Page 4 of Told You So
Eyes wide, I gape at him, then at Bethany. “A sense of humor? I didn’t see that one coming.”
“Sometimes,” she says. She smiles and runs her fingers through his brown hair.
Though Jesse doesn’t seem to take much notice to her attention, I get the feeling she’s the one person in the world he probably cares most about. There’s something calming in the way they are together, putting Jesse more at ease. I’ve only been drip-fed information about her parents over the years, but they seem like cold-hearted ass-hats. And, after tonight, learning how careless they’ve been with Jesse, I doubt his relationship with them is half as easy as his relationship with his sister.
He stares thoughtfully at his sundae. “They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,” he says, catching me off guard.
“Who was, Queen?” I ask, and lean my elbows on the table. “How do you know that?”
“And they received the Lifetime Achievement Award this year at the Grammys.”
I look at Bethany, who’s smiling from ear to ear. “I told you, he loves pop culture.”
Chuckling, I lean toward him a little bit. “And how is it that you know so much about Queen—wait, how do you know who Queen is at all?”
He glances at Bethany. “My sister listens to them sometimes,” he explains. “She listens to a lot of music.”
My eyes widen with surprise. “Does she, now? I had no idea.” I look at Bethany and our eyes meet for a brief moment. “This gets more interesting by the second.”
Bethany rolls her eyes. “Oh, please. It can’t be that surprising. You barely know anything about me.”
“I guess.” I know enough, though. I know that every time I think I have her figured out, she throws me a curveball, and that every time I tell myself I’mdonethinking about her, she does something surprising that hooks me in again, making thoughts of her inescapable.
I lean back in the booth, my sundae long gone. “All right then, so you guys are awesome and like my favorite band, but what about this Indiana Jones business?” Watching Jesse lick his fingers, I settle in for another debate. “Which is your favorite—wait, let me guess...Raiders of the Lost Ark?”
Jesse’s blue eyes meet mine and hold for a brief second. “How’d you know that?”
Suppressing a triumphant smile, I shrug. “Maybe a lucky guess. Or, maybe I figured that since you like dinosaurs”—I nod to his Jurassic Park shirt—“you’re partial to the snake scene—reptiles, that sort of thing.”
Jesse smiles a little, but I’ve lost his gaze again. “Yeah, you’re right.”
I clap my hands together. “What can I say, nothing gets by me.”
“But,” Jesse continues, “paleontologists say dinosaurs were a mix between warm and cold blood. So, they weren’t actually reptiles, like snakes.”
Bethany smiles again, with pride this time, and shakes her head. She’s beautiful when she’s like this, when she opens up and lets her walls down. It’s her crinkled, stormy gray eyes that have stuck with me all these years, making it nearly impossible to forget about her, no matter how many times I’ve tried.
“So, you’re a smart guy, huh?” I say. “I dig it.”
Jesse shrugs. “I read a lot.” He stirs what’s left of his sundae around in his glass.
My phone buzzes on the table beside me, and Savannah’s name fills the screen. I frown down at it. “Uh...Give me a sec, would you?” I look at Bethany, whose eyes are on me as I excuse myself from the table and make my way to the door.
I answer the call as I step outside. “Hello?”
“Hey!” Savannah shouts, laughing into the phone. It’s her drunken laugh, herhappylaugh. “Happy New Year, Nicky!”
I let out a relieved breath, glad she’s just tipsy and not crying or depressed on the other end. Leaving Saratoga Falls—me, her job, and her friends—to go back home to take care of her parents has been more difficult for her than she’d expected, and forme, if I’m honest. “Happy New Year, Red. Where are you?”
“Umm, I’m at a bar in Hannington Beach with a couple of new acquaintances. It’s my new hangout. What about you? Is Brady being a mean ol’ bastard and making you work all night or did he let you off the hook to meet up with Mac for New Year’s?”
I glance inside the restaurant, through the window at Jesse and Bethany as they sit, tucked away at our booth. “I’m at Denny’s, actually, of all places.”
She laughs. “That’s...unexpected.”
“Yeah, it is.” Savannah has no idea.
There’s movement on her end, and she’s huffing and puffing before the commotion dies down in the background. “I miss you, Nick,” she says quietly. “I just—I wanted to hear your voice. It’s weird being here, when I really just want to be there, with you.”
