Page 59 of All Autumn
“What’s this about how Blanton looked at you?” Connor said.
32
~ Connor ~
I’d wantedto grab that phone out of Melinda Archer’s hand and see for myself how Blanton looked at Autumn.
Autumn shrugged. “My mother’s delusional. You know that.”
True, but I’d seen the man’s head leaning close to hers during the parade. Not to mention the vibes I’d picked up before the parade started. I wasn’t imagining that Blanton was interested in her.
If she returned that interest, she’d tell me. I think. It wasn’t like I had a claim on her, not exactly. She was the one who’d asked that I not see other women as long as we were together, and I assumed that applied to her, too. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t deny that I was jealous, a new feeling for me. I didn’t like it.
Bluegrass music filled the air. “That’s Hamburger,” Autumn said. “Let’s go listen to him.”
Jenn glanced at her. “I thought we were going to a meeting with Mary.”
I leaned around Autumn’s back, getting Jenn’s attention. “Catch up with us here, Jenn. There is no meeting. That was just to get us away from the crazy parents.”
“Oh, right.” She slapped her forehead. “My dumb.”
That was one of the reasons I loved Jenn. She’d always been able to go with the flow. The biggest reason, though, was that she’d always been there for Autumn, whether it was to assure Autumn that her parents loved her, no matter how much they ignored their daughter, or the way she could make Autumn laugh.
Autumn grinned. “I always said you were the dumbest of us all.”
Jenn snatched Beau’s leash out of Autumn’s hand. “Just for that, I’m stealing your dog.” She trotted backward as she and Beau headed away from us. “Dylan will never forgive me if I don’t bring Daisy’s son to see him. I’ll catch up with you guys later.”
“I love her,” Autumn said, her eyes on her dog and her friend as they disappeared among the people heading over to the festival ground’s stage.
“Impossible not to.” I put my arm around her waist, pulling her next to me. “Let’s go do some feet stomping to Hamburger’s fiddle.”
“I wish Savannah was here,” she said out of the blue.
“Hmm,” was all I could say to that. Personally I hoped she stayed far away. I no longer considered Savannah Graham a friend, but I knew better than to say that to Autumn.
I’d once liked her as much as I had Autumn, Jenn, and Natalie. I still remembered the day the four of them had stormed the tree house our father and Adam had built together. Autumn’s head had poked up in the opening first, and looking back, that wasn’t a surprise. She was the instigator of all their pranks and shenanigans. And believe me, there had been more than their fair share of both those things.
“Hello,” she’d said, grinning and waving at Adam and me as if it were perfectly acceptable to invade a boy’s secret hideout, even though there was a sign at the bottom of the ladder that said NO GIRLS ALLOWED. Both of us had stared in shock at the girl who’d dared to risk our wrath when we had water guns. We grabbed them and fired, drenching her. The crazy girl only laughed.
Her face and hair wet and dripping water, she climbed in. “Shoot them, too.” She pointed at her friends as they followed her in. We knew the girls. Jenn’s house was next door to ours. Still, they were girls, so we soaked them, too.
Unfazed, Autumn, Natalie, Jenn, and Savannah had relentlessly moved in on our territory. They’d turned out to be cool girls, though, up for anything, and the six of us had become lifelong friends. And then Natalie had died, and Savannah had gone to New York, taking Adam’s heart with her.
That left four of us still in the valley, and here I was, lusting after Autumn. I never saw that one coming. But where Adam had fallen in love with one of the girls, that wasn’t going to happen to me.
Hamburger Harry walked onto the stage wearing his signature overalls and carrying his fiddle. For any tourist in town who’d come out to watch the parade, they were in for a treat. Hamburger played a mean fiddle. I didn’t much care for bluegrass music, unless it was Hamburger playing it.
“Don’t let us leave without a jar or two of moonshine,” I said to Autumn. Hamburger always had his canvas tote filled with mason jars of flavored moonshine.
“Definitely. He better have a jar of peach.”
“You know he always has a peach flavored for you.” And he’d have an apple pie one for Jenn. Since I wasn’t as high on his favorites list as Autumn and Jenn, there may or may not be a jar in his tote of straight moonshine with cherries in it for me.
“Seriously, this is their entertainment?” someone behind me said.
“Whadda you expect from a one-horse town?”
I glanced behind me to see two guys looking at Hamburger with smirks on their faces. “Actually, if you watched the parade, you know we have eight horses.”
