Page 70 of Pick Me
“Same!” I said with enthusiasm I didn’t feel. “I mean, I will be. I’ve got a huge job interview coming up down in Cambridge. Probably on Thursday.” I gave him the rundown about Rubicon and Jason and the incredible make-your-own job Knox had described. “And the position would be in New York.”
“Holy shit! Gage! That sounds amazing, man. You’ve always wanted to live in New York! You are kicking ass. No surprise there.”
“Yeah. Yep. Kicking all the ass,” I agreed. I hesitated, rolling my lips together, and asked in a small voice, “So why am I not more excited?”
“Wait, you’re not?”
“No, I am! I totally am. I mean… gosh, yes. It’s legit what I have dreamed about. If I could have hand-drawn a job, it would be this. Yup.” I paused. “But also… not.”
“Ahhh. You’re nervous,” Jay said knowingly. “That’s what this is. You want it too much.”
“Yeah. Probably.” I ran a hand over my face. “That makes total sense. I mean, I don’tfeelnervous, but it’s probably a subconscious thing.”
It was Jay’s turn to hesitate. “You don’t feel nervous? At all?”
“Mmm… Nope.” I shrugged, though he couldn’t see me. “I think it’s probably because Knox said that I have it in the bag.”
“Knox.” I heard the crinkle of leather that meant Jay was getting comfortable on my dad’s living room couch, settling in for the hot gossip the same way my stepmother did. “Is that the lumberjacky guy Toby mentioned? The one who secretly wanted to bone you? Spill your guts.”
I laughed. “Yeah, he’s a lumberjack alright. Gorgeous and beardy and frustrating. Remind me to send you a picture. And the desire to bone’s not exactly a secret anymore. Not to me, anyway. But it’s super casual between me and him. Just fun, physical, sexy… casual. Because Knox has had some minor health stuff from last spring that’s weighing on him, and he’s thirty-nine, so he feels like he’s at this whole other place in his life than me, and I’m leaving town in a couple months anyway. That kind of casual.”
“Oh,” Jay said seriously. “Thatkind of casual. Oh, honey.”
“Huh? No. There’s no ‘oh, honey,’” I assured him. “It’s just…”
“If you say casual, I’m staging an intervention.”
“Well, itis,” I promised. “Casual, casual, casual. But that’s not the point of this call anyway, remember? I need to figure out how to get over whatever mental block I’m having that’s fucking with my mind about the job.”
Jay made a noise that sounded like he was laughing, but I couldn’t imagine what was funny about this.
“Can you help me or not?” I demanded. “Because I’ve gotta get back to work—I’ll be damned if I don’t finish this app before I pack up for some other job. And after school, I promised Aiden—that’s my boss’s first grader—that I’d make Sunday Sundaes to celebrate his science fair win. And then I have a rehearsal for the Santa singalong thing at seven, and if Lonnie Duncan bitches to me even one more time about me making a better elf than a Santa, we are going to havewords, so I need to be emotionally prepared.”
Jay was silent for a moment. “Lonnie Duncan?”
“Yeah. He runs the chicken farm down the street, on the other side of Norm Avery’s place, and rumor has it he rigged a pumpkin-carving contest last… You know what? Never mind. Also not the point.”
“Or maybe itis,” Jay said inexplicably. “Have you ever considered… staying in Little Apple Hollow?”
“Little Pippin Hollow,” I replied impatiently. Honestly, it wasn’t that difficult a name. But then I processed his words, and I snorted. “Stayhere? Oh, hell no. Nope.”
I looked up and found that I’d walked almost to the Pond Orchard. The fruit had been almost entirely harvested in that section of the property, and the perpetual apple scent in the air was overlaid with a tang of smoke, probably from the wood stove at the farmhouse. It was fuckingcold, too. The old guys who sat around the counter at Panini Jack’s predicted a monster storm before Thanksgiving.
It was still pretty, though. Now that the foliage had died back, I could see the shadowy mountains against the horizon. And the trees looked like dainty dancers who’d taken their final bow and were stretching out their long limbs toward the blue sky in preparation for a well-earned nap.
“This town is gorgeous,” I told Jay sincerely. “Really. Even Whispering Key can’t hold a candle to it. But man, there isnothinghere for me. I mean, what would I do with myself? There are zero tech companies around here. Nary a skilled website designer in sight, let alone anyone doing cutting-edge shit. That’s why Webb had to find an app developer all the way inFlorida.”
“Right, that’s true,” Jay agreed. “I mean, that could also be a sign that they need you there.”
That made me pause for a minute, remembering the conversation about Pipsy and Jack needing my help, before shaking my head. “They might need me, but only because I’m here, not because they reallyneedme. If I weren’t here, they’d find another way to do stuff.”
“I see,” Jay said, in the same voice he’d used when he said, “Oh, honey.” It was not remotely comforting. “Okay, so you want my help?”
“Yes, please.”
“Remember that you are a brilliant star, Gage. You can shine anywhere.”
“Uh. Okay?” I hesitated. “Is… is that the advice? Because I thought Toby was a shit advice giver, but maybe he’s comparatively not bad at all. He told me I should fuck Knox, and that worked out delightfully… Eventually.”
