Page 9 of Best Friends, Tennessee

Danielle snorted. “Not Olivia’s.Mom’s. I guess both of them sleep like babies, though, despite the fact that only Olivia is an actual baby.”

I stood up to give her a hug. “See you soon. Good luck Sunday.”

After Dani left, I ordered another citrus IPA. I settled in, seeing if I could muster the energy to meet a cute girl tonight. Kane was behind the bar counting cash in one of the registers, and Max came through again with a basket of limes ready to slice. He looked up at me, leaning over the bar like he was about to give me a secret tip.

“It happens with the front doors, too,” Max said. “Randomly opening, just a little. It’s got to be the ghost cat going in and out—”

“Max, stuff it,” Kane said from the register, not even looking up from his task.

If Max was a dreamer, Kane was a realist.

Max glanced up toward the doors, then did a double take. “Look. Holy shit, it’s doing it right now.”

Even Kane looked over toward the front doors of the bar. I turned to look, and sure enough, one of the front doors had opened slightly and then closed again.

“I need to post this online,” Max said, pulling his phone out to take a video.

But a moment later, the door swung open completely, and we saw that it wasn’t a cat ghost at all.

Nothing even close.

“Fuck,” I muttered under my breath.

Ori was here.

Ori fuckin’ Adams.

Seeing him walk in was more surprising than if Taylor Swift herself had just walked through those doors. The energy in the place felt different all at once.

He was carrying a giant bottle of champagne that had a big, decorative gold ribbon attached to the top of it, along with an envelope. In the other hand, he had a couple of notebooks and his cell phone on top.

I clicked my tongue.

The nerve on him. Waltzing in here like this, after shitting on the idea earlier tonight, acting like he was above it all?

He walked over and I saw that his jacket was coated in a thin dusting of gold glitter.

“I don’t know if you’re aware, but you don’t have to bring yourownalcohol to bars,” I joked, looking down and running my finger through a particularly gold-dusted portion of his sleeve. “What the hell is this?”

“If I’d known this ribbon would shed this much glitter, I’d have gotten a six-pack of Bud instead,” Ori said, setting the champagne in front of me. “Here. It’s for you.”

The gold bow on top was so big that when he set it down, it almost hit one of the green pendant lights hanging above the bar.

“For me?” I asked.

“I didn’t have a thank-you gift ready when I got to your place, but… better late than never,” he said, sliding onto the bar stool next to mine.

“You don’t have to get me a gift,” I said. “Jesus Christ, what is this—”

I opened the envelope to see a gift certificate for Archie May’s, the nearby animal feed store. The amount on the certificate was two hundred dollars.

“For the horses,” Ori said. “I know you always talk about having to make trips to Archie’s.”

Fuck.

That was a really nice gift.

I was surprised he was thinking of me at all, after I left for the bar.

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