Page 29 of Dear Adam
“Ohno,”Igroanand set my phone on the counter at Bloomie’s. “No, no, no.”
“What’s wrong?” Emma asks, coming from the back holding a teetering box of vases in one hand and a bucket of daisies in the other. I take the box from her and set it on the counter. “You don’t look so good.”
“My dad just left me the voicemail of all voicemails.” Suddenly, I’m queasy, and the room around me starts spinning.
“And?” Emma presses.
I hesitate. I know if I tell her what the voicemail is about, I’ll also have to tell her about my evening with Levi, and I don’t know if I’m ready for that. We spent one harmless evening watching a movie together wheremaybeI ended up snuggling into the crook of his arm, andmaybeI pretended to fall asleep because I didn’t want to move. I’m not ready to talk about how when we woke up this morning, we snuggled under a blanket on my deck with steaming mugs of coffee to watch the sunrise over the harbor. I definitely don’t want to let her know that it felt natural and right and like butterflies and rainbows were bursting from a pinata in my belly, because that would mean admitting that Ilikehim. And that will not do.
What I definitely don’t want to admit to though, is the way he looked at me right before he left, like he wanted to kiss me. So I went in for it, and was rewarded with a kiss on my cheek and a pat on my head.
Hepatted my head.If that doesn’t screamfriend zone, I don’t know what does.
“You might want to sit down,” she says, pulling two stools from under the counter and gently backing me into one. She settles into the other, her brow creased with worry as she asks, “Is it Adam?”
“No, no,” I say quickly. “I went and saw him this morning. He’s doing well and his vitals are all back to normal. Everything is healing as it should. He could wake up any day now.”
I don’t tell her the doctors are baffled as to why he hasn’t yet. They say the same thing when I visit every morning.
“It could be today, it could be next week, or it could be never,” one brash doctor told me today. Granted, he was only doing his job, and you can’t sugarcoat things when you’re a doctor. Still, the lack of reassurance set the mood for the entire day. This voicemail from my dad is the icing on the cake.
Her brow softens and her shoulders relax a little, while my body does the opposite. “Tell me what it is, Aly.”
“I don’t wanna,” I whine and try to slip from my stool. She instantly pushes me back down and stares into my eyes, one hand on each shoulder.
“It’s about Levi, isn’t it?”
“No,” I say and cross my arms in the mostmess with me and find out what happensexpression I can muster.
“What then? Are you constipated? You kind of look constipated when you make that face.”
“I’m not constipated, you weirdo.” I reach over and grab my phone to hit play on the voicemail. My father’s barking tone instantly covers the soft Leon Bridges playing through the store’s speakers.
“Alyson Jayne! I swear if you don’t have a good reason for leaving Hudson at dinner last night, I will make you regret ever stepping foot away from that dinner table. If you don’t call me back immediately. Oh I could just…How could you do that to my star employee? I would hate to think I had a selfish, unkind, daughter…”
Emma reaches over and hurriedly turns it off. “Ooookay. That was more than enough. Wow.”
I cover my face with my hands and give it two seconds before Emma pries them away.
“Why do you let your parents get to you like this, Aly?” she says, once again looking into my eyes.
“I don’t know,” I groan. “They’re still my parents, you know? I still want them to be proud of me.”
Emma gives me a sad smile and nods.“So you left in the middle of your date, huh?” she says, still holding onto my wrists, making me feel even more trapped. I start to squirm when she says, “Why’d you do that?” She’s wiggling her eyebrows so hard, I’m afraid one might slide right off her face.
“I got a text from Levi during dinner,” I mutter.
“Oh, so it was a booty call!” she squeals and Pretzel, who was being a good girl and napping under the prep table, gives a sharp little yip. She settles down once she realizes everything is okay and is asleep again in seconds, one arm tucked under her stuffed unicorn.
“No, definitely not a booty call,” I say, and waves of embarrassment wash over me as I think about how wrongly I read his goodbye this morning.
“So he picked you up from your disastrous date and then what?” She bounces up and down, my wrists still in her hands, causing my arms to flap like wings. My glasses threaten to fall off, so I scrunch my nose in a failed attempt to keep them on.
“Emma, my glasses,” I say, hoping she will release me. Instead, she continues peppering me with questions.
“Are his arms as really big as that picture on Instagram made them look? Did you see him shirtless? Is he a good kisser?”
“If you must know, I wouldn’t know if he’s a good kisser because when he was leaving this morning, I went in for a kiss and he patted my head instead!”
