“Stranger things have happened. I can’t think of any just now, but I’m sure they have.” She gazed into his eyes, giddy with happiness. “I feel like I know you so well in some ways—I mean, all that time together, all those long talks after your dates never worked out. But it’s still been a long time. Things to learn.” She laid her head on his shoulder, leaning on him a bit.
“I like that,” he told her.
“You like what?”
“When you . . . when you leaned on my shoulder, just now.” He cleared his throat. “It’s really, well, it’s nice.”
“It is, isn’t it?” she sighed. “It’s been such a long time since we last spoke.”
“Well, civilly, that is,” he pointed out.
She wrinkled her nose, nodding. “And it’s all my fault.”
“It’s no one’s fault, or it’s everyone’s.” He stroked her hair softly, and her knees went rubbery. “So let’s just get over that. What matters is now. We’ve got time. Well, some, anyway.”
“Time,” mused Ava. “It goes by so fast, doesn’t it? It truly seems like just a few months ago Suzanne was telling me that she wasn’t going to college because she was going to have a baby. And then Molly was walking and off to school herself. Then, of course, our Jimmy was getting sick.” She stopped herself. It was okay to talk about him, but she didn’t want to cry for him, not tonight. Tonight was for something altogether different.
Buddy glanced up to see the peepers, still fighting over the front spot in the window. There were at least three other windows they’d be visible from, Buddy figured, but the Three Stooges apparently hadn’t thought of that.
“We’ve got an audience, you know. Don’t look now.”
“Do we?” She caught them out of the corner of her eye as Buddy spun her around slowly, in time to the music. Now it was “Mr. Tambourine Man,” another one of her favorites. “Well, will you just look at those little busy-bodies? We should really give them something to look at, as long as they’re going to watch, don’t you think?”
“Sure.” Buddy peeked again at the crew at the window. “What did you have in . . .”
He never got to finish the sentence, because Ava grabbed his face with both hands and planted her soft lips on his.
He forgot their audience. He forgot every other woman that he’d ever kissed. He forgot the smell of the citronella candle. He forgot his own name. It was, by far, the sweetest, most meaningful kiss of his life.
“There!” Ava batted her eyelashes prettily again. Brandon was right. This flirting thing was just like riding a bike, something you never really forgot. “That should keep them busy for a while.”
“Uh, I guess,” Buddy said shakily, trying to compose himself. It seemed he might not need that Viagra, after all. “Well. So. What do we do now?”
“In a little while,” she told him sweetly, “I want to go into your house. Tie a kerchief on the knob—Brandon’ll know what it means. We’ll be all alone.”
“All alone? You mean,” he innocently raised an eyebrow, “you mean that we’ll . . .”
“I mean,” she smiled coyly, “we’ll have a little privacy.”
“We will?” He couldn’t resist asking. “Like what?”
“Well, we can talk,” she shrugged casually. “We can watch a movie, we can look through photo albums, drink tea, laugh, cry. Or maybe we could just go into the bedroom and see if we both remember what it’s for. Away from the peanut gallery.”
He cleared his throat. “That would be nice.”
“Sorry to be so bold,” she apologized, “but dancing with you, well, it’s nice. It got me to thinking that maybe other things might be fun too.”
“They just might, at that,” he admitted. “So, Miss Ava, sky’s the limit. Just what do you want to do till it’s time to go in?”
She looked up at him, and he thought that he’d never seen such a happy look on her pretty face.
“I suppose,” she raised herself to her tiptoes and kissed him again, this time softly, “we just keep dancing.”
She Effin' Hates Me Page 33