Page 53 of Infatuated as They Come
I felt a hand clap at my shoulder and my eyes flickered up from the desk to see Nate. “Oh, hey. You bringing your car in today?”
He nodded. “Yeah, it keeps pulling to the left. You think you could take a look at it? My mom’s gonna be pissed if there’s some major issue with it. I messed my last car up bad.”
“What’d you do?”
“Long, long story. Are you gonna be working on the car? I trust you with my baby.”
“Everyone here knows what they’re doing, but I’m gonna be heading out for my break in a second, so someone else will be taking care of it.”
“Are you meeting up with Holly?”
“Not right now. There’s this art thing she really wants me to check out. Some place around the corner.”
“Oh, cool. Holly showed me some photos of your stuff. You’re really good. What the hell are you doing working here?” he whispered as he leaned in close. “No offense.”
“Painting’s more of a hobby for me, I guess. Just something I do when I get the chance.”
“You’re too good for it to be a hobby. If I was that good, I’d be doing it full time.”
But just like Holly, he didn’t get it either. “We just need you to fill these out,” I said before giving him a stack of forms.
“On it,” Nate said, grabbing a pen from the counter.
I suddenly felt two hands on my shoulders and I craned my neck to see Jay right behind me, a little grimace on his face. “What’s up?”
“You’re gonna hate me,” he said. “I know you made some plans, but we’ve just had a bunch of customers pull in. It’s getting real busy. You think you could hang back?”
“Hang back?” I repeated. I could already picture Holly’s face in my head if I took Jay up on that offer.
“I’m asking for a lot. I know. Could really use an extra pair of hands, though,” he said. “I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
I thought about it for a moment. For the last few weeks, I had been pretty much shoveling my lunch down my throat so I could just work the rest of my break. It meant instead of wasting time just sitting around that I had more of a chance of getting that efficiency bonus. That bonus meant I’d have some spare cash, so having to waste my whole lunch break today already had me worried.
I had been planning it all out: making sure I put enough aside for Holly and our dates and the stuff I wanted to buy her, and then the biggest one was paying for rent. So, some stupid little art thing was just getting in the way of everything else I had been trying to perfectly arrange. I’d be missing out on it, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t curious to go see what it was all about, but staying back meant money, and money meanthaving money.
“You okay to stay back and help?” Jay asked.
Holly was gonna be pissed and she’d absolutely let me know it, but I needed money more than she realized, and going down to that art studio wouldn’t guarantee me anything. Art could wait.
“Yeah.” I gave Jay a firm nod. “I can do it.”
He clapped my shoulder. “You’re a lifesaver, kid.”
“Man, you’re not going to that studio?” Nate asked, looking up from the form. “I was eavesdropping.”
I shrugged. “Maybe another day.”
“If I could paint like you, I’d be doing that all day instead of being at this place.” He turned the form around, sliding it over the desk to me. “Maybe one day, right?”
I held in a sigh. “Yeah, maybe.”
* * *
Five hours and way too many cars later, I was at the stadium. I caught a glimpse of Holly on the field, her red and white pom poms in her hands. She was busy talking to Claudia and I felt guilt squeeze at my chest knowing that I was about to upset her when I told her what I had done.
Claudia spotted me first, smiling and waving at me before spinning Holly right around to face me. And I was expecting to see that usual pretty smile on my girl’s face, but I could have sworn I traveled right back in time to high school as she gave me nothing but a scowl and turned back around.
“Okay…” I muttered to myself. There was no point texting her since she didn’t have her phone on her, and I didn’t want to go down there and disturb her before she had to do all her cheer stuff. Instead, I was left to wonder what had got her so annoyed. Maybe she just had a bad day.
