Page 44 of Our Little Moments

Stella’s hand lands on mine, and she rubs her thumb over it, as if she can sense the turmoil inside of me.

“Hey there, Adrian!” my sister calls from her kitchen cheerily. “I didn’t see you come in!”

I cave and ask, “Do you need help setting up your shop?”

She stops rushing around in her kitchen. “No, Adrian.” She giggles as if she finds my question ridiculous. “I’ll be fine. Jay offered to help around today.”

My heart stops beating.What?“Jay? As in Jay Harper? As in my best friend you constantly complain about? You’re letting him help you and not me?”

“Yeah, he is. I couldn’t believe it when heaskedif he could help out this morning. I never thought I’d see the day.”

The shop’s bell chimes as the traitor comes in.

Jay looks at me and grins. “Looks like I made a hell of an entrance.”

“Well, you can move your ass over here and come help me, instead of wasting time trying to charm Stella with your infuriating cockiness and constant jokes,” my sister calls out in annoyance.

Well, at least their bickering hasn’t changed.

“I see my charm is very unappreciated, but I always keep my word. Stella and Adrian, I hope you’ll have a nice day.” Jay heads into Isabella’s kitchen.

“Charm, my ass,” my sister mutters loud enough for the whole shop to hear. I chuckle as I phase out their bickering, only to find Stella’s face red as a stoplight.

“What is it?” I ask Stella, laughter still in my voice.

“This is so far from being how I planned this to go,” she mutters to herself.

It’s only then I notice her foot is tapping and her hands are shaking, though she tries to hide it by holding her cup of coffee with both hands.

“What’s making you this nervous?”

She lets go of her cup of coffee and stares into my eyes, looking for something in them.

Her foot tapping gets louder, and I try to reassure her by repeating her gesture from earlier: I land my hand on hers and rub my thumb over her knuckles.

She smiles warmly, and her feet stop tapping.

“I thought about what we talked about and . . . I wanted to do something for you.”

How is it possible for this woman to have perfect timing in everything? We keep seeing each other around town, she finds me where I hide away from the world, and she offers to help the very next day I decide to step outside my comfort zone.

Stella starts getting more nervous when I don’t answer. “I know you don’t spend a lot of time doing things for yourself, and I wanted to do something to help you. So I prepared a hiking afternoon for both of us. I asked Jay for help this morning sinceI needed help figuring out everything for this. He offered to help Isabella out to ‘help convince you to do something for yourself.’” She groans. “Ugh, now I know both Isabella and Jay know about what I planned because they’re both hiding behind that counter and spying on us.”

I turn around to find Jay and Isabella hiding their faces behind drinks like idiots. I laugh at the sight.They can’t be serious.

Stella keeps going, “I’m sorry. I . . . didn’t mean to do anything that could make your friend or sisters give you trouble. I just wanted to do something for you.”

I chuckle and smile at her.

Not only did she set up an entire afternoon for us both to hike because she knows I struggle with taking time for myself, but she also tried to do so while not giving my sisters ammunition forgiving me trouble.

It feels sospecialto have someone see you and try to help in any way they can.

“Stella. Don’t . . . Don’t apologize,” I reply when I finally get back my ability to speak. “What you did is . . . ” I chuckle, words feeling inadequate. “What you did is leaving me speechless. It’s perfect.”

Her entire eyes light up. “Really?”

I can’t help grinning at her. “Yeah, really.”

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