Page 78 of Cherry Picked
I glanced out my side window. Despite the rain, two little girls were riding on plastic unicorn toys in the fenced front yard of a white clapboard house. Two grown women stood under the cover of a wide front porch, watching the girls and laughing at their antics despite the mud covering both girls and the toys they were riding on.
Finally, I couldn’t take the tension in the truck anymore. “Fine. You win. I’m in love with your brother,” I blurted. “He’s in love with me. We’re together.”
“No shit.” He folded his arms over his chest and sat back in his seat, utterly unsurprised. “Good thing I wasn’t waiting to hear it from you.”
“I texted you earlier this week!”
“You texted, ‘Hey, drop by the diner soon? Wanna run something by you.’ That’s what you say when you wanna debate the pros and cons of a riding lawn mower,Jack. Not when you’re shacked up with a man’s baby brother.”
“Look, what did you want me to say? I know how you feel about Hawk, and I could venture a guess as to how you’d feel about Hawk ending up withme,” I said darkly. “I wasn’t gonna ask for your blessing, and I sure as fuck wasn’t gonna ask your permission. Hawk’s an adult—an adult who’s recently been knife throwing, I might add, and who wouldn’t hesitate to remind me of that fact if Iwasfoolish enough to ask his big brother for permission to have a relationship with him. I prefer my essential organs to have as few holes as possible.”
“You’re wrong,” Webb said.
I shot him a look. “I assure you, I am very averse to puncture wounds.”
He rolled his eyes. “Not that, dumbass. You said you know how I feel about you and Hawk together. Clearly, you don’t.”
“Huh?”
“Jesus. And they sayI’mdense when it comes to emotions. You’re my best friend, fucker. I…” Webb stretched his neck from side to side, like Hawk did when he was uncomfortable. “I love you. Whywouldn’tI want Hawk to be with a good guy who works hard and protects people he loves? I’m just annoyed that Luke says I was the last person in town to realize you two have been ‘mutually pining’ for years.” He smirked. “Though, gotta say, I still figured it out before you did.”
I realized my jaw had dropped, and I forced it shut. “But… wait. If you feel that way, why were you pissy when you walked into the diner just now?”
“I wasn’tpissy,” he scoffed. “I’m a grown man, Jack; I don’tgetpissy. I may, however, have been…justifiably annoyed.” He threw up his hands. “Dude, my best friend just fell in love, and he somehow managed to con the kindest, most loving human in Little Pippin Hollow into falling in love with him, too, but no one even mentioned it to me. Not a postcard. Not a telegram. Not a folded-up note shoved in my locker.” His tone was joking, but the hurt in his voice was clear. “If my family wasn’t solidly dialed in to the Hollowan gossip network, you and Hawk would have had seven kids before I knew anything.”
“Kids?” I goggled at him for so long I missed the light change at the corner of Parrish and Stanistead, and the car behind me laid on the horn. “Whoa. No one said anything about kids.”
Webb snorted. “So I take it that’s a no on children, then? Have you and Hawk talked about it?”
“No. I…” I shook my head to clear it. “We’ve been together a week, Webb, and he’s been up on a mountain most of that time.”
“Hmm. So you’re ayeson kids?”
“No! I…” I paused.
I honestly had no clue how I felt about having children. I had no desire to parent solo, that was for sure, and since I’d never intended to have a relationship, that put children squarely in the column of “Nice, But for Other People,” along with luxury yachts and the ability to write poetry. Now, though, I was having to rethink all of my columns. Because I didn’tnotwant children, and if Hawk wanted them…
Well, Hawk deserved the fairy tale. The happily ever after, just like Elizabeth and Darcy.
Nothing in life was guaranteed, of course. People changed. Dreams changed. Bad shit happened when you least expected it. There wouldalwaysbe things that Hawk and I disagreed about and maybe even argued over. Chaos and mess and misunderstandings. But…
I thought of those little girls, riding their muddy unicorn tricycles with joy on their faces and decided maybe the chaoswasthe fairy tale. Maybe happily ever after was just the beginning of the story.
“…I think I’m gonna have this conversation with your brother first,” I told Webb firmly.
He laughed.
“But I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about us sooner,” I offered as we approached the Rock Cut pullout. I shoved his shoulder. “And I’m glad you’re with me now.”
“Me too,” Webb said. He pointed at a familiar rain-soaked Toyota parked in the dirt lot. “Especially since it looks like my brother has a death wish. What was he thinking, hiking up the steepest trail on all of Fogg Peak in the rain?”
I threw my truck into Park, then reached behind me for my hiking boots and rain jacket. “If he’s here instead of meeting Simon, there’s gotta be a good reason.”
I shrugged my jacket on and stomped my boots a few times to get the feel of them after wearing chef clogs. Thankfully, I kept my hiking gear in the back of the truck these days for impromptu visits to my boyfriend in his tent.
Webb, on the other hand, only wore running shoes and no rain gear. “Stay here,” I advised, waving him back inside the truck. “There’s no point in you getting drenched when I can look for him on my own, and I’ll go faster without you. If I can’t find him… I dunno. Maybe the timing belt in his car was acting up again and he caught a ride back to town with someone else. We’ll look elsewhere.”
Webb eyed me warily but eventually nodded and hopped back in the dry cabin of the truck.
