Page 54 of Perfect Pitch

Don’t shatter a man’s fantasies. For years, we lived on chips, beer, and the idea that women had pillow fights in microscopic sleepwear.

—@PRyanPOfficial

College is over, my man. It’s a whole new era.

—Viego Martinez, Celebrity Blogger

You’re a killjoy.

—@PRyanPOfficial

“Sorry, that was Fallon. If I didn’t answer, she’d think I was kidnapped or something equally crazy.”

“Fallon? Are you friends with a relation of Jimmy’s, and I don’t know it?”

Austyn’s urchin grin appears across the table. She props up her hand on her chin. “Fallon Brookes, my best friend.”

“Ahh.”

Her eyes narrow. “What does that mean?”

“Girl best friends are scary. You all have some secret pact to drink copious amounts of wine, slash tires, and wear ridiculous outfits to each other’s weddings. It’s something they taught us in boy puberty classes—don’t play with girls.”

“I’d disagree except everything you said was absolutely on the mark.”

I assume an expression of horror. “Wait. I always thought Mr. Westemeier was lying about pillow fights.”

“Only if we’re in a good mood and you’re lucky.”

I wink at her just as Austyn lets down her fully unplaited hair. Massaging the long length, she looks like a nymph, a mermaid. When I tell her she’s just missing the tail, she says, “I’ll order it on Amazon. It will be here in two days.”

We both crack up. “So, you have a Fallon and I have a Trevor. Think they’d be a match?”

Austyn shakes her head.

“Why not?” I’m a little hurt on behalf of my brother.

“Well, my Fallon has a thing for men who are more mature.”

“Trev’s mature,” I argue.

Austyn drops all pretense and tells it to me straight. “You’re too young for her, Mitch.”

“Oh. Well, I can’t fix that.”

“No. We can’t cryofreeze my best friend until your brother is in his late 30s.”

“I suppose you’d miss her.”

Austyn reaches for her cell. I admire a picture of the two women hugging each other as if the world’s going to end, even as they clutch one another’s mortarboards. “For graduation, Fal gave me a copy of this framed. She had them engrave something breathtaking on the bottom.”

“What does it say?”

“You’ll never be just a moment or a memory in my life. You’re the entirety of it.”

As Austyn returns her phone to her bag, I realize the woman across from me has more than just a beautiful face, she has a beautiful soul.

I want to get to know both.

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