by Hughes, Maya
“She will need a date to her sister’s wedding. Maybe it should be you.”
Jules shot a glare at Elle then her gaze collided with mine and she softened her expression. “She’s joking. I don’t need a date.” Those words were spoken through gritted teeth.
Elle swanned over to her and sat in the chair beside her. “I think it’s a great idea, Jules. Seems like a fair trade to me.”
“Sorry, everyone, Elle must’ve hit her head on the way over here. She’s not thinking clearly. Can I see a menu?”
Even more food arrived at the table, and everyone dug in while discussing plans for the rest of the year and training camps for the Trojans in the pros or for their senior year.
“Not sure yet, but if I do go, I won’t find out about my placement until the week after graduation.” Elle’s face pinched for a second before her gaze flitted to mine and relaxed a bit.
“Don’t sound so thrilled about it. Elle’s got it in her head that she has to join the Peace Corps if she doesn’t win.”
“But if you do win, you stay?”
“It’s not a big deal. I haven’t decided yet. If I win the Huffington Award, I’ll be able to stay. I’ll live off the stipend for a year and figure out what I’ll do next. If I don’t, that’s sort of the only life plan I have in place.”
I dipped my head and ran my hand over her leg. “But we wouldn’t get to see each other.” Did that come out as a little needy?
Her startled look told me it might have, along with at least a little whiny. “At this point, I’m a lock for the Huffington Award. I spoke to my assistant dean and he said my application was the most impressive he’d ever seen.”
“I really hope you win it.” The thought of going through everything that was coming my way without Elle by my side only made the unknown that much scarier.
“Me too.” She ran her hand over mine.
I left my hand on her leg with a happiness glowing in my chest that eclipsed a comeback touchdown. The server dropped off a stack of blueberry waffles in front of me with a side of bacon.
“Those look so good. Maybe I should order some.”
I cut off a piece and held it out to her on my fork. “Here, try some of mine and see if you like them.”
A fork clattered to a plate.
“Thanks for the syrup shower,” Jules grumbled.
“Did you just offer her food?” LJ leaned across Marisa.
“It’s not that big a deal.” I met his gaze, praying he’d drop it and chill the hell out.
“You nearly tackled me for the last butterscotch cookie the other day.” Marisa’s playful glare made LJ laugh.
“It was a choice between that and the soup you made.”
All the guys at the table shuddered.
“Would you stop being such babies? It wasn’t that bad.”
“You’ve built up an immunity to your own cooking, Ris. It’s like Rasputin ingesting poison daily for years.”
“Did you just compare my cooking to poison?”
LJ shrugged. “I mean…we’ve actually sent it out to be tested for crimes against the Geneva Convention, so…“ He held his hands out palm up.
“You never complained before.” She smacked his shoulder.
“Probably because my vocal chords had been melted away.”
Marisa speared a perfectly cut waffle square and lifted her fork, looking over at LJ. “It’s really that bad?”
He rushed to tell her it wasn’t, which meant we’d all have to try to choke down some Marisa concoction that weekend. I knew I’d better stock up on Pepto and Tums.
I held up my fork to Elle and she took a bite. Her lips wrapped around the fork. Hell, I’d have fed her the rest of my waffles bite by bite just to watch her pink lips get shiny with syrup, ready for me to kiss them clean.
“Those are delicious.”
“Here, take the rest.” People three tables over whipped around at my gunshot-loud voice. “I mean, if you want.”
She laughed and scooted my plate closer. “How about we share them?”
Sitting next to Elle, sharing the best blueberry waffles covered in syrup and whipped cream, was the best breakfast I’d ever had. The words I’d wanted to say to her for so long burned a pattern on my heart, and they were in the shape of her name.
I rested my arm on the back of her chair and she leaned into me, laughing along with everyone else at the verbal sparring going on between LJ and Marisa. Seemed someone was a blanket hog, but neither was fessing up, even though Marisa’s roommate had left our house a couple weeks ago and one of them could’ve slept on the couch or the floor. No one wanted to rock their friendship boat, which seemed to be teetering on the edge of something neither would walk away from unscathed. Either way, the longer they shared a bed, the bigger the explosion, no matter how many times they tried to pretend it was just like old times, but last I’d checked, neither of them were in middle school anymore.
Elle threw back her head, laughing. The smooth lines of her neck called out to my fingers. It was the same spot I’d run my lips along while tangled in the sheets with her and where I whispered her name each time I was pressed up against and inside her.
“Nix.” She looked to me with a hungry amusement. “Berk’s talking to you.”
“What did you say?”
“I said, which one of us is going to get one of your friends-and-family season passes next year?”
“Who said you jokers were either?” I laughed.
Berk blinked and his head jerked back.
“Kidding. I’m kidding.”
He let out a pfft and shook his shoulders. “Like I don’t know that. Whatever, man. It doesn’t matter.” He stabbed at his plate.
“You can both have one. My dad won’t need one—he’ll weasel his way onto the sidelines and watch from there.”
“At least you won’t need a prostate exam with how far up your ass he is.”
“His own personal meat puppet.”
Reece’s face scrunched up. “And now I’m done with my food. That’s the most disgusting visual ever described.”
“How’s everyone doing?” Gramps stopped by the table.
I got up and hugged him. “What are you doing here? Weren’t you in last night?”
He scoffed. “Who else will be here if I’m not?”
An abundance of servers, customers, and chefs bustled behind him. “You’re a regular one-man show.”
“I worry, that’s all. Is everything here that you need?”
“Of course. Come and sit with us.”
“No, I need to get back in there. Those Eggs Benedict aren’t going to plate themselves.”
“I’m sure they’d make it out to the table without your help.”
He grinned. “I know, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy it. Ah, is this the Jules you said makes desserts better than my own?”
Jules practically sprayed her mouthful of water all over Berk with wide eyes, shaking her head. “I’d never say that. No. Definitely not. No way.”
“She’s being modest. They’re amazing. Everyone?” Elle held her hands out for consensus, and the table agreed.
“They’re just being nice,” Jules insisted.
Gramps grinned. “Well, we can always use someone good around here. The world needs as much sweetness as we can get. The check is taken care of. You kids have a great day.”
“Gramps, you didn’t have to do that.”
He shot me a ‘no shit’ look and disappeared back into the kitchen.
Everyone threw down some money for a tip and we headed outside.
“My dad’s rung his bell, so I’m headed over there. Are you two headed back to your place?”
Jules stood beside the person-height glass window in front of Tavola, pretending not to see our PDA.
“I’ll see you at my place later?” After however long my dad kept me in his office, I’d need an Elle injection to revive my day.
“My shift at Uncommon Grounds ends at seven.”
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“I’ll be there then to pick you up and maybe score some stale donuts.”
She motioned me closer, crooking her finger and glancing over her shoulder. “I’ll save a couple for you under the counter.”
“The perks of dating a barista.” I kissed her quickly. She tasted like sweetness and coffee.
“More like a coffee burner.” She grinned and linked arms with Jules. “See you tonight.”
The drive to my dads was like it always was: way too long and over too quickly all at the same time.
As I walked into his office, Dad closed a drawer and rested his hands on the top of his desk. “Spending time at the restaurant again?”
I paused in front of it. “How’d you know?”
“You think after all this time I don’t know the smells of my father’s kitchen?”
“Would it hurt you to go by now and then?”
“More important things are going on. Speaking of which, there’s an award ceremony at your school happening next week. You’ve been invited and you need to be there.”
He held out an envelope. The Fulton U Pre-Commencement Recognition Ceremony invitations raised blue embossing shone on the front of it.
“If I was invited, you’d think they’d send this to me.”
“I was meeting with the university president and he passed it along.”
“We only have a few weeks left until the end of the year. Stop meddling. Everything will be fine.” I rested my hands on the back of a leather armchair.
He stood from his seat and rounded the large wooden desk. “It will be fine because I meddled.”
“Ever think what you’d do with yourself if you didn’t have my life to arrange anymore? No more behind-the-scenes talks and meetings?” I tugged my phone out of my pocket. The level of disappointment at seeing it was a phantom buzz and not a message from Elle, even though I’d just seen her, told me everything I needed to know about this thing with her, and it didn’t scare me nearly as much as it should have.
Linking his hands behind his head, he sat in the other chair in front of his desk. “We won’t have to find out, will we? Who’s the girl?”
“What girl?”
“The one who’s got you checking your phone like an eager puppy. She’s distracting you.”
“I’m not distracted.”
“Haven’t I told you how important it is to be careful with women right now?”
“She’s not like that.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. The unspoken ‘They’re all like that’ hung in the air between us.
“She’s big into charity work, volunteering. She’s at soup kitchens, community build projects, tutoring, and she’s got a job. If anything, I have to schedule time to see her. She’s going to get this big prestigious award from the university for doing all that community service. She’s not some football groupie.”
There was a strange flicker in his gaze, but then it was gone and he was back to all business. “I’m flying to LA tonight. I wanted to go over everything before I left.”
Relief that we weren’t going to keep harping on the Elle train made me latch onto any lifeline. “Maybe you should go look for a girlfriend, someone to keep you occupied, less worried about my life and a little more focused on your own.”
“Your mom’s gone.”
“I know she is…but it’s been almost 22 years.”
“She’s gone.” His split-second faraway look was replaced by the determined one he always took on when he was ready to lay out one of his big plans. “Now let’s go over those videos.”
He pushed up out of the chair, banging his knee. A pop shot through the room and he grimaced before dragging out an indexed binder, dimming the lights, and flicking on his presentation that glowed on the projector screen on the far wall.
If I made it out of there before graduation, it would be a miracle.
29
Elle
“I can bury you in places out in Jersey where they’ll never find your body.” Jules shook her whisk at me, sending batter splattering on the floor.
“What’s the big deal? All I did was throw out there that maybe you could use a date to your sister’s wedding.”
“To Berk. Berkeley Vaughn. Are you kidding me? I’m the fat girl with the baked goods. He’s not thinking about twirling me around the dance floor any time soon.”
“You’re always putting yourself down.”
“Better I do it instead of anyone else.”
“I never knew you were such a freaking bully.”
“Oh please, my threats of murdering you are mostly for laughs.”
“I wasn’t talking about me.”
“Who the hell do I bully?”
“Yourself.”
“I learned from the best.” Her half-laugh didn’t do anything to cover the age-old wounds. “Anyway, it’s better to toughen up since I’ll be going to the engagement party this summer.” She kept her gaze trained directly ahead.
“There’s nothing I can do to talk you out of this, is there?”
“Short of a lobotomy, no. It’s a long weekend, and my mom made it clear that she’d find it difficult to pay for my last year of school if I didn’t play the role of best little sister in the world.”
“Would you be super offended if I ran her over with my car?”
“The spell she’s cast would probably break your car before it got anywhere near her. Anyway, it’ll give me a chance to hunt down those Peter Rabbit books in the house.”
“A, that’s offensive to actual witches, and B, don’t let your mom know you’re still looking for them.”
“Oh, I know. She’d gift them to Laura as a wedding present the second she got a whiff that I still wanted them. Anyway, on to less depressing topics. Three weeks until graduation—how’s the job search going?”
“Definitely not less depressing. Every application has been rejected or disappeared into a black hole. I had to get the companies where I applied to ask for my transcripts directly because the registrar won’t even release them to me until I pay the last five grand I owe for the semester, and my GPA doesn’t exactly scream hire me, even for some of the nonprofits. They either don’t have the funding to take someone else on or they want someone who’s done more than arrange some events. They want data people or business people. I’m over here with my humanities degree with my pants down.”
“What about something outside of that world? Like event planning or something like that?”
“Why in the hell would you think I’d be an event planner type of person? Do I look slick and coiffed with nails and hair to match?”
“No, but why would you think you’d need to be? The blood drive, everything else you organize—it seems like it would be a good fit for you.”
“Right, and everyone would take me so seriously if I started picking out flower arrangements and tablecloths.”
“Who the hell gives a flying fuck what anyone thinks about you?”
I lifted an eyebrow and stared right at her.
Her gaze dipped and her shoulders popped up. “Touché, but if you need a job and you don’t want to get shipped off to Burma or somewhere else, why not look into it?” She flicked her nails against each other.
“If I say I will, will you drop it and give me a cookie?”
“What are you, five?”
I held up four fingers. “Almost.” I smirked. “Can I take a nap and you handle my shift for me, Weekend at Bernie’s style?” I slumped over in the chair in our kitchen.
“While my pole dancing has toned muscles I didn’t even know I had, I don’t have time to hook up a pulley system to move your body around behind the counter at work.”
“You ruin all my fun.”
“Don’t I know it.”
Closing my books after a few hours, I jammed what I needed into my bag and headed to Uncommon Grounds. Switching off with the shift ahead of me, I wrapped my apron around my neck and manned my spot behind the counter.
The door
opened and my not-too-bad, actually-kind-of-great day withered like a flower on a severed vine. Mitchell sauntered in with his arm around a brunette—not the girl he’d cheated on me with.
“Elle.” His mock surprise given the fact that he’d seen me walk into this coffee shop at least ten times in the past month made it clear to me that this asshole hadn’t turned over a new leaf at all. Come to show off his new girlfriend? How nice of him.
“Mitchell, what can I get you?” I wasn’t going to let him get to me.
“I’ll take a medium organic coffee with almond milk and a vegan biscotti, and I brought my own cup. What would you like, babe?”
“I’ll have the same.”
“Coming right up.” I grabbed the cups from him and turned to make the most pretentious cup of coffee known to man.
“I’m glad they got rid of the plastic straws. I sent a petition around last month to make that happen.” He preened for his newest conquest.
I happily corrected him. “Actually, the board made a decision a couple of months ago, but it took a while to find a supplier since everyone else is switching to paper right now too.”
His face froze and his gaze darted to New Girl before he recovered. “Well, I’m sure my petition got them to move things along. Same with getting in the almond milk. Fresh milk—I mean, it’s a horror show, environmentally speaking.”
Had I ever been this holier-than-thou? Was I this sanctimonious and annoying in different ways? Had I been acting like this with Nix and everyone else I’d worked with before? Holy crap, it was a miracle I still had all my teeth.
“So, you’re going for the Huffington Award too?” He leaned against the counter like he had all the time in the world.
“Yes.” I poured the almond milk into their cups.
He put a hand to his chest and bowed his head, ever so humbly. “You know I’m also nominated.”
“Of course you are.”
“I’ve done more than eighty projects over the past four years. I’m pretty sure we both know how things are going to work out.” He glanced at his girlfriend, who simpered appropriately.
“Here are your drinks. Have a great day.” I slid the cups across the counter to him.
“No hard feelings, right, Elle?” He leaned forward and tried to give me his best sympathetic look. “Are you doing any better? You look tired. If you ever need someone to talk to…”