Page 81 of Kiss My Glass
“Could someone get Nate some food?” Shelby asks. “I don’t think he’s eaten all day.”
“Shel, I’m fine,” he protests, embarrassed.
“Oh, I completely forgot!” Mom reaches into her tote bag and pulls out a snaplock container. “I brought cookies!”
‘Huzzah!” says Ava. “Let me at ’em!”
“You needproteinfor real energy, Ava,” says Dad. “Not empty calories and a glucose spike.”
“That is so true, Dad,” says Ava, who already has the lid off. “But this has been a tough old day, and we need cookies.”
She hands them round, and everyone but Dad and Shelby takes more than one. They’re chocolate and salted caramel, and they disappear in a flash. Ava’s right. There are times only cookies will do.
Nate’s color starts to come back. I can’t even imagine what he’s been going through emotionally.
“Bro, can we bring you dinner?” I ask. “There’s a Denny’s next door.”
“Nate’s going to come home with us and we’ll feed him there,” says Mom.
Nate gives me and Frankie an apologetic look. “Thought I might crash at Mom and Dad’s for a couple of nights. Be closer to Shelby. Would that be okay with you?”
“Tell us what you need,” I say, without hesitating. “Frankie and I will hold the fort.”
“Thank you.” Shelby blows us a kiss.
“Time to go.” Frankie walks to the bed and gives her sister a hug. “Bye, Shel. Take care. Obey all medical directives.”
“I will. I promise.” Shelby smiles. “You two should go back to your date that I so rudely interrupted.”
Frankie raises a wry eyebrow at me, and says, “Maybe a quiet dinner for two?”
I’m filled with affection for her. I thought she’d want to crash into bed for an early night, but she’s chosen to spend a little longer with me.
“Sounds perfect,” I tell her.
It’s only after we’ve said our final goodbyes and are walking back to the parking lot that I realize why Frankie might not want to rush back home. With Shelby and Nate gone, it’s only her and her mom at the house. No buffer between them at all.
I’m okay with Frankie using me as an excuse to stay away as long as she can. Means she might spend more nights with me in the tiny house. If you look hard enough, there’s always an upside, isn’t there?
ChapterForty-Five
FRANKIE
Danny must think I hate my mom. I don’t – that’s the problem. I look at the easy, loving relationship she has with my sister and I want it so bad, I become furious. I want Mom to respond to me the way she responded to Shelby’s baby, who isn’t even born yet, whereas I’ve been in the world twenty-six years and counting. What do I have to do – who do I have tobe– in order to get Mom to see me?
My pent-up emotions power me across the hospital parking lot, but when I reach my car and have to stop, I can’t prevent a sobbing sigh from escaping. Danny’s right there, and he pulls me into his arms.
“I know,” he says, softly. “I know. It’s been a day…”
I rest my cheek on his chest. He feels firm, steady, reassuring. Part of me wants to stay here in his arms forever, and another part wants to teleport us both to his bedroom, so I can work off all this emotion with a scandalous amount of sex.
“What do you feel like now?” Danny says. “Quiet dinner out? Burgers back at mine?”
“My brain’s stopped functioning,” I tell him. “You decide.”
He’s quiet for a moment, pondering.
“I think I’d like to take you to dinner. Somewhere nice,” he says. “Not Denny’s, in other words, though their cake batter shake with sprinkles is revoltingly great.”
