Page 27 of Nerdelicious
Besides, they would make a cute couple. Caroline seems like an okay person. I mean, she and her friends weren’t the friendliest patrons I’ve served, but they were talking and having a good time together, no reason to fraternize with the staff.
Resolute, I get into bed and chant a little mantra as I fall asleep.
Let it go. None of my business.
Chapter Eight
My heartalways timidly hides itself behind my mind.
I set out to bring down stars from the sky, then,
for fear of ridicule,
I stop and pick little flowers of eloquence.
–Cyrano de Bergerac
I scrub at the bar, attempting to focus on my job and not on Caroline chatting up Beast over at the tables near the dance floor.
We’re almost empty, only a few stragglers left. Beast was stacking chairs until Caroline came over to talk to him. Talkathim.
Whatever. I’m not watching.
The last week has gone by in a blur of late nights at work, chores around the farm, and continuing to poke at my resume. Which means I stare at it blankly, change a word, think about how I’m not qualified for anything and people would be stupid to hire me, and then I change another word and stare at the screen some more. I sent it out to one employer so far. One.
After a few minutes of successful avoidance, my curiosity gets the best of me and I risk a look. She’s still there. Standing too close. She hands him a piece of paper and he takes it. His gaze roves over the page and then back to her.
Her smile falters for a flickering second, but then she leans into him, stretching up to say something closer to his ear. Then she takes his hand, the one holding the note, and guides it into his back pocket.
I gasp. She’s touching his butt!
“You okay?” Eliza pauses in her counting, flipping through bills.
“Fine.” The word is a bark. I scrub the spot in front of me like it’s steeped in sticky dirt.
“Uh-huh.” Eliza steps closer to me, lowering her voice. “This wouldn’t have anything to do with Miss Blonde-and-Ready over there, would it?”
“Nope.”
Eliza snorts and resumes her counting.
Work is great. Lucas and Eliza and Ranger are all fun to work with. So is Beast. Except now Caroline is attached to him like a barnacle almost every night. And despite my internal pep talks to let it go like Elsa, for some reason it makes me feel... prickly.
It’s not like Ilikehim.
So why does something wrench in my chest every time I see her flirting with him?
“Hey Fred, what did the bar ever do to you?” Ranger sticks his head out of the window between the bar and the kitchen.
“What?” Startled, I twist in his direction.
“If that spot were any cleaner, you could see straight through the Earth.”
“Oh. Sorry. I was distracted.”
Eliza looks pointedly at Beast and then back at me. “We can see that.”
Ranger laughs and disappears back into the kitchen.
