Page 25 of Love Around the Corner
“Thanks, Liv. You’re the best.”
He slid off his bar stool and immediately stumbled. Livie lunged forward, catching his weight as he righted himself. But he kept an arm slung around her shoulders, his side pressed up against hers. He was heavy and ungainly, but her body didn’t care, lighting up with tingles anywhere he touched her.
She was pretty sure she’d just made a terrible mistake.
Chapter Ten
Thank God it was a short walk home, because Nick seemed to be getting drunker by the second, and he washeavy. He was also taking a drunken stroll down memory lane as they navigated his old neighborhood.
“Aww, look, there’s Russo’s Pizza. I can’t believe it’s still here. Ilivedin that place when I was a kid. Do they still have that ancient Ms. Pac-Man game?”
“Yep, it’s still there. It’s probably fused to the linoleum at this point.”
“I spent, like,hoursplaying that game when I was a kid. Got the high score once.”
Livie paused, and Nick lurched to a stop beside her. “Wait...areyouNADS?”
She had to scramble to support him as he burst into laughter and doubled over. “Oh my God, I forgot all about that.”
“You’rethe high score on Russo’s Ms. Pac-Man?”
“When I was, like...” His face screwed up as he thought. “Ten? Why, did you try to beat my score, Livie?”
She ignored his teasing grin, keeping her eyes focused on the sidewalk ahead of them so neither of them tripped. “I don’t play video games, but I heard every boy in school joke about it often enough. Why are gonads so hilarious to prepubescent boys?”
“I wasn’t even making a joke.”
“What?”
“Those are myinitials. Nicholas. Anthony. DeSantis. NADS.”
“Well, intentional or not, you’re a legend to every obnoxious boy in this neighborhood.”
“Whaddaya know? I live on in Carroll Gardens.”
“On a video game anyway.” She hesitated, but in the end decided he probably wouldn’t remember any of this tomorrow anyway, so she asked the question that had been eating at her. “Why haven’t you been back? What happened with your parents?”
Nick scowled, rubbing his hand across the top of his hair until it was left standing on end. “We had a fight.”
“Was it about you getting kicked out of DeWitt?”
He shook his head too vigorously and threw his balance off. They lurched to the side briefly before she was able to steady him. “It was after that. Something bad happened. It wasn’t my fault, but they blamed me anyway. Which is fine. They’ve got their golden boy, all safe and sound. They don’t need me.”
“Golden boy?”
“My brother. Doesn’t matter. I’m fine.”
So fine that now, when his life was falling apart around him, there was no one he could reach out to for help except for some girl he barely knew. That seemed like the opposite of fine to her. She couldn’t imagine being estranged from her family, living in the same borough and never seeing them. Everybody’s family drove them crazy sometimes, but they were stillfamily.
“Tell me about your brother,” she said, trying to keep him alert as she maneuvered him around the corner and onto her block. Not much farther now.
“Chris,” he muttered.
“Okay, his name is Chris. What else? Older than you? Younger?”
“Older. By three years.” He was quiet for a bit, then he spoke again. “He’s a stockbroker. At least, I think he is. He was supposed to be one.”
“My cousin James is a stockbroker.”
