Page 29 of Bring You Back

“Hey,” I say to the girl, my voice hard and ready for a confrontation. The girl—whose name I don’t care to remember—stares back at me with narrowed eyes. “Remember the guy who harassed you last spring, and you bitched for months about how he couldn’t takenofor an answer?”

Her eyes narrow more until they’re slits. She knows where I’m going with this, so I don’t have to say the rest.

Reyna nods with an appreciative gleam in her eyes. “I remember that, too.”

We share a pointed smile, and the girl looks stricken. I roll my eyes.

I hate when people can dish it out but can’t take it in. If you’re spewing shit, you better be prepared to get sprayed, too.

“So back off,” I say. “Like he should have.”

“Where have you even been?” she throws at me as she walks past, then out.

“Thanks,” Reyna says with a sigh. “I really wanted to throw these cones at her.” She waves a small stack of cones around and I chuckle.

“Well, maybe the day you quit, you can.”

“Not if I want a good reference.”

I make a face. “For what? Another ice cream shop?”

A look passes over her face, reminiscent of the look that passed over Tommy’s this morning when I mentioned college. The future.

All she says is, “Maybe.”

What have these two not told me yet?

We fall into silence, now that our comrade-ship has sunk. We’re not sure how to approach each other or what to say. It’s easy to talk without talking while other people are around.

We’re in a position we’ve never been in. Besides my leaving and stopping contact shortly after, we have Julian between us. We didn’t have the chance to talk about her seeing our almost-kiss, then subsequently stopping it from happening, because I left before the aftermath. It didn’t matter, because I was no longer around.

Now, Reyna’s had Julian in ways I should. She has him in ways I still want to.

She doesn’t actually have him.I need to remind myself of that.

She occupies herself with the register while I occupy myself with taking in the nineties music playing through the speakers. She has a hand in this. Nineties music is her mother’s obsession that became hers. This decade of music has sometimes seeped onto our own playlists, especially Tommy’s. But he has his own obsession with the girl who listens to it.

“Two Princes” is the one playing now. Funny.

Reyna’s eyes catch mine for a moment. She looks back down at the register, tucking her hair behind her ear, and I could laugh at the way she’spretendingto count cash. Her eyes lift again, up at me, back down at the register.

Finally, she closes the drawer in a huff. “So, why are you back?”

Here we go again.

My brother is dead and I want my friends back. Why is that so hard to get?

With the guys, the question is simple. With Reyna, the question is loaded. Suspicious. Asked with an undertone ofAre you going to take him from me?

I’m not taking anything of hers.

I don’t want or need anything of hers.

But what am I supposed to say about the dark-haired elephant in the room? Deny that I’m trying to set things back to how they should be? Tell her that she was just here when I wasn’t?

No. Speaking facts is consideredrudethese days, especially when hurt feelings are involved.

Feelings don’t change facts, and I’m known for spewing plenty of them, but that isn’t how I want to go about this. Again, I’m not against Reyna. She’s a better person than we’ll ever be, and Julian is hurting her worse than I ever will.

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