Page 47 of No One Else

Her face settles into a smile again. “When did you work here?”

“Two years in high school, as soon as I turned sixteen. I quit after I got my certification for personal training and was hired at Suncoast. I liked it here fine. The staff are really nice even if the job itself wasn’t the greatest, but I make way better money now.”

She opens the menu, scanning the entrees section, and tells me about her first job at seventeen working retail at a clothing store. She’s told me about it before but I don’t mind. I could listen to her voice all night.

We talk through the chips and salsa, the chimichangas for me and enchiladas for her, and the sopapillas we share for dessert. She’s drawn more stories out of me tonight than in the year and a half I’ve known her, some kind of reserve broken. Her warmth, her laughter, the sparkle in her eye, all has me talking till my throat is hoarse.

“The food was amazing,” she says after our dessert plates are cleared away, leaning back in her seat. When she starts licking the cinnamon sugar off her fingers and groaning in delight, I have to adjust myself under the table. Does she have any idea how she sounds right now?

“I wouldn’t lead you astray.”

She gives me a small smile, sobering some. “Thanks for being so cool about the Carter thing.”

“You don’t have any more exes that might pop up, do you? Maybe behind that plant over there? Under the booth?” I ask jokingly, pretending to look. I hate seeing her down.

“No,” she smirks, trying to hide her growing smile behind her glass of water as she brings it to her lips and takes a drink. “What about you? You’re local. You must have a lot.”

“One.”

“One?” She sets her glass down. “That’s it?”

I nod. “Junior year of high school.”

“Four years ago? Wow.” She appears surprised.

“What?”

“I know it’s not really any of my business, I’m just curious. Was it a bad breakup? Did you... love her?” she asks quietly, a strange look in her eye.

“No. I didn’t love her.” I can’t help the bitterness in my voice.

She picks up on it, eyebrows raised, and wipes at the condensation ring her drink left on the table.

“We only went out for about a month,” I tell her, somehow needing to explain myself. I’m not sure why, though.

“I guess I never took you for a commitment-phobe.”

I give her a tight smile. “No, it’s not that.”

“Then what?”

“My dad.”

“Your dad?” She honestly looks perplexed, like she couldn’t possibly fathom a reason he would have anything to do with my lack of dating.

I sigh, rubbing my forehead. “I only saw Lena at school. Neither of us had cars then, but when I finally saved up enough and got my Bronco, I brought her home for dinner one night.”

She leans forward, invested in the story, the same way she’s done for everything I’ve told her tonight, but I know this one won’t make her laugh or smile or any of the other emotions I love to see play across that beautiful face of hers.

“Dad hadn’t had his last surgery at that point. The skin on the upper left side of his face was rougher, his eye more obscured.” I motion to the area on my own face, even though she knows exactly what I’m talking about it. “Not to mention his left arm and leg, but he keeps that covered. He had a harder time walking then too.”

The faint smile on her face drops, seeing where I’m going with this.

“Anyway, Lena clammed up as soon as she walked in the house. Dad was trying his best, but she was so visibly uncomfortable.”

I glance down, realizing my napkin is all wadded up, torn at the edges. “He stepped out of the room and she turned to me and said, ‘You didn’t tell me he was a cripple’. He walked back in a second later. He’d obviously heard.”

She holds her hand over her mouth, eyes wide. “Oh, no.”

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