Page 80 of Waking Olivia

I feign surprise. “I didn’t know Peter was already here.” He laughs and gives me the finger at the same time, which is decidedly un-coach-like.

By 1pm, everything is done, or nearly so. “I guess it’s time for us to get ready,” Dorothy says, removing her apron. She leans out of the kitchen and yells at the guys to go get dressed. They both make similar sounds of protest, which she ignores. “We all kind of dress up, by the way. The boys hate it and every year they complain, but a rule’s a rule.”

“Oh,” I pause. “I didn’t bring anything. Just jeans.”

“Well, as it happens, I bought you something,” she says hesitantly. “I hope you don’t mind. I just saw it in the store and thought, ‘Olivia would look gorgeous in that.’”

“You shouldn’t have done that.” They’re nearly as strapped for cash as I am.

“I always wanted a little girl to dress up, and you’re the closest thing to a daughter I’ve ever had, so damned if anyone’s going to tell me I can’t buy her a few dresses.”

I follow her to her room feeling nothing but dread. I figure there’s a 90% chance she’s bought me something I wouldn’t be caught dead in, and I’m going to have to sit through dinner with Will and Brendan making fun of me the whole time. In fact, I’m already annoyed at both of them for it in advance.

While she goes to her closet, I pick up a picture of Will that sits on her dresser. He’s a gangly little towhead, standing shirtless by a lake with a big crooked smile and a few missing teeth. I’m still smiling at it when she emerges.

“Wasn’t he sweet?” she asks.

“Yeah,” I sigh. He was adorable. There’s something so free and unencumbered about him in the photo that it kind of breaks my heart. I’ve seen glimpses of it when we’re climbing, but almost never outside of that.

She’s holding up two different dresses. “I got you one for today and one for the fall athletic banquet.”

I laugh uneasily. “I guess the one that looks like lingerie is for today?”

“It’s a slip dress,” she scolds, “and no, that’s for the banquet.”

Both of the dresses are beautiful, but the idea of wearing either of them makes me feel squirmy and self-conscious. She has me take the dress that doesn’t look like lingerie and try it on. It’s a fitted beige sheath in matte jersey, pouring over my body like it was made for me. Dorothy sighs happily when I emerge. “I knew it would be perfect on you. Do you like it?”

I nod. “I do. I’m just not used to wearing dresses I guess.”

She smiles. “Maybe that’s for the best. You’re dangerous enough in running clothes. Now run and put on a little makeup and I’ll see you in the kitchen.”

I go to my room and put on mascara and lip gloss, hating myself a little for how much I care. How badly I want Will to like it, for blindly hoping it will somehow change things for us when he’s made it so clear that nothing’s going to happen. It’s a course of action destined to fail but here I stand, undertaking it anyway.

I brought heels, thinking we might go out with Brendan one night, so I slip them on and look in the mirror one last time. I look good, and it won’t be enough. He made that clear last weekend, didn’t he?

I see Will before he sees me. He’s at the dining room table carving the turkey, wearing khakis and a button-down shirt, which isn’t all that dressed up, I suppose, but far more than I’ve ever seen from him. He’s gorgeous. Even in that shirt you can see the raw strength of him, the breadth of his shoulders, the taut forearms. He looks hot and grown up and just … I can’t put my finger on it but it’s something that makes my breath come a little short.

“Hey, Mom!” he shouts. “Do you want—”

His voice trails off as I come into his line of sight. He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t move. He juststares.

“You’re looking at me like I walked in here carrying a decapitated head,” I tell him.

“That’d be less surprising than you in a dress,” he mutters, turning back to the turkey.

55

Will

Holy shit.

Olivia stands before me in a dress that flows over every curve. Curves evenIdidn’t realize she had, and I’ve done more than my fair share of looking. I am temporarily struck mute. I want to tell her that she is gorgeous, breath-taking, astonishing. That the second I saw her my stomach dropped with something that goes so far beyond lust that I can’t even name it. I can’t tell her any of this though, so I do what I’ve always done.

I try to pretend she’s no longer there.

There isnothing about this day that isn’t hard. It’s hard to be this close to Olivia, looking like that, and not touch her. It was hard seeing her with my mom in the kitchen, seeing the way she seemed to cure a certain loneliness in my mom that me and Brendan and my dad never did. It was hard seeing how much she belongs here, and knowing it’s never going to happen. It’s hard looking at my brother’s smug smile. I don’t know where they went yesterday, but I know they didn’t climb for eight hours.

It doesn’t help that my mom invited Peter either. I struggle enough to conceal the way I feel about Olivia as it is without having my boss here as an audience. And it could easily come up that Olivia is staying here, and that I am too. I don’t think he’d fire me, but I know for a fact he’ll tell me I can’t stay here tonight and there’s no way in hell that’s happening.

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