Lydia leans against the doorjamb, watching for a moment as Jamie tears into the box, freeing the instruction manual and the bags of pieces. “Can I get you anything to drink? Coffee? Root beer?”
“I want a root beer!” Jamie’s eyes light up.
“What’s the magic word?” I ask him.
“Please can I have a root beer, Mommy.”
“Two root beers, coming right up.” Lydia tosses a wink my way and heads to the kitchen, leaving me and Jamie with our LEGO project.
I don’t get back to Pearl Lake until Sunday night. Spending time with Jamie is fun but also mentally and emotionally exhausting. I wish I lived closer so I could see him more often than I do, but Lydia’s family lives in Chesterton, so she won’t move this way.
I brush off Teagan for the next couple of days, not because I don’t want to see her but because I do. I want to forget where I’ve been all weekend and lose myself in her.
So instead of being forthcoming about where I’ve been and who I’ve been with, I tell her I’m tired and need to work late on some projects across the lake. I also don’t respond to a lot of her texts, or I give one-word answers. I know I can’t keep this from her forever, but I don’t want this to change what we have. I feel like we’re in a good place, and this could mess things up.
On Wednesday, when the guys invite me out to play pool, I drive by the pub and notice Dillion’s truck and Allie’s car and bail.
But by Thursday night I feel like I’m in withdrawal. I wonder if this is what drug dependency is like. And I also feel like shit because I haven’t heard from Teagan since Tuesday. I’m guessing I hurt her feelings by avoiding her. Which is reasonable. I told her I wanted to date her, then went away for the weekend and snubbed her. I’m mixed-message central over here.
So after work on Thursday, I head home, shower, shave, change into fresh jeans and a T-shirt, and head over to the pub, where she’s working. I know I’m in trouble by the way my heart beats double time as soon as I lay eyes on her. And I feel even worse for keeping things from her, like the reason I was gone all weekend.
I slide into my seat at the end of the bar and murmur hello to the two women sharing a meal on the stools to my right. Fran and Gertie are locals and have been friends their entire lives. Their husbands are best friends and long retired, and every Thursday night they play cribbage and Fran and Gertie come to the pub for beers and dinner.
Teagan’s steps falter when she notices me sitting at the end of the bar, but she recovers quickly and stops to deliver the pints to Mike and Jerry, who, like Fran, Gertie, and me, always eat here on Thursday nights.
She spends a couple of minutes chatting with each set of customers before she finally ends up in front of me. She smiles, but it’s strained and doesn’t reach her eyes. “Hey, stranger. I was about to give that seat away. Can I get you the usual?”
“Yeah, that’d be great.” I don’t have a chance to say anything else because she’s already heading back down to the other end of the bar. I should’ve expected the frosty reception. I should also apologize for ghosting her this week, but the middle of a bar isn’t very private, and groveling isn’t normally something I do in public.
Teagan is clearly not in a rush, seeing as it takes twelve minutes—yes, I look at my phone to time it—for my root beer float to arrive. And it’s not delivered by Teagan.
Louis sets it down in front of me, one eyebrow arched, shaking his head slightly. “I don’t know what you did, but your presence has sucked the sunshine right out of my bartender. It’s like watching a damn thunderstorm roll in.”
I glance at Teagan, who’s down at the other end of the bar, pouring pints for Aubrey, the server.
“She ask you to serve me?”
“Not in so many words.” Louis leans on the bar. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you weren’t here last night and Teagan was, or the fact that the past few weeks you’ve been driving her home.”
“Why is everyone always up in my business around here?”
“The problem with living in a small town is that you can’t screw up and hide out for very long, so it might be a good idea to fix whatever you did wrong.”
He’s right. The good and bad part of small-town life is that everyone knows everything about you. Or at least they think they do. And you can only keep secrets for so long. Although I’ve been keeping mine for a lot of years. From everyone in Pearl Lake. And one of the ways I’ve been managing to do that is by keeping most people at arm’s length. People can’t get the dirt on you if they aren’t close enough to go poking around.
This entire situation with Teagan shines a bright light on that. But I can make this work. It’s not like she’s going to fall in love with me or anything. She’s here to figure her life out, and when she’s done, she’ll go back to the city, and I’ll stay here, where it’s comfortable. For some reason that thought seems empty, but I brush it aside, not willing to face the fact that I’m clearly lying to myself when it comes to how I feel about her.
Teagan manages to avoid my end of the bar until she brings my burger over. Her arms are full of condiments, which means she only has to make one trip. That fake smile is stretched across her face, and her actions are slightly stilted and jerky.
“Here you go, today’s special with a side Caesar and barbecue sauce. Can I get you anything else?” Her eyes don’t quite meet mine, staying on my mouth.
I duck my head, trying to get her to look me in the eye. “Uh, yeah, actually.”
“Another root beer float?” She adjusts the napkin holder on the bar in front of her.
“Can we talk when you’re done with your shift?”
“I’m closing tonight. It’ll be late.” She keeps fidgeting with the straws, moving the box that they’re in around.
“I can wait.”
She sighs and tips her chin up, looking at the ceiling. “If that’s what you want to do.” And with that she spins on her heel and sashays down the bar.
I spend the rest of the evening watching her smile and laugh with all the other customers and completely ignore me, apart from when she absolutely has to speak to me. I’ve definitely managed to put myself in the doghouse.
It’s after midnight by the time she finally finishes up. And it seems like she’s stalling, wiping things down more than once and spending a long time in the back room. I sit at the bar until Louis tells me I need to go so he can finish closing. So I wait by her car.
And of course, because this night isn’t shitty enough, it starts raining.
Teagan comes out a few minutes later, rushing across the parking lot, chin tucked into her chest, purse over her head, trying to protect her from the rain that’s coming down faster and harder with every passing second.
Her head is down, so she doesn’t notice when I step in front of her, blocking her way to the driver’s side door, and she crashes right into me.
“Oh!” She stumbles back a step, and I grab her around the waist to prevent her from falling into the pothole she jumped over.
She shields her eyes with one hand and tips her head back, her lips thin. “I thought you’d gone home.”