“Not bad at all,” he agreed. “We can get these changed out pretty quick. One more weekend of Faire, but then after that? Make a weekend out of it?”
I shook my head. “We’ll be in full-on college prep mode for the next couple weeks after that.”
“Ahhhh, right. Is she excited?”
“That’s an understatement.”
“And how about you, Mama? Are you excited?” But he seemed to know the answer to that, wrapping an arm around me and kissing my temple before I could formulate an answer.
“Not sure if ‘excited’ is the word.” I accepted his embrace, even leaned into it as I slipped an arm around his back. “Is there a word for full of dread yet proud yet worried, and feeling like I won’t get a good night’s sleep till I see her again at Thanksgiving?”
“Probably one of those really long German words.” He released me to open the fridge in the kitchen while my phone buzzed on the kitchen island. “Aw, man! Am I out of beer?”
“Hey, you know the rules,” I said lightly as I scooped up my phone. “BYOB around here.”
“Fine,” he sighed elaborately, grabbing a soda instead and nudging the door shut. He reached for his phone in his back pocket, and we both looked at the text we’d simultaneously received from Emily.
Beer and pizza at Jackson’s in an hour? Let’s give Stacey and Daniel a send-off before they go!
“Is Stacey leaving already?” I glanced up at Mitch, who shook his head in confusion.
“She shouldn’t be. One more weekend of Faire and all.” He shrugged. “But it’ll be a busy weekend, and then they’re off to the next festival, right? Getting the goodbyes out of the way early, maybe.”
I considered that. “Okay, then. What do you think? Want to go?”
“Yeah,” he said. “May as well.” He looked down at the soda in his hand. “At least they have beer at Jackson’s.”
I bumped his arm with my shoulder and he chuckled in response. We bent over our phones, and while I sent a quick text to Caitlin at the bookstore （You okay if I go out tonight? No wild parties while I’m gone）， Mitch’s response to the group text came through. We’re in. See you in a bit. A chill prickled my skin.
“We?” I looked up at Mitch with alarmed eyes. It felt like he’d announced something without checking with me first.
“Yeah. Wait, you said you were going, right?”
“I did.” But I looked back down at my phone, where the words “We’re in” seemed to be blinking at me in red.
Beside me, Mitch didn’t notice my discomfort. “You want me to drive?”
“No,” I said quickly. His text was bad enough: answering for both of us like we were a couple. If we rode over together that would pretty much seal the deal in a town like this. “No,” I said again. “I haven’t heard back from Cait yet. I’ll drive myself over in case she needs me.”
He scoffed. “She’s eighteen and it’s Friday night. I can guarantee that she doesn’t need you.”
“Almost eighteen.” I gave him a thin smile. “Humor me, okay?” I needed some distance while I got myself together. I needed to keep my cool and not hang all over him at Jackson’s like . . . like a girlfriend or something. In my secret heart I hoped we were heading in that direction, but it was all still too new. He hadn’t made any real declaration, and neither had I. Those words were impossible to take back once they were said. I wasn’t ready to make that leap, and I certainly wasn’t ready to take this public. Not even to the people I felt closest to. No matter how natural it felt to have his arm around me, his lips in my hair.
No, I needed to get a grip. On myself. Not on Mitch.
Twenty-One
On nights that I went to Jackson’s with my sister we usually grabbed a booth in the back, so we could talk quietly while the bad karaoke happened toward the front. But there were six of us tonight, and with Mitch’s huge shoulders and Daniel’s long legs, there was no way we’d all fit in a booth. By the time I got there Simon and Daniel had pushed two tables together, and I helped Emily grab the chairs to put around them. Mitch and Stacey came back from where they had gone to get menus, as though we all didn’t have it memorized. After some good-natured fighting over pizza toppings （Stacey and Emily were pro-pineapple, Mitch and I were solidly against, while Daniel and Simon wisely stayed neutral）， we placed our orders for a couple pizzas, far too many mozzarella sticks, and a round of drinks.
“I can’t believe you’re leaving already,” Emily said, grabbing Stacey in a one-armed side-hug. “Didn’t you just get here?”
“Sure feels like it,” she said. “But we’re not going anywhere, you know.”
“You’re not?” I asked. “This is the last weekend of the Faire, right? Isn’t Maryland Ren Fest next, down by the coast?”
“Sure,” Daniel said. “But it’s not that far away. Stacey’s parents offered to let us stay, so we don’t have to worry about hotels or camping or any of that.”
“Wait,” Simon said. “？‘Us’？ You don’t mean . . .”
“I do.” Daniel’s eyebrows arched in a smile as he picked up his pint of Guinness that had just been delivered. While he took a sip, Stacey finished his thought.
“The whole band is staying at my house,” she said, almost with a straight face. “The guys are in the spare bedrooms, and Daniel and I are in my old place over the garage. Mom offered, and then she wouldn’t take no for an answer. I think she was mesmerized by their kilts.”
“God. Please.” Daniel grimaced and closed his eyes. “These are my cousins you’re talking about. I don’t want to think about your mom looking at them in any way.”
“Anyway,” Stacey giggled. “Lucky for Dex, my parents got rid of my pink canopy bed, and I spent this week cleaning out my old bedroom of any incriminating teenage evidence.”
I snorted and took a sip of cider. “So that means you’re here till when? October?”
Daniel nodded. “And we’ve already been here a month. So Willow Creek is going to be home base for a while. That’s, what . . .” He glanced over at Stacey. “Almost four months in one place? For us that’s practically putting down roots.”
“Okay, fine. I guess this isn’t much of a send-off, then.” Emily pretended to grumble, but the mozzarella sticks had arrived to cheer her up.
I raised my glass. “It’s a plain old Friday night out, then. Nothing wrong with that.”
“Yeah . . .” She looked around the table and a grin crawled over her face. “Look at all of us! It’s like a triple date!”
I choked on my cider as my heart thudded in my chest. I kept my eyes on the baskets of mozzarella sticks and pointedly didn’t look across the table at Mitch. I couldn’t.
“Speaking of . . .” Stacey propped her chin on her hand, twinkling her smile in my direction. “You two have looked awfully cute at Faire lately.”
Goddammit, Stacey. I bit down on my bottom lip to keep from scowling. Mitch laughed, but before he could answer her, I cut in. “Thanks,” I said with a laugh of my own that came out a little too loudly. “I think your grandparents bought it, right?” I looked across the table at Mitch, whose smile faltered a little, but he rallied.