Page 19 of Story of My Life
I glanced up to find a man standing next to my car. He was backlit by the sun like some hero on a movie screen. Tall and broad-shouldered, he wore jeans and an extremely well-fitting T-shirt. Medium-brown hair curled yummily atop his head.
I tore my gaze away from him and looked down at the gearshift. It was indeed aligned with theN.
Well, that was embarrassing.
Mr. Observant leaned down. Wow. He wasreallygood-looking. He also looked vaguely familiar. Maybe I’d seen him onthe pages of a fashion magazine or in some cologne ad? Maybe he was a model who just finished an outdoorsy photo shoot in the Poconos? I had a vague flash of memory of curling up with the L.L.Bean catalog as a teen and salivating over the bearded, flanneled men carrying canoes around. This gentleman lacked the beard, the flannel, and the canoe, but it didn’t detract from his wholesome hotness.
“Need some help?” he asked.
“No. I’ve got this,” I said, trying to sound like someone who drove cars on a regular basis.
I shifted to theDand pressed on the gas. Unfortunately, I pushed a little too hard and smacked soundly into the gleaming truck bumper.
“What in the hell do you think you’re doing?” the driver demanded, looking red enough that I worried he’d swallowed his tobacco.
“Relax, Willis,” my window-side hero called. “Bet it didn’t even scratch the chrome.”
“Where’d you learn to drive? The goddamn bumper cars?” the man allegedly named Willis demanded as I started to climb out of the car.
“Might want to put that in park,” the outdoorsy stranger suggested with a wink.
Adventure Hazel couldn’t decide if my knees were going to melt out from under me or if I should just shrivel up like a raisin. I shifted into park and got out, squinting in the sunlight.
The three of us studied the situation. The sexy, winking stranger was tall and muscular, while the truck driver rolled in an inch shy of me even in his cowboy boots. The truck’s bumper remained flawless. My rental hadn’t fared quite as well. The plastic grill had a crack down the center.
“Looks like you escaped unscathed, Willis,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if you were right about that lift kit, but looks like it already paid off.”
Willis grunted.
I had no idea what a lift kit was, but Willis looked a little less pissed, so I too was grateful.
The sedan behind me honked again.
“Might as well go around, Ms. Patsy,” the handsome stranger said, waving to the driver.
The driver’s window rolled down. “But that’s my lucky pump. I almost always win on my scratcher when I pump from number four,” complained the white woman with a hairdo that hinted at a beehive and wraparound sunglasses that fit over her regular glasses.
“I’ll buy you an extra scratcher if you loop around to number one,” my hero promised, unfazed.
We were in the middle of nowhere, and these three gas station customers all knew each other by name. I definitely wasn’t in New York anymore.
“Better be a five-dollar one. I ain’t no cheap date,” Ms. Patsy warned, before whipping her wheel around and expertly maneuvering to another pump.
Willis grunted and spat again. “Guess itiskinda a hassle to call the insurance company.”
“How about this pretty lady buys you a Mountain Dew and we call it even?” my hero suggested.
Willis gave me one last fierce frown, then nodded. “Make it a two-liter and you got yourself a deal, Lawyer Man.”
“Deal,” I agreed hastily. I hurried back to the car and dug through my purse for my wallet before he could change his mind. “I only have a twenty. If you have change?—”
Willis snatched the bill out of my hand. “Nice doin’ business with ya,” he called as he marched toward the store.
“Don’t mind Willis,” my hero said. “He hates everyone and everything.”
“I’m from New York. He’s my people,” I quipped.
“What brings you into rural Pennsylvania, Big City?” he asked.
