Page 12 of Make it Real
“Not anytime soon.”
FOUR
callie
This gatheringat Ty’s was like theBrady BunchmeetsModern Familyplus a side ofFull House.
I. Loved. It.
After going through most of my life with just my mom and grandma around, slipping into the flow of Harper’s big family get-togethers came surprisingly easily. Since her first invitation over Christmas, I’d spent quite a few evenings surrounded by her sisters, cousins, and extended family, the lone Matheson fish in the big Webb-Evans pond. But nobody ever made me feel like I didn’t belong or like I’d crashed their party.
I’d grown up watching too many big sitcom families that made me long for just a little of that kind of raucous togetherness. Hard not to envy it, with only two other names on my family tree. Probably someone out there preferred the solitude and would have been grateful for a similar loneliness, but that’d never been me. I’d always wanted to know what life would have been like with older siblings, and now, I caught a glimpse of it through my friendships with Harper and Eliza, Wade and Jed.
Well, no. Not Jed. I definitely didnotsee him as a brother, but I loved watching how he big-brothered June to pieces. He’d taken on a similar, though noticeably less intentionally-irritating role with Harper and her sisters. I’d heard stories of him driving across town to change flat tires and helping set up back yard sheds. He’d even once subtly run Sam off when Harper wasn’t sure yet she wanted to get back together with him. In short, he stepped up to help whenever and however they needed him.
I guess that’s why I’d hoped he would step up to help me out, but in hindsight, my ask had been nuts. Like, full-on, squirrelly nuts. I really wish I’d thought about it longer before just going for broke and embarrassing the heck out of myself. Maybe one day, I would stop feeling like a doofus whenever I was around him.
Today was not that day.
I’d tried my best to avoid him tonight, but Jed Evans was impossible to ignore. No matter how I’d told myself not to look at him, my eyes had wills of their own, and I’d looked anyway. Maybe even admired the man for a second or two when I was certain he’d have no clue. And then, I’d gone and run smack into him, because of course I had.
But now that we’d gotten our first post-coffee date conversation out of the way—props to me for making it extra weird by mentioning the wordstalkereighty-seven times—I figured we could go on pretty much as usual. Casual and friendly. Normal. Not stuck in bizarro world because I couldn’t stop spewing at the mouth.
“Check out the pictures Sam sent today.” Harper turned her phone my way, revealing a pristine waterfall. “Gorman Falls. They’re on a big hike through Colorado Bend State Park. They’ll be back tomorrow morning, but he’s bummed to miss out on the party tonight.”
Her boyfriend worked for an adventure tour outfit and was always off in some gorgeous, out-of-the-way locale. Actually, he’d become her fiancé last month. Clearly, they’d made being apart half the time work.
“Just seeing pictures of everything he does exhausts me.” Hiking, climbing, rafting—his trips covered a lot of extreme sport highlights. I’d joined the group on a big hike a couple of months back, and I’d proven myself just barely up to the task. I couldn’t imagine making a career out of it.
“No kidding. But he loves it, so I can’t complain.”
“Plus, there’s always the thrill of being reunited, right?” Eliza bobbed her eyebrows at her sister in a naughty way.
Harper glared, but her cheeks flamed bright red. “That part’s not so bad.”
“I wouldn’t be able to stand it. When Dean went on that camping trip with his brothers in the spring, I was practically crawling out of my skin by the time he got home.”
He nudged her with his shoulder. “Maybe I should schedule another trip so you have a chance to miss me some more.”
“Don’t you dare.” She poked him in the ribs, but he took her hand in his, twining their fingers together.
They were so cute. Him in his neat dress shirt and jeans, her with her blue-highlighted hair. Poster children for an opposites attract love story.
“Oh, but the part I forgot,” Harper said. “Sam wants to go to Fool Hearted Memory tomorrow night after he gets back. It’s six months since we went there the first time.”
“You guys are celebrating half-anniversaries?” Eliza scrunched up her nose. “Sad.”
“We celebrated our half-anniversary,” Dean said.
She pressed a finger to his mouth as though she could cram that admission back in. “Shh.”
“It’s just for fun,” Harper said. “So if anyone else wants to do a little dancing, you’re welcome to join us. Callie, are you in? Since you’re the line dancing champion around here.”
“Line dancing champion?”
The voice behind me made heat coil up my back in a slow wave like all my nerve endings had come out to say hello to Jed. He moved forward, claiming his spot at my side in our little group, his eyes full of questions. Made sense, considering how little we knew each other.
“I’ve danced a few times.” Simple and true.
