Page 2 of One Little Problem
“And that’s a point against it?” I was all for suggestions, as long as those suggestions were about and/or coming from sexy guys.
“No,” he admitted. “But come on, we’re gonna tell people that’s our song? Sucker?”
Luke knew what it was called! He totally dug the JoBros. Wait, did he think Nick was more attractive than me? Wait again… “Okay,” I said. He had a good point. I tried to relax into my seat.
I wasn’t driving, so I had a good view of the slight pout forming on his face. “That’s all? I thought it was good innuendo.” It went something like, I’m a sucker for you, which yeah, could be taken so differently.
“It is,” I agreed. That was why I hadn’t been able to say anything else. Startling the driving by screaming or tackling him with my body wasn’t a great idea. “I’m so proud of you.” This is why his nickname was Genius. There was no one else I’d rather spend my Friday night with.
I looked outside the car while my adoring smile lingered on my lips. Nothing to see really, just flat land. A lot of the crops had been harvested, so there was a clear, unencumbered view of a lot of nothing. Our town wasn’t so small that everyone knew everyone else, but it wasn’t a big, bustling city. And the view wasn’t very spectacular, at least not outside of the car. Inside the car? I didn’t have any complaints about the view of my baseball player boyfriend.
“What about Ari?” Luke asked as we arrived at his house and he killed the engine.
“Yeah, the girl has pipes,” I said while getting out of the car. “But she’s no JoBros.” We went into his house. Wow, me not having complaints about anything? Had that ever happened before? Life was crazy.
“No, I didn’t mean what do you think of her, I meant for our song.” Oh right, that’s what we’d been doing. It was easy to get distracted when I got to watch him walk in the house, track pants loose but not loose enough to hide his firm ass. Wait, what was happening? Oh yeah, our song. Luke’s suggestion was, “Break up With Your Girlfriend—"
We have a winner. “Oh, I’m sold.”
“Cuz I’m bored,” he finished.
I smiled at him sweetly. “You had me at break up with your girlfriend.”
He stepped closer to me. “I don’t have one.” Luke’s profile in the car had been striking, but I liked this better, being met with his vivid green eyes, and while the dimples weren’t out at this moment, they could appear any time.
“Right, but that’s how it always should be, you should always be breaking up with your girlfriend.” I’d become adept at internally gushing over my bf while still carrying on conversations.
He shook his head. “That would mean I’d have to get one in order to—"
Oh right, in order to break up with them. Didn’t think that through. I frowned.
“Don’t worry,” he said, smiling slightly and giving me a peek at his dimples. “I have no plans of breaking up with my not-girlfriend.”
That was super news, seeing as the not-girlfriend in this scenario was me, the boyfriend. Feelings of fondness washed over me, along with hotness at seeing Luke’s soft smile and I had to attack his mouth with my own. See, everything was perfect. I would have once thought I had a better chance of winning a Nobel prize than being happy in high school, but I was happy to be wrong for once. I wasn’t going to make being wrong a habit, but still, it worked out.
We shared a kiss in the entryway. Technically, this was supposed to get old. All the dopamine and serotonin coursing through our veins would lessen over time, send less excitement and fluttery feelings to all the nerves in our bodies, let us settle into something more comfortable. At least, it should, in terms of science. We’d been dating for a while and yet I couldn’t ever imagine not feeling this way when kissing Luke. Kissing him just made me want to kiss him more.
I put my hands on his broad shoulders and his hands came around my waist as he pushed me towards the wall. Yeah, life was perfect.
“I hate to interrupt, but,” said a pointed female voice. Luke and I broke apart enough to see his mom Linda standing there, hands on her hips as she took in the scene in front of her with distaste. She stopped speaking, like she didn’t actually hate to interrupt at all.
Okay, everything was still totally perfect. Between Luke and I. When it came to Luke’s parents?
Maybe there was some discord there.
* * *
Luke
My parents liked to pretend me dating a guy didn’t exist. Pretty difficult to do when confronted with the evidence, like us making out in the entryway to our home, but I almost had to give them credit for trying. Mom had a fake smile plastered on her face; her smiles were always tight and fake these days, at least around me, which is why I thought it was stupid to gloss over it, it’s not like that made everything okay.
Again, I almost had to give them credit, but I didn’t. Because, yeah, them being weird about my relationship wasn’t exactly something I was happy about.
“We didn’t know you were having a guest over, Luke,” Mom said.
There were a lot of things I didn’t understand. Any movie involving time travel. Why people were so worried about bees when there always seemed to be some hovering around Mom’s flowers. Geometry, even though I was in that class last year. Algebra II, even though I was in that class now.
But my parent’s passive aggression? Yeah, I was well versed in that. They rarely said mean things when it was so much easier to put on a happy face and hint at mean things instead. Mom didn’t want this particular guest in our house, even though the mat at the front door said welcome. The mat was a lie.
