Page 7 of That Moment
The reality of his reputation hovers between us like a neon sign. Scotty, head mechanic and shop manager, boss of thirty guys, hero to every person who just wants their truck to start when it’s negative ten. Scotty, quiet and steady and always at the fringes, looking like sin in a cowboy hat.
“That is not fair,” I say, and I hate how quickly it comes out.
Milly lifts her brows. “It’s not like he’s a villain, Adrienne. He isn’t even a dick. He’s just... not anyone’s last stop. He does casual. He does it simply. He does?—”
“Everyone,” Brooklyn adds.
“Wow,” I say, pressing the heels of my hands against my forehead.
Brooklyn taps her nail on the table. “Babe, we aren’t telling you anything you don’t already know. He flirts with everyone. Janice is at the feed store. Kenzie at the DMV. Your Aunt Autumn, for God’s sake, when he fixed her trailer hitch and she told him he was a gentleman. The man was born flirting.”
He flirts with me differently.The thought is intrusive, unreasonable. It slides under my ribs and makes itself at home.Is that true, or is that just what I need to believe to keep playing?
I raise my cup. “So your advice is… stop enjoying the harmless flirtation. Mary, my work. Ignore men with sexy forearms and a tongue that would probably make me see God?”
Milly’s voice softens, the way hers always does when she sees through me. “My advice is to be honest with yourself. If you like the game, own the game. Play the game as many times as you want, but if you want to win something, at some point you have to stop playing.”
“Wait,” Brooklyn scrunches her brow, “shouldn’t she have to keep playing to win?”
Milly rolls her eyes, “You know what I mean.”
“While I get the analogy, all the sports talk is a little unnecessary now that Keegan and I are history.”
“Sorry.” Milly shakes her head, “Kent always has Sports Radio on in the car.”
Brooklyn smiles, gentler now. “Look, all we’re saying is we know you. We also know this town and every rumor that’s swirled around about Scotty over the years. Most of which, he has confirmed, are true.”
I look out the window to where Main Street hums, a barrage of memories wanting to flood my brain, all of which involve Scotty.
“Also,” Milly adds, because she is incapable of leaving good enough alone, “we have to acknowledge the very real possibility that if you ever actually let him catch you, you would freak out. Because then it isn’t theoretical. Then you have to decide what you actually want.”
I want… I want to be wanted, desired, and cared for. I want someone to see me, really see me. But beyond that, I don’t really know what I want when it comes to happily ever after. I thought I knew.
I take a giant bite of my chicken salad sandwich to give myself a task besides spiraling.
Brooklyn sips her latte. “How long has it been now since you and Keegan ended things?”
I swallow. “You mean how long has it been since he dumped me? Six months. And no, I don’t want to talk about that anymore. It was a mismatch.”
Brooklyn’s mouth tips. “It was a pattern, too. Shiny on paper. Not enough in person.”
“Wow,” I say, smiling without humor. “Lunch is fantastic.”
She reaches across and squeezes my hand, quick and warm. “We love you, we just want you happy, not just entertained.”
“I can multitask,” I say lightly, but my chest aches because she isn’t wrong. I have spent years choosing safe, choosing impressive, choosing things that photograph well for the family thread and make Dad’s smile grow just a little wider.
We eat, and Brooklyn pivots into a recap of her morning at Slade. Production schedules, a distributor trying to bully them on social media campaign deliverables, Trent needing a tasting note sheet rewritten because an intern insisted “campfire energy” was a tasting note, to which Trent replied, “unemployment energy” is what the intern was going to be tasting.
“Campfire energy is a vibe,” Milly argues, talking around a bite of grilled cheese. “Put it in. That’s how the younger generations are talking nowadays anyway. That’s why we hired Gen Z interns.”
Brooklyn grins. “Speaking of vibes, the twins decided five a.m. is their new wake-up time. There is not enough caffeine in Colorado to make me look awake these days. Tyler helps me as much as he can, but he’s usually halfway out the door to manage the ranch by then.”
“You are still one of the hottest women in a ten-mile radius,” I smile.
She blushes and laughs. “Tell that to my under-eye circles.”
Milly leans back and tells us how Kent texts her baby name ideas, and she replies with suggestions from surrogate agencies. Brooklyn offers me the latest toddler-ism.
