Page 105 of More Than Pen Pals

“Nothing funny ever happens to me.”

“Well, does anything funny happenaroundyou?”

“Hmmm.” I wrack my brain because I can’t let her down. “Oh! I’ve got it.”

“Good. What?”

“You know Jay?”

“From your work? Unfortunately.”

“Then you’re going to love this.” I grin. “He was rude to Annette this morning, which honestly isn’t any different from most mornings. After lunch, she somehow attached a length of toilet paper to the back of his suit jacket without him knowing. He walked around the office all afternoon with toilet paper streaming out behind him.”

Leslie laughs. “I wish I’d seen that. How long did it take him to figure it out?”

“He’s not the most popular person in the office, so nobody told him about it until Dad saw him late this afternoon. He was hopping mad. He said, and I quote, ‘This is a place of serious business, not a carnival!’” I snort. “As if people walk around with toilet paper hanging off them at carnivals.”

“You know, I’m not looking forward to meeting your dad someday, but I think I’ll find him fascinating.”

“Morbidly fascinating, maybe.”

“I’m going to have fun messing with him.”

I smile. “I hope you do.” We could keep talking all night, but we shouldn’t, so I say, “Okay, I’d better go.”

“Wait a minute,” she says.

“Yes?”

“You said Melissa recently moved back to town and needs some friends, right?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Because I recently moved to town and need more friends than Wendy. Do you think Melissa and I would get along?”

My jaw drops. “Are you serious? You want to be friends with Melissa?”

“Maybe. Do you think that’s weird?”

“A little, if I’m honest. But I do think you might get along. You have several things in common.” They both love baseball, they seem to have a similar sense of humor, and they’re both coming out of long-term relationships.

“So can I have her number? I think her Saturday evening is about to open up.”

fifty-one

Ifeel energized after my call with Ash instead of devastated. It’s not that I’m excited we put the brakes on our relationship yet again, but for the past month all I’ve thought about is the drama with the men in my life—first Glenn, and now Ash. And it’s not that I won’t still think about Ash, but since I now have no good reason to think about when he might call or write, or what I’ll say to him in my next letter or when I see him, I feel an odd sense of freedom.

I surprised myself almost as much as Ash when I suggested I might become friends with Melissa. I can’t hold a grudge against her for what she did to Ash when they were kids, considering what I did to him. And she shouldn’t lose out on potential friendships because of my stupidity. Thanks to me, a friendship with Ash—and possibly Randall, too—is off the table for her unless I befriend her. The least I can do is meet her and see if we click.

Ash asked me to wait a half hour to call Melissa so he’d have time to contact her first and cancel their plans. In the meantime, I call Wendy to give her the update on my talk with Ash, and then I dial Aunt Star’s number.

“You were right,” I say when she answers. “It was too soon.” I cry for the first time since I got off the phone with Ash.

“Oh, Les. What happened?”

I tell her all the details of the encounter at the bar and my phone conversation with Ash.

“Maybe it’s good you tried it,” she says. “Now you know without a doubt that waiting is the best thing to do. You won’t wonder if you made the wrong decision.”

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