Page 65 of When We Were Younger

Dorothea hasn't answered her phone, not that I thought she would. Kira has been in contact with at least one their girlfriends in California, and no one has heard from her.

When Kira found the cell phone number of Dorothea's closest neighbor in Malibu–it took a few levels of internet sleuthing as well as some grease palming over the phone with the head of Dorothea's HOA–the neighbor said she saw a car drop a blonde woman off earlier in the day and then that same woman left about an hour later, but she couldn't say for sure if it was Dorothea or not.

Not exactly getting ‘sense of community’vibes from Malibu.

After that call, Kira was on hold with MasterCard pretending to be Dorothea so she could get a readout of her most recent transactions. I don't even have my own social security number memorized, so watching Kira rattle off the information the operator needed was seriously impressive.

She has the call on speaker while we listen to the elevator hold music, and I can see a notification pop up on her phone.

"It's my home security system!" she says, tapping the banner. The app opens and with a few presses, Kira's phone shows a slightly blurry security camera video of my girl and a Louis Vuitton bag on Kira's doorstep.

"Jesus, she flew to Los Angeles and then San Francisco all in one day? She must have really wanted to get away from you," Kira says. I don't know if she's joking, but I force out a laugh anyway.

"She's alive. That's a good sign," I say. Step one, done. Now it's time to figure out what step two is.

"Okay, now onto step two," Kira says. She figured it out a lot quicker than I could have. "We need to get you on a plane to San Francisco and to my house. You can do your big love proclamation- do it in my living room so I can watch on my cameras- and then you can take her to a hotel and fuck the stupid out of her. And I mean it, get a hotel. No sex in my house. Maybe the bathroom if you really can't wait, but not my bed. I swear to god, Stephen, if you get your country boy cum on my bed-"

"Jesus Christ, Kira!" I interrupt, my eyes going wide.The woman has no filter. If I let her keep going, she'll no doubt say something worse than 'country boy cum', so I go for the redirect. "I sort of already did the love proclamation thing. Last night, after we-"

"Got your country boy cum on your own bed?"

"I think that's why she ran. I mean I knew she was going to try. That's why I was being so careful about what I did and said. I didn't want to scare her off. I thought if I had a chance to be around when she bolted this time, I could change the outcome. Whatever that meant." I shrug.

"You told her you loved her after sex? That's a rookie move, Hudson," she says without a hint of sympathy.

"I know, I know," I say, running a hand over the back of my neck. "That's why I think I need to give her time."

Kira opens her mouth to interrupt me, but I hold a hand up between us.

"I'm going to go after her this time, Kira. I swear. I don't want to live without her anymore, and if I have the smallest chance in hell of making her mine, I'm taking it. But you know Dottie. She needs to process things her own way. I think she might need a day or two to just sit with everything before she's even remotely receptive to anything I might say."

"Ugh, I hate how right you are. I'm too impatient for this crap. You promise you're gonna get her back?" she asks, holding out a pinky to me.

"I promise I'm gonna try." I link my pinky with hers and we shake on it.

"Besides," I continue. "There's something I need to talk Ivy about before I go."

"Oh my god, Ivy Crowe? I haven't seen her in years! Is she still hopelessly in love with your sister?" Kira asks. Uhhh…Ivy? In love with my sister?

Shit. That makes sense. But I don't have the bandwidth to dissect all that right now.

"Okay I'm gonna put a pin in that thought, but we are most definitely coming back to that later," I say. Kira snickers, and then I tell her about the tattoo Ivy and I discussed at my parent's house. She squeals and agrees that I absolutely must do it before I go to see Dorothea.

Neither of us acknowledges that if she rejects me, the tattoo will be something to remember her by instead of a symbol of my feelings for her. But that, like my sister and Ivy, is a problem for another day.

I text Ivy, and OperationMy Dorotheamoves right along into stage two.

The next day, Ivy and Delilah come up to McKenna Mountain at Kira's insistence–I'm pretty sure she just wanted to see me squirm under Ivy's needle. Ivy gets herself set up in the kitchen, and when she's ready, I lie back on the table without a shirt and let her do her work.

Kira, Dean, their dad's and my sister all watch as Ivy works. Jay and Keith swoon and call me a hopeless romantic. Kira, Dean, and Delilah just laugh and poke fun every time I wince, which unfortunately happens more than I'd like to admit. What can I say? I havesensitive nipples, and they don't particularly enjoy having a stabby needle so close to them.

When it's all finished, Ivy wraps me up with some sort of special plastic wrap and leaves me with care instructions for my new tattoo and her well wishes for whatever happens when I get to California. Delilah gives me a hug, careful not to fuck with the inked-up spot on my chest.

"Don't screw this up with her. I've always wanted Dottie to be my sister for real," she says as we hug, and I roll my eyes.

"Thanks for the confidence boost, Delilah. I knew I could count on you."

She leaves me with a pat on the back, and then Kira and I sit down at the table and move on to stage three.

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