Page 15 of Space Crush
Thank you, Andy.
“Man.” Ian shakes his head. “I may have had some trouble getting Trish to date me, but I was never bodily harmed.”
“I was pushed off a ladder,” Bodie offers, as if trying to make me feel better.
And it does, a bit.
“Question.” Ian signals to me with his index finger.
“If it’s about my dick, I don’t want to hear it.”
“Ah, no.” Ian scoffs before getting serious. “It’s about Kaley.”
Wary, I tilt my head back. “What about her?”
Picking up his beer, Ian shrugs. “Is she worth it?”
Reminding myself Ian’s a friend, I allow him the courtesy to explain before getting pissed about him questioning what Kaley’s worth. “What do you mean?”
The hand not holding his beer goes palm up. “I just mean that while you’ve both worked at NASA for years, you only just met a few months ago. And by your own admission, you two have only been on a couple of dates.”
I straighten, my back bristling. “So?”
Ian shares a glance with Bodie.
Taking over, Bodie rests his beer glass on the table. “I think what Ianmeansisis it worth going through all this”—he gestures to my lap—“for her?”
Ian pauses mid-sip. “Shedidjust try and emasculate you. Are you that sure about her?”
It’s a fair point. From their point of view, I dated, then was kind of ghosted and junk-punched with a cellular device. To them, I’m sure I seem crazy for being so adamant about Kaley being the one.
But then again, they weren’t there when Kaley and I met. They didn’t feel their chests shift at the sight of Kaley’s blue eyes sparkling as she lectured about regulatory standards and hazard recognitions. How, when I manage to make the normally serious safety engineer throw her head back and laugh, I feel more victorious than when I discovered the source of the anomalous friction in the Spidernaut2 lunar prototype.
They didn’t see the way Kaley rested her hand on mine as she listened while I shared about my mother or felt the world right itself on its axis when she trusted me enough to share about her own.
Taking a beat to lock eyes with each of them, I answer, “Absofuckinglutely.”
“All right, then.” Ian claps me on the back. “Welcome to the club.”
Bodie nods, tapping a knuckle by my phone. “Still no reply?”
“Nope.” I glare at my phone’s dark screen.
Kaley’s ghosting me again. And because—this time—I know why, I did more than just call and text.
After Andy, looking extremely satisfied that I’d received some payback for having left him to deal with the kiddos solo—twice—offered me a hand up, I ran after Kaley.
Okay, Ihobbledafter Kaley.
Except she wasn’t in her office. Nor could I find her at the festival. It was on my second loop around that Bodie and Ian found and took pity on me.
“You could always go to her house,” Ian offers.
I shake my head. “I don’t know where she lives.”
Bodie’s head pulls back. “Seriously?”
“Well, I know where, as in which neighborhood.” I think through Kaley and my many topics of conversation. “She mentioned it in passing, but it’s not like I have the house number.”
