Page 22 of Ignite

“Oh, you love birds have a fight?” Felicity dropped her groceries on the bench next to me. “Thanks,” she said when I rescued a rolling apple from falling onto the floor. “You’ve got good reflexes for a center.”

“I’ll have you know that I played fullback in primary school and never dropped a bomb.”

“Now I know why the kids love you,” she joked. “You’re more full of shit than they are.”

“Maybe so,” I admitted. “But they don’t know when to believe me and when not to.”

“So, what about Rylee?”

“Oh, she doesn’t believe a word that comes out of my mouth. And even when she does, she hates herself for it.” I looked to Rylee’s friend, “Are you ever going to tell me why a woman as sexy, smart, and nice as Rylee seems to be everyone’s little sister and no one’s girlfriend?”

“No.” Felicity motioned for me to take my groceries and leave, but I had a captive audience who’d just overheard me being shut down.

“I can go, or you can give me a hint. Does Rylee date guys?” It hadn’t occurred to me that Rylee might prefer women. Could I handle only ever being her friend? For a start, I’d have to have a long and honest conversation with my cock who wouldn’t understand.

Felicity laughed, and I even caught the cashier almost choking on her bottled water. “When Rylee dates, she dates men. But she isn’t looking for a man.”

“Not since …” the cashier said before being shut down by one of Felicity’s high school teacher glares.

“So, Rylee is still nursing a broken heart,” I suggested, looking from one to the other for the truth. Felicity held my gaze, but the cashier decided to check her change drawer. “Fine. I can be patient.”

“Eric tells me that you haven’t done the firefighter training yet.” Felicity adopted an air of innocence as she handed her credit card over. My chance was almost over, but why the hell would she be pushing me towards the firefighting stupidity. I’d never join. I’d never volunteer. Hell, that wasn’t in my employment contract so why was it the only thing anyone wanted to talk about?

No one cared that I had started dropping into the aged care facility to talk about introducing a program for core strength and mobility. No one seemed to care about the program I wanted to introduce to Felicity’s students as a way of encouraging them to stay in class or be good enough to impress league scouts.

All everyone wanted to know was when I’d be signing up for the volunteer firefighting unit.

“Why would I?” I took a step towards the door. I hated running away from a fight or an argument, but there was no winning this one. “I’m not signing up. So there’s no point doing the training.”

Rylee

“What do we have here?”

I jumped at the familiar voice and felt Ethan’s presence over my right shoulder. “Sending or receiving presents?”

“Picking up a parcel,” I said, clutching the box to my chest and hoping he wouldn’t look at the label. I didn’t need another person treating my obsession like a joke.

“Tut, tut, tut,” Ethan clucked in my ear before looking at the newsagent. “Miss Rylee Mettner gave me a half hour lecture about the benefits of shopping local, and here she is, picking up the evidence of online shopping.”

“Where I can shop local, I do,” I protested even as Mrs Murphy laughed from behind the counter. This would make her day, telling all her friends about little Rylee Mettner being dressed down by an outsider.

“This box would say otherwise.” Ethan ducked and weaved, trying to look at the label. “Tell me what’s so special that you can’t get it in town.”

“Oh, we don’t stock the sort of teas Miss Rylee prefers,” Mrs Murphy chortled as my face grew red. I’d never be able to live this down. “How can we stock something when she doesn’t know what flavor she wants from one day to the next?”

“Tea?” Ethan crinkled up his nose. “Doesn’t it just come with milk and sugar?”

I feigned horror even though the sentiment was real. “You would be talking about black teas, but even then there are hundreds of varieties. My personal fav is Earl Grey but with a squeeze of freshly sliced lemon.”

Which reminded me that I hadn’t made a pot of Earl Grey in weeks and needed to stop by Felicity’s house on the way home to pick a couple of lemons from her tree.

“What do you do with the rest of the lemon?”

“Boil it with grated ginger and freeze into ice cubes for summer.”

“Oh, Miss Rylee makes her own ginger, honey and lemon tea and sells cups of it at every fundraiser. My Scotty swears the ginger is so strong it’ll scare away any cold.” Mrs Murphy added proudly.

“The only reason the tea is strong is because your Scotty adds a shot of whiskey,” I reminded her.

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