Page 53 of The Dangers of Daydreaming

They struck up a conversation about that, and I was content to just trail behind them, listening and enjoying the scenery. It had been a while since I’d gone on this tour. The last time had been the previous fall, but I hadn’t joined the group, opting to stay in the car until the tour was finished. We weren’t particularly busy in the winter and spring, but there had been a Green Gables Christmas event last year, and I’d just dropped our guests at that and then picked them up after.

Really, most of the time, I was just an overpaid chauffeur.

Seriously overpaid, considering my qualifications, which equaled living on the island and happening to be the grandchild of a couple that ran a popular B&B.

Lucy glanced back briefly, catching my eye, but then focused again on her conversation. I smiled to myself. She wasn’t as unaffected as she liked to pretend.

My text tone went off, so I pulled my phone out. Until Pops had ended up in the hospital, I hadn’t bothered to check my phone hardly at all, but despite knowing Gram was still sleeping at the B&B and Pops was slowly getting his energy back, another update could come anytime. And being so far from them today made me want to stay on top of things evenmore.

Dadbeat: Hey Finn, I talked to Gram today and heard your Pops hasn’t been doing well. I’ll be headed up for a few days—would love to get together and get something to eat or catch a movie while I’m there. Let me know your availability.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

It had been two and a half years since I’d seen my dad. He texted on my birthdays and major holidays, but that was it. And now he was just going to drop in and wanted… to get a bite to eat or catch a movie? Like we’d seen each other last month?

Man, he could at least pretend to butter me up a bit first.

A dozen responses filtered through my mind, none of them nice and most of them straight up mean, so I pocketed my phone. I’d deal with it later.

We finished the walk through the Haunted Wood, and I probably had several missed opportunities to make jokes or insinuations about Lucy and me on Lovers’ Lane, but like usual, even just the thought of my dad was ruining my day.

What would it have been like to have a real dad? Not a perfect one, but maybe one that didn’t end up in jail. One that didn’t decide after he’d served his time that a kid seemed like too much work. One that…

“You okay?” Lucy asked quietly from next to me.

I looked up. We were at the van and everyone was standing around waiting for me to unlock it.

“Yeah, yeah, sorry,” I said, unlocking and opening her door.

She shot me looks all through the drive, but I wasn’t about to say anything. My phone with that text burned a hole in my pocket the whole way. I almost waited in the car while the group visited Lucy Maud Montgomery’s grave, but at the last second, I pocketed the keys, chucked my phone down by the van pedals, and jogged after them all.

Lucy sawme coming and broke off from the group. Her eyes took me in, and I half expected another interrogation like after the hospital.

“Don’t want to talk about it?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Okay.” She fell into step beside me.

I shook my head at her.

“What?” she asked.

“That’s all it takes for you to drop this, but I can’t convince you to go out with me?”

Her hair was coming out of its braid, and it reminded me of the unkempt style she’d had last night… and how it had looked that morning. The bun had been lopsided, and more than a few hairs had escaped. Freaking adorable.

“I’ve told you my reasons about the date,” she said, but her eyes were smiling.

“I know. So trivial. Something about an ocean between us.”

“Yeah, trivial.”

We grinned at each other for a minute before she seemed to realize what she was doing.

Another point for me.

We caught up with the group who were around the gravesite and spent a few minutes there.

---