Chapter 14 #2
“Remember?” Brie answers quietly, eyeing Dev’s plate of seafood linguini. I fork some of my own seafood linguini onto her plate as she says, “I worked here over summers because The Square wouldn’t let me do doubles.”
Doubles? I knew from that night in the rain that, while I cruised around town with friends and our parents’ credit cards, Brie worked for her allowance, which she sometimes had to use on her pathetic father.
But two jobs over summer break? And beyond that, it’s unfathomable her job here was the only reason she ever ate the food here.
“Aren’t you a little young to be principal?” Harvest asks, picking the conversation back up where she was last included. I wonder if her voice sounded this nasally all along. “You must have worked yourself to the bone to get where you are.”
Brie chokes on her pasta. My eyes cut to Harvest. She flutters her eyelashes at me.
Unruffled, Dev leans back in their booth with a placid smile, but I notice his arm is no longer draped behind her.
“The man works hard,” he says like the wingman I don’t want. “I heard you earned your masters while teaching. Before that, you got your degree while you were on active duty? You were a SEAL, right?”
Brie’s head snaps to me. “You enlisted?”
“Wait.” Harvest shifts her gaze to Brie, a wide grin pulling at her mouth. “How do you not know? I assumed you guys were dating,” she nods toward my plate. “Sharing food—”
Brie’s gaze snaps between our plates, eyebrows knitting. For a second, I wonder if she’ll hurl the linguini back at me.
I don’t know what compels me to do it, but I cover her hand with mine in her lap.
She tenses for one strained moment before determination takes hold of her, and she brings our hands up to rest on the table.
A message to Harvest. I know she’s doing this for Dev, I know she probably hates to see him snubbed by his own date, but I’ll take it.
For his part, Dev looks as happily sedate as ever.
“—holding hands,” Harvest finishes with an arched eyebrow. “I thought you two were together.”
Brie tightens her hold and scoots closer to me. Our thighs press together. Her smell wafts toward me. I’m simultaneously the most content I’ve ever been, and so keyed up I could flip over a car.
Brie smiles at Harvest. It’s so saccharine it comes around to being venomous. When she rests her head on my shoulder, I make the mistake of peering down. Her shirt looks stretchy. I shift uncomfortably as my jeans try to strangle my dick.
“We didn’t keep in touch while I was away,” Brie replies. “But we made quick work once I came back.”
Dev laughs, completely obtuse. “Brie hated Sawyer in school.”
Brie and I stiffen, but he doesn’t seem to notice. How was I ever jealous of this guy? He’s a complete bonehead.
“Seriously?” Harvest breathes, hungry for drama. “Why?”
I grind my molars. There are things I did that I’m not proud of, behavior I’ve had to work through with my therapist to understand they were all in response to my own demons. Sometimes it’s hard for me to believe I’m not that guy anymore.
When neither of us answers, Dev does. “Lots of reasons.” He turns to Brie, guffawing. “Remember when you wore heels in ninth grade?”
Brie’s spine goes ramrod straight. She tries to pull her hand away, but my hold is strong.
“What happened?” Harvest prods.
“Halloween, Brie was dressed as some twenties flapper—”
“Holly Golightly,” I correct. “From Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Fuck if I know why I’m helping Dev tell the story.
“Right. I wasn’t there,” Dev continues, “but Brie walks into math class—”
“Art,” Brie and I say tensely together.
“Sure,” Dev says, giving zero shits about veracity.
“So she walks into art class, and Sawyer throws a bunch of marbles at her feet.” He bursts out laughing.
Before I can cut in, he adds, “So there she is, in front of everyone, swinging her arms around, trying to stay upright. Like a giraffe on roller skates or something!”
Brie’s body tightens even more beside me, which I didn’t think was possible. “Colored pencils,” she says, trying so hard to keep her voice steady it’s almost monotone.
“I didn’t throw them at you,” I mumble weakly.
She twists her hand out of mine, truce over.
“I loved that dress. I found it with what was left of my mom’s things, and I’d never felt so elegant walking into school that day.
Like Audrey Hepburn.” She shakes her head, and almost to herself adds, “I was so stupid.” Her eyes harden when they find me again.
“And of course, you proved exactly how stupid. It took you just a split second to ruin something I was excited for all week.”
My stomach lurches.
I remember it all perfectly, but it didn’t happen in a split second like she thinks.
The day prior, Brie had come into my family’s bookstore to sell some old bodice rippers.
I was the only one in. Without anyone around, I was able to just be myself.
It was the best interaction we’d had, maybe ever, even if it was a little awkward.
I gave her a good deal, and she gave me a tentative smile.
But Dad walked in from the back entrance just in time to see her leave out the front. He gave me more than a hard time that night for not just doing business with a Casey but giving her more than she deserved.
I was still stewing the next morning when Brie walked in not dressed like a ghoul for Halloween, but looking even prettier than normal. If I let myself soak in the memory, I can still feel the bitter rage take hold of me.
I could never have Brie, even though she was right there.
Looking back, it’s lucky all I did was knock over some pencils. I don’t know if I meant for Brie to be the target. I still don’t know if I wanted to see her suffer, like I was suffering, or if she was just collateral damage.
But Brie was always clumsy, susceptible to accidents anyway. That day, she didn’t stand a chance. It happened in slow motion. There was nothing I could do but watch, slack jawed, as her arms windmilled out as she skidded along the floor.
Everyone in the class roared with laughter, some cheering for me.
“I landed on my ass, right on my tailbone,” she adds, still ignoring me. “For six months I couldn’t sit without the reminder.”
I wince. I didn’t know that.
“But it was an accident,” Harvest says helpfully. “Right, Sawyer?” She winks at me, and I want to throw up.
Brie looks at me with all the contempt I deserve. “Just like prom was an accident? Or heckling me at every presentation? Or, let’s go to a classic, laughing the loudest when I tripped in first grade and knocked out my top two baby teeth?”
“I was in first grade,” I grit out. “I saw someone fall, I laughed. The second I saw blood, I ran to you. I took you to the nurse’s office!”
She leans in, doubling down on her indignation. “You did not! Dev did!” she all but spits.
“It was me,” I say.
My dad was so angry that evening, at his son for taking a hurt kid to the nurse’s office just because of who her father was. No matter what I said, he believed I was secretly friends with Brie, deliberately disobeying his orders to stay away from her.
Brie and I are nose-to-nose. She’s ready to gouge me.
All I want is to kiss sense into her.
Out of the corner of my eye, Dev holds his finger up, about to speak, but Doug’s hesitant voice cuts through instead. “Can I get you all anything else?”
Still glaring at me, Brie says, “Check, please.”