Page 10 of Promise Me Sunshine

He blinks.

“Let’s have pancakes from Stavros!” Ainsley calls down the hall.

“The diner on the corner?” I ask when she arrives in the kitchen.

I’m beat, but who could say no to a smile like that. So I divest myself of the fancy wear and am just tugging my sneakers back on when a large pair of feet materialize in my line of vision, sliding into a correspondingly large pair of sneakers. I blink up at Miles. “Are you joining us?”

“Miles tags along whenever Mom and I go to Stavros,” Ainsley says, tugging at the tongue of her shoe.

My eyes cut back to his.

He shrugs. “I like pancakes.”

So ten minutes later we file into a booth. I’m just perusing the menu when the waiter nearly ends my life. With his face. He must be one of the prettiest men I’ve ever seen in my life. Eyes, hair, lips, even his ears are good-looking.

I can already see it. On our first date we’ll get drunk and wild and sober up over the Atlantic, on a last-minute red-eye to Madrid. Spain will suit us just fine, but after a few weeks we’ll meander to Italy, where his family surely has a villa. I’ll get fat and happy off olive bread and he’ll paint me like one of his French girls. I can’t wait to kiss this waiter’s ChapStick right off.

He must see me giving him the eyes, because his instantly screamBedroom? Why not?to me. I blush and play with the end of my ponytail. Miles orders pancakes and slaps the menu into the waiter’s hand. Can’t he see that I’m having a moment with the man who will surely be the great love affair of my life? Can’t his dinner order wait a gosh-dang second?

Well, Ainsley’s can’t either because she’s ordering us both a short stack. I add a cup of tea to my order and try to breathe through the sexiest eye contact of my life. The waiter speaks, his voice like slow-spilling caramel I’d lick off the floor if pressed.

Miles gets up to go to the bathroom and by the time hegets back, our dinner’s arrived. The three of us eat in silence, but it’s more thoughtful than tense.

The bill comes and Miles hands his card up.

“Oh, you don’t—” I start to say reflexively.

“I always do.”

“He and Mom always have this argument too. But Miles always wins,” Ainsley informs me as she licks the last of the syrup off her fork.

I shrug and concede. Miles pays quickly and jets out of the diner. Ainsley and I are standing up and shuffling out of the booth.

And then I look down at the receipt…

My mouth drops open.

I turn to stare at Miles through the window of the diner, but he’s looking in the other direction.

He didn’t. Tip. The waiter.

WTF? Who does that?

I’m so shocked it’s all I can do to just scramble some cash out of my pocket, toss it on the table, and leave.

We walk back to the apartment in silence, but I can’t help but glance at Miles a few times. His profile is resolute, dour, inscrutable.

I can’t believe I ever had the hots for this man, no matter how briefly. Someone who doesn’t tip waitstaff is…I mean, is there even a word bad enough for someone like that?

I put it to the side and focus on Ainsley for the rest of the night. We read a few chapters of herSquirrel Geniusbook together, and somehow in the last day she’s made it all the way to #50 without me even noticing. She’s asleep before I even turn out the light, and I congratulate myself on a job well done. Miles stays at the kitchen table until Harper arrives. She’s baring her teeth at him in an attempt atpoliteness while I wave goodbye. I glance back to see Miles walk past Harper with barely a nod of acknowledgment. I’d put fifty bucks on her giving the door the finger the second she closes it. People do not like this guy.

He disappears up the stairs, the elevator doors close, and I collapse backward, burying my face in my hands. The performance is done for the day. I’ve done right by Ainsley, but now I’m dangerously depleted and can’t stand the thought of going home.

I wave goodbye to the doorman and start trudging down the block. I get to Broadway but don’t cross with the light. I am frozen, unsure of where to go. I reach into my pocket and involuntarily worry the edges of the laminated paper, always in safekeeping there. I can hear her voice in my head. I can hear the promises we made to one another.Live again.

But it’s dark and lonely in this land with no sleep and barely enough air. There’s no living here. There’s barely surviving.

The crosswalk light changes again and then again.

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