Page 17 of Faking it With the Player Next Door

You were a million miles away,“ Taylor laughed. “Did you hear anything I just said?”

“Sorry, I kind of zoned out,” I apologized. “Care to repeat it?”

“Not really,’ she shrugged. “I was just rambling.”

We strolled to the end of the trail, where the old Dairy Shoppe was located, and I hadn’t had a good ice cream in quite some time.

“Feel like an ice cream cone?” I asked to change the subject without hurting Taylor’s feelings that I’d been so callous and hadn’t listened to a word she’d said for the last few minutes.

“Sure, why not,” she nodded, and we strode to stand in line.

Slipping my hands into the front pockets of my jean shorts, I glimpsed at how Taylor seemed to be studying the menu. Glancing around, I saw quite a few people waiting for ice cream, sitting at one of the numerous picnic tables eating their frozen delights, and some kids playing on the open field between the ice cream shop and the trail.

Nodding to a few people I recognized, I decided on a whim to place a hand around Taylor and pull her a little closer to me. As I did that, I caught her off balance, and she stumbled to my side.

“What are you doing?” She gasped.

“Making a show for the audience,” I mumbled and cocked my head to the people standing around us. “For Hunter’s benefit.”

Taylor opened her mouth to reply, then snapped her lips closed. She nodded, realized what I was saying, and decided toplay alongwith it. She laid a hand on my chest, and I felt my stomach flip. Just having her so close, touching me so intimately, made me wish this was all real, and not just for show.

“Hey, Van,” Kurt Collins, an old classmate, and the catcher for the baseball team during my senior year at high school, came up and offered a hand to shake. “I heard you were back in town.”

Shaking his hand, I smiled. “Yeah, only for a week or so now.”

“How long are you here for? I saw you got hurt and had surgery,” Kurt said, shaking his head.

We chatted for a few minutes, and then Kurt’s gaze shifted to Taylor next to me. “Oh, wow!” He exclaimed, “I didn’t know you two… that you guys were an item.”

“Yeah, well, we just started seeing each other,” I responded, then squeezed my hand on Taylor’s waist.

“It was an unexpected turn of events,” Taylor added with a sparkling smile, and she nudged her hip into my thigh.

“So, what are you doing back in town?” Kurt asked Taylor.

“Well, I, uhm… Taylor stammered, and I opened my mouth to rescue her, but she began speaking again. “I’m on a hiatus from work, and was a little homesick…”

“Yeah,” Kurt chuckled. “We all say we can’t wait to graduate and high tail it outta here, but we all end up coming back.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” I laughed and realized it was our turn to order. “Catch up with you later.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he nodded and strolled back to his pickup truck in the parking lot.

“Well, Hunter should hear about this pretty quick,” I whispered in Taylor’s ear.

“How long will we have to keep this up for?” Taylor grumbled and wouldn’t glance at me.

“I don’t know,” I frowned. “I haven’t thought about that.”

Taylor nodded, then placed her ice cream order, and the conversation ended.

After we got our treat, I strolled to an empty picnic table, and Taylor followed me. We sat across from one another, and she finally removed her sunglasses. She set them on the table in front of her, and for the first time since I arrived at her house earlier, I was treated to her glorious emerald eyes.

As she licked away at her vanilla ice cream atop the cone, my eyes were drawn to her tongue and how it swirled around the melting ice cream. I moaned and closed my eyes for a brief second. When I reopened them, Taylor had her head tilted and she was glaring at me.

Busted. She caught me in the middle of gawking, or rather fantasizing.

“The sooner this is over, the better,” she hissed.

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