Page 49 of Gone for You

The kids are running back and forth, dodging behind bales of hay and trees, completely ignoring the fact that they’re about to get pelted by the sweet, innocent little blonde who was most recently cowering in fear. She lets out a loud war cry, completely over the top but hilarious, and starts rapid-firing as much as she can, considering she has to keep stopping in place to put more darts into her cheap toy. In the process, four boys notice the fresh bait and jump into action. Female or not, they’re about to take her down.

Before Liv realizes what’s happening, she’s being crept up on, army-crawl style. She stays in character, or so she later claims when we’re all giving her hell about her dramatics, and drops to the ground, splaying her arms and legs out wide and yelling “Surrender! Surrender!” then produces a white flag – from where, I still don’t know – and starts waving it over her head.

She’s so ridiculous.

Panting and gripping her chest, she staggers back over to me, falls into my arms, her own arm flung over her forehead as she sighs, “My hero, rescue me from these hoodlums.”

I allow her performance to go on, encourage it, even, because it’s cute as hell. “Do I need to go into battle for you?”

“You would do that? For little ol’ me?” Her eyelashes flutter and now she’s suddenly a southern bell.

“I’d do anything for a chance to impress you.”

“Oh hell. You guys make me sick,” Rex groans, gagging. “There’s no room for this mushy stuff at a kid’s birthday party.”

“Don’t hate on us just because…” I stop myself before saying something about being in love. Are we? In love? Is that even possible at this stage of our relationship? We haven’t even defined whatever we have together but I’m claiming her as my own.

Rex smirks, seeing that I caught myself. He knows everything. Well, noteverythingbut most of it.

Clearly my throat, I set her upright as we make our way to where Samantha and Austin are setting up lunch for the kids. It’s good to see them happy. When they see us approach, they offer us a drink that we gladly accept, down a bottle of water quickly.

“Did you have fun?” Samantha asks.

Liv says with seriousness, “I almost died but yeah, it was fun.”

“You’re so dramatic.” I poke her in the side and she jumps out of my reach.

“What? Those kids are ruthless!”

Rex nods. “They are. But I still think I won.” Just then he gets nailed in the back of the head with a dart and he drops to the ground. “Ahh!”

“You won, huh?” I ask, standing above him. He raises a middle finger and I hear Levi shout, “Mr. Rex just used the naughty finger!”

I point a finger at Rex. “Tsk, tsk, Mr. Rex. Remember there are children around.”

“Yeah, but these kids are like mini terrorists.”

Austin barks out a laugh, and Samantha reaches down a hand to help him up.

“Come on, ya big baby. Let’s get you a cookie.”

“Chocolate chip?”

“Of course.”

“Okay,” he whimpers, throwing a smile over his shoulder as he limps away.

“Hands to yourself!” Austin shouts.

We hang out at the birthday party for another few hours before making our rounds, saying goodbye to everyone. Liv can only stay tonight before she has to get back to Chicago and I’ve shared her enough as it is.

“Ready to get out of here?”

“Depends. What did you have in mind?”

“Stuff I can’t say at a kid’s birthday party.”

“Oh. I like stuff.”

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