Page 17 of No One But Us

“Yes, James,” Max says with a weary sigh. “I know she’s 19. It was ajoke.”

“It’d better be,” James replies, walking off across theyard.

Once again it feels like he’s pissed at me, and I have no idea what I’vedone.

Chapter 11

ELLE

Toward mid-June,after a couple weeks on the job, I’m promoted to waiting tables in the bar area, as opposed to the restaurant. It’s not exactly ideal, given that James has been acting like I have the plague for the past week. And I find it hard to imagine how I got promoted in the first place, because I still totally suck. I struggle to remember all the shorthand and find myself checking with Kristy or Ginny constantly. The whole thing is humbling. A few weeks ago I was setting up interviews with heads of state. Now I’m getting bitched at because I didn’t put the dressing on theside.

“Congrats,” says Kristy, who’s working the section with me. “You’ll make amazingtips.”

“I have no idea why Brian put me over here,” I reply. “My waitressing abilities aren’t exactlystellar.”

James rolls his eyes. “Your waitressing abilities had nothing to do withit.”

Ashleigh, the third girl working the bar, titters at this. Of course, giggling is her response to pretty much any words that come out of James’ mouth, but it has a particularly vicious bent when aimed at me. I’m not sure why, but Ashleigh has disliked me from the moment I walked in the bar. And today she is only slightly less rude to me than James himself, who actively looks elsewhere when I come to place my drink orders, providing terse answers atbest.

“Okay, what’s going on?” I ask him point blank. “Why are you being so unfriendly all of asudden?”

He stiffens. “I’m not unfriendly. I’m just trying to do myjob.”

“Well, you manage to do your job and not treat anyone else this way. Plus you’ve been weird athome.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says. And then he walksaway.

Yeah, because walking away in the middle of a conversation isn’t unfriendly atall.

Adding to my misery, as the evening wears on, is the fact that my earlier assumptions were correct: I am definitely not ready to be waiting tables in the bar area. I’ve broken three glasses and screwed up innumerableorders.

I’m standing across from James when Brian comes out to talk to me about my latest slip-up. “I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I keep messing up theabbreviations.”

“No prob,” he says, coming around behind me and rubbing my shoulders. “Don’t let yourself get all tense. This is supposed to befun.”

It’s slightly awkward, having my boss—a married father of two—stand in the middle of the bar giving me a massage. James scowls, and I feel a little ill, wondering if he, like everyone else who knows my mom, thinks Ienjoythis kind ofshit.

I manage to escape Brian’s hands and go check on my tables, but I hear a bottle break behind me and look back. A very heated conversation has ensued between James and Brian, with James now towering over Brian, his face a study in focusedrage.

It ends with Brian retreating angrily to his office while James stands there with clenched hands, looking like he’s figuring out what to punch and how manytimes.

Kristy sidles over to me. “Well, that wasexciting.”

“That’s the kind of excitement I can live without,” Ireply.

“So what’s up with you two?” she asks, a little secret smile beginning on her face. “Are youdating?”

“Dating?God, no. Nothing is goingon.”

“He looked awful upset for it to benothing.”

I glance toward him at the bar, still steely-eyed and angry and impossibly good-looking. Something flutters low in my stomach. “He sees me the way he seesGinny.”

A little light comes into her eyes. “You’ve got it bad, don’tyou?”

I could deny it, but why? I would guess my crush on James has been amply evident to anyone who’s seen me with him anytime since I was four. “You’re not going to say anything, right?” I ask, a little desperately. “He’s not interested, and it would make things super awkward since we livetogether.”

She laughs. “I’m not going to say anything. But I wouldn’t be so sure about the ‘not interested’ part. He stares at you way too much forthat.”

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