Page 31 of Betting on the Boy Next Door
“How’s it going?” I ask. “Show tonight?”
She shoots a glance at her place, as if to make sure none of her roommates overheard me.
“Sorry,” I say, lowering my voice.
“I’ve got rehearsal. Show tomorrow.”
“Nice.”
She nods and gets into her car, and I walk into my condo feeling stupid.Nice?That was a meaningless response. I could have turned that into a question to keep the conversation going.Where do you practice?Or at least I could have said something marginally less idiotic. Even justCool.
But somehow, when I’m around Sami, I feel like the funniest version of myself half the time and the cringiest version the rest.
I switch into something for dinner at home with old family friends who are kind of elitest. That means black jeans and a black-and-white-checked shirt. Casual but not too casual. I pause before I walk out of my room. Maybe I should choose something Presley would hate. For a second, I consider switching my shoes for flip-flops, but my dad would see right through me.
“Bernice.” I crouch and look into her tank. I’d picked her up from my old place early last week. She doesn’t even bat an eye when my face looms in front of her. “Why can’t Presley be more like you? Happy if you’re fed, content to let me do my thing?”
Bernice doesn’t answer, and I head out to my car and spend the fifteen-minute drive to my parents’ place rehashing the last time I tried to disentangle myself from Presley.
It had been last summer, when my parents invited the Reillys to spend the Fourth at Gramps’s ranch west of the city. I’d only gone out for the actual Fourth, and Presley had been there, ready to pounce.
Presley has a body that doesn’t quit, and she made sure it was on display in her Gucci bikini top and shorts, the whole look classed up with a large sunhat and Louis Vuitton sunglasses. And yes, Meghan Trainor, she made me look.
The problem, Meghan Trainor, is that Presley spent a disproportionate amount of time working on that body and shopping for those labels. And worse, talking about them.
When she’d tried twining herself around me as we watched fireworks set off by the ranch hands, her smelling too much like wine coolers, I’d detached her arms from my waist and told her—not for the first time—I wasn’t into her like that.
She’d only smiled and said, “Not yet, Josh. But you’ll come around.”
What the crap are you supposed to do about someone who thinks that way?
Avoid. Avoid, avoid, avoid. Evasive maneuvers at all times.
It had worked.
Until now.
I voice dial Reagan. “Are you coming to dinner?” I ask when she answers.
“Can’t,” she says. “I’m hosting poker night for my girls.”
“Reagan . . .” I know my voice is almost a whine. But her “girls” are all other wives from her neighborhood. “I’m yourbrother.”
“I heard Presley’s going to be there. But don’t worry, you’ll be fine. Just use your big boy words.”
“I tried that this summer, but it must not have worked because she emotionally blackmailed JP into making sure I’m at dinner tonight.”
“Look at it as an opportunity to set the record straight once and for all. Just use your big boy words.”
“I don’t know the words. I have tried all of them. Zero worked.”
“Good luck.” Her tone is way too cheerful. “Hope you figure it out without ticking off JP and losing the firm millions in revenue.”
“Thanks,” I mutter as she hangs up.
When I pull into my parents’ driveway in Tarrytown, I spot JP’s Escalade. He keeps a luxury apartment and a vehicle in Austin for the half dozen times a year that he’s in town.
I park and climb out. Usually, I love coming here. It’s the house I grew up in, and it sits on an acre patrolled by my mom’s three shelties, Tater, Bean, and Queso. It’s two stories of light brown stone, black shutters, and white trim. It manages to look both classy and welcoming at the same time. My mom incarnate.
