Page 17 of Pieces Of You

Jamie looks up, scrunching the napkin in her fist and setting it aside. I’m bummed that I didn’t even have time to make out what it was before she ruined it. “Hi, Carol.”

“Is this your new boyfriend?” Carol asks, motioning to me.

“No,” Jamie’s quick to answer. “We’re working on a school project together.”

Carol smiles, her eyes shifting between the two of us before finally settling back on Jamie. “He’s cute.”

“He’s right there, Carol. He can hear you,” Jamie deadpans.

“Oh, hush.” Carol taps my shoulder. “He already knows he’s cute.”

“I do,” I agree. “Though I prefer hot. Sexy. Dynamite in the sack.”

Jamieblushes. Ah, so this is her hot button. No amount of filthy words and insults can cover up the fact that the thought of me and sex makes her… something. Or maybe she’s embarrassed that I just said all that at her place of work. Yeah, that’s most likely it. I should probably rein it in. Or at leasttry.

Try—it seems like it’s all I’ve been doing lately.

“What do you want?” Jamie asks, and for a moment, I think she’s just busted me staring at her. Analyzing her. But no, she’s asking about the food.

I drop the menu. “You order for me. You know what’s good.”

Jamie orders the standard burger, fries, onion rings, and vanilla shake each, and once Carol leaves, I reach across the table and pull her hand toward me. “Hey, what the hell?”

Ignoring her, I turn her hand over, inspecting the scrapes now starting to scab. “It messed you up good, huh?”

“It’ll heal,” she mumbles, pulling her hand back and hiding it beneath the table. I don’t miss the way her cheeks bloomed pink at my touch, and now I’m wondering if they were that same way when I slid the gloves over her hands earlier. I wish I’d paid more attention.

Her gaze drops to the now balled-up napkin sitting between us, and I watch as her shoulders shift as if she was about to raise her hand to collect it. She doesn’t. Instead, she pulls out another napkin and starts the process again. Unfolding. Spreading out. Before she can put pen to paper, my phone vibrates, and I rush to see who’s calling, my lungs emptying with relief when I see it’s not Mia or her idiot dad.

“It’s Dean,” I tell Jamie. Then hit answer and say, “Hey, man. What’s up?”

“I was just checking in. How did it go?”

I watch Jamie watching me. “It was fine.”

“Cool. Did you want to meet up, grab something to eat?”

“I uh…” I don’t know if Jamie can hear Dean’s end of the conversation, so I don’t know why I’m looking at her, waiting for a reaction—an approval of some sort to say that it’s okay if I tell him we’re together, doing something we don’thaveto be doing… but then I figure,fuck it. Whatever they have going on is their problem. Not mine. “I’m actually with Jamie right now. We just ordered.”

Silence greets me while Jamie gives no visible reaction.

“You good?” I say into the phone.

“Yeah, man. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

He hangs up before I can respond, so I drop my phone on the table and say, because I’m sick of all the secrets, “So, Dean.”

Jamie’s lips press tight before her shoulders drop. Man, she must’ve been tense the moment I mentioned his name. “He hasn’t told you, has he?”

“Told me what, exactly?”

Her mouth opens, shuts, again and again. “Can I ask you something first?”

I nod, settle into my seat.

“You know Bethany, right?” Well, that was unexpected.

“I mean, we’re not close, but yeah, I know her.”

---