Page 45 of Like A Daydream
“Spending time with you, and also people who hate me,” she says, holding her hands out in front of her like a scale and pretending she’s weighing her options, “or spending it on my couch with a book. Tough choice.”
She’s not sure how she feels about Andrew, or how he feels about her. Even if she has her parent’s warnings ringing in the back of her mind, and she’s very aware that he’s leaving at the end of the summer, and she’s got her own life to contend with, she still wants this. Wants to see where it goes.
He’s taking risks and shooting his shot. She can be brave, and see if this goes anywhere. She can be brave and say that Andrew is a good influence on Harper if anyone asks, and not just a risk that she’s wanting to take for herself. She owes him, and herself, that much.
She really thinks that this man could be worth the risk.
“I’ll come. My parents already offered to help with Harper if I wanted to be an adult,” Danielle says. “Just make sure you tell Ainsley.”
“She promised to be civil, if you said yes,” he says, grin splitting his face.
“Then I also promise to be civil.”
“I’ll pick you up at six.”
Andrew
“You promise to be civil?” he asks Ainsley as he follows her through the local grocery store.
The amount of food in her cart says she’s about to live through the apocalypse, but she had explained that they just don’t get to the store as often. Lake Placid isn’t remote by any means, but sometimes even fifteen minutes is a hike when they’re coming down a mountain.
So, she’s enlisted Andrew’s help to get about a month’s worth of groceries, plus food for dinner and the fire they’re having at the house.
“You said she promised to be civil,” Ainsley says with a shrug, “I can be civil if she can.”
“That’s not what JT said.”
“New year, new me, Andy,” Ainsley says.
“It’s almost July.”
“Still counts.”
“In what universe?” he asks, under his breath as he turns the corner. “I really like this girl, Ainsley, I need you to be chill.”
“You’re lucky I love you, or this would not be happening,” Ainsley says, dropping a box of graham crackers into the cart with a bag of marshmallows. “Spending time with someone who gave me hell in high school and then tried to sleep with my husband isn’t the way I wanted this weekend to go.”
“She tried to sleep with JT?” Andrew asked, raising a brow. “Were you married? That doesn’t sound like my Danielle.”
“Your Danielle,” Ainsley says, using air quotes, “has a past, and is part of why it took me so long to come back here. And no, we weren’t married. We were broken up.”
“This sounds like Ross and Rachel’s ‘we were on a break’, so I don’t think it should matter.”
“You’re a man,” Ainsley says, rolling her eyes, “of course you wouldn’t think it matters. But it does. It matters,a lot.”
Once Andrew is sure that JT isn’t going to start a forest fire in his back yard, he jumps into his truck and heads into town to pick up Danielle. Fourth of July announcement banners have gone up along Main Street, letting him know about the fireworks happening the next weekend, and he can’t help but get excited.
It had been a while since he’d had a small-town Fourth of July, spending more of his adult life Raleigh, but it seems like this year might change that. According to JT, Lake Placid has thousands of people come into town for the weekend, boasting a carnival, and a huge horse show, plus fireworks like he’s never seen before.
And he’s done Fourth of July at Boston Harbor, so he’s sure these ones are going to be a treat. Boston had been a week-long event, starting on June thirtieth and running all the way to July fifth. There was a Chowder Cook Off, a Boston Pops concert, a reading of the Declaration of Independence, and also a huge market than ran the length of the harbor.
He’s hoping it feels like home.
There were places in the Triangle that he was sure had massive Fourth of July celebrations, but the last time he had been to one was when he had first moved there. He’d snuck into Wake Forest and hidden on the lawn at one of the high schools, just in case he was recognized, and watched as the fireworks lit up the sky.
He’s excited to be in a small-town. They know how to do it, and do it right. He remembered when he was growing up in Stillwater, Minnesota, it was the best time of year.
Main Street has transformed overnight, and he finds himself impressed at how efficient small towns are. There are patriotic banners on every light post, celebrating businesses and veterans. Red, white, and blue stars are underneath them, and he has a feeling that they light up at night while people are walking the main strip of the town. His heart is starting to beat for this small-town life again, and he’s not sure he ever wants to go back to Raleigh.
