
Gio had kept the conversation light, like he always did.
He’d told me a story about a patient who ordered a sex worker to his hospital room, the nurse caught them in the act, and the woman insisted that she get paid despite the interruption.
Another patient ordered UberEats to his surgical suite, he was convinced he was going to die under the knife and wanted steak to be his last meal.
I laughed at all the right places, Gio had always been entertaining, but my mind was still stuck on Dawson.
My skin prickled with the memory of Dawson’s hand on my wrist, the way his voice had dropped when he said my name and asked if I needed a ride.
I told myself that was just the alcohol talking, but the truth was, Dawson Lockhart had a magnetism that bent everything in my life around him, even after all these years.
If I were being honest with myself, I wanted it to be Dawson’s truck I climbed into, wanted to see him gripping the steering wheel like it might snap in half.
But I was terrified of what I’d do if that actually happened.
It wasn’t just the old ache of wanting him, it was the new, dangerous certainty that I’d say or do something reckless.
I watched the way he looked at me all night in the bar, the tension in his jaw, the heat in his eyes.
There were things between us that had never been resolved, only buried under long silences and awkward avoidance.
I kept my gaze fixed out the window, watching the fog roll in thick sheets along the pastures. Sometimes I imagined Dawson was the fog, everywhere at once and impossible to escape, even when you tried your hardest.
“Was it nice catching up with everyone tonight?” Gio asked.
“Yeah, I can’t believe that Gen and Gavin are together,” I said, half-laughing, half-incredulous, my words cutting through the pop music playing from the speakers.
To be honest, I couldn’t believe Gio’s cousin Gen was with anyone. I never in a million years thought she’d settle down. She always talked about marriage and commitment like it was a death sentence.
“Apparently they’ve been hooking up since high school.” He glanced at me sidelong and drummed a rhythm on the steering wheel with his left hand.
“Really?” I shot him a look, the kind you give when you’re not sure if you’re being played. In the dark, his eyes were just reflections in the dash lights, but I could see the gleam of mischief.
“Yep,” he confirmed. “Gen told me they used to sneak out behind the boathouse after football games. At first, I thought she was just fucking with me.” He shrugged, his smile morphing into something more wistful.
“But Gavin corroborated her story. I can’t believe they managed to keep it a secret for so long. ”
“Same, that’s actually pretty impressive,” I agreed.
Valentine Bay had always felt like a petri dish, a place where every secret, every rumor, every mistake, was dissected under a microscope and grew into something larger than life.
We lapsed into an easy, companionable silence, one that I was grateful for.
I focused on the way the headlights sliced through the fog, illuminating the white fencing and manicured hedges that marked the entrance to the ranch.
Everything about Lockhart Ranch was exaggerated, almost cartoonish in its perfection—the glowing lanterns, the stone pillars, the rows of lavender marching up the drive.
I knew that Dawson didn’t live here anymore, but I still felt like he did.
I pictured him inside the house, waiting to ask why I had chosen Gio over him.
Or maybe he was out in the barn, pretending to be too busy to care.
About halfway up the mile-long drive, Gio turned and cleared his throat. “How is it being back?” he asked, his tone careful.
I shrugged, then realized I hadn’t answered aloud. “Good, weird, but good.” I inhaled deeply and tried to expound on my response. “It’s like nothing’s changed and everything’s changed.”
The Audi’s headlights picked out the glint of the vineyard’s wire trellises, the endless rows of dormant vines as he turned toward the cabins. I could see the memory of a younger version of myself running those rows, chasing after a boy who never once slowed down to let me catch him.
Silence again, but not the comfortable kind this time. Gio’s gaze flicked to me, lingered for a beat. “Why’d you stay away so long? Is there a body buried somewhere you were running from?” He phrased it as a joke, but there was something raw underneath.
I hesitated as my mind considered my responses.
I could feed him a platitude, tell him I was busy.
I could tell him the truth, that I’d stayed away out of respect for Buddy because every single time he looked at me I knew it was like rubbing salt in the wounds of losing his Rosie and Rosebud.
Or that I’d always known Dawson was my kryptonite, and if I came back and he asked me to stay, I would, so I hadn’t come back. But I didn’t say any of those things.
“I think I just needed space to figure out who I was without…” The rest trailed off. Without the ghost of my mom or this town telling me who I was, I thought, but didn’t say.
“Without Dawson?” Gio’s voice was gentle, but the question cut all the same.
I felt my cheeks burn, even in the dark. “No,” I shot back, but realized as I did that, I was lying, because there was some truth to that. I hadn’t known who I was without being Dawson and Sadie, Sadie and Dawson. “I just…I couldn’t breathe here. You know?”
Gio nodded, but didn’t push. That was his gift: knowing when to press and when to back off. He let the car coast to a stop outside the cabin Selma had moved me to after the Hope Falls guests had checked out, the engine idling quietly.
I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle, but Gio touched my arm, feather-light. “Is it weird, me asking you to hang out while you’re here?”
“No.” I stopped, my hand hovering inches from the latch. “It wasn’t weird. I’ve known you my whole life.”
He took a steadying breath. “Would you maybe want to get dinner? Just the two of us. No Lockharts. No Valentines. No pressure.”
The question hung between us, heavier than I expected.
For a wild second, I wanted to say yes. I’d liked the way Dawson had looked tonight, like he wanted to go to war over me.
But there was no way I was going to use Gio as a pawn to make his best friend jealous.
I wish I didn’t care what Dawson thought, or what he felt, but I couldn’t help it.
Dawson was a living, breathing magnetic force that pulled every molecule of me in his direction, even when all my logic screamed to steer clear.
I shook my head, slow, regretful. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
Gio gave a small, lopsided smile, but I could tell it stung. “Because of Dawson?”
I didn’t answer at first. I thought about all the ways I could lie—tell him it was work, or exhaustion, or Buddy, or the million other tiny obligations that never seemed to leave me alone. But I was so tired of pretending, so tired of holding my breath every time I thought about the past.
I nodded. “Yeah. It’s because of him.”
“So there is still something between you two?”
“I can’t speak for him,” I responded as diplomatically as I could.
Gio exhaled as a tiny grin appeared on his face. For the first time in my life, he seemed to be at a loss for words. The silence was clean, and sharp, and not as awful as I’d imagined.
“Thank you,” I said, and I meant it for everything—for the ride, for the friendship, for showing interest but still being respectful.
He smiled again, softer this time, then reached over to open my door from the inside, just like he used to do in high school before the world got complicated and we all learned to lock ourselves in. The dome light snapped on, painting his face in stark white.
“Thanks again.” I stepped out into the chilly night, the damp air immediately curling around my ankles, and closed the door with a gentle click.
I glanced back once, and saw Gio’s silhouette in the driver’s seat, his head bowed in what I would assume was disappointment, although it looked like he was saying a prayer.
I took a deep breath and climbed the steps to the little guest cabin.
I opened the door and paused at the threshold.
When I looked back down the long drive, I saw Gio’s taillights turn at the main gate.
I couldn’t help but notice the illumination of the main house, windows blazing against the inky black night sky like a beacon of golden light, a living diorama of the perfect family I’d never quite belonged to.
It looked like some kind of fairytale—one I was only allowed to visit as a guest, never a resident.
That’s how I’d always felt at the Lockhart Ranch, no matter how much Selma, Chuck, and Dawson’s brothers had tried to make me feel like family.
All my life I felt like an outsider looking in.
Even at Buddy’s, I never felt like I really belonged, especially after my mom got sick and then was gone.
I felt like an inconvenience more than anything else.
I do have some memories of being close to my mom, but when she was sick, which was a lot of the time, I just needed to let her rest and stay away from her.