Page 37 of Unlucky in Love
“And Taylor only ever got that particular shade of pink when someone said his name,” his mother added, unhelpfully and accurate.
Taylor covered her cheeks with both hands. Ryan felt his mouth twitch. The urge to drag her chair closer rose like a tide. Not the time. He settled for nudging his knee against hers under the table. She nudged back.
Plates circled. Stories started. Family dinners worked like a current. Once you were in, you drifted with it. Tonight the current rushed toward memory.
“Remember when Ryan taught Emma how to drive in the church parking lot?” Uncle Dave said. “We needed hazard pay.”
“I learned,” Emma said, proud. “We only hit two cones.”
“Three,” Ryan corrected.
“Two cones and a trash can,” Taylor added, laughing now.
His father pointed his carving fork at Taylor. “You were there.”
“She filmed it,” Ryan said. “For leverage.”
“Historical documentation,” Taylor said primly.
“She has always been the responsible one,” his mother told the table. “We should have put her on the insurance.”
“Actually,” Emma said, stabbing a green bean, “Taylor was also the one who climbed on the diner counter to fix the jukebox because she didn’t like the playlist. Then she fell off in the middle of a tap dance and sprained her ankle.”
“Y’all have a faulty memory. I broke my big toe.”
“Speaking of diner,” a cousin piped up. “Are the rumors true? Slow dance by the jukebox last night?”
Emma gasped. “You danced?”
Ryan tried to outpace the heat at his collar. “We swayed. A little. There was a song.”
Taylor took a very serious drink of water. “Purely hypothetical swaying.”
“Hypothetical in full view of half the town,” Uncle Dave said. “I saw a video with ketchup bottles in the foreground.”
“Why does this town film everything?” Taylor whispered.
Emma leaned across the table, eyes shining. “Because we love you. And because Kyle from the hardware store thinks he is a director.”
His father clinked his glass. “To hypothetical swaying.”
Everyone lifted their glasses. Taylor hid a grin behind hers. Ryan lifted his along with the rest because resisting was pointless.
“To Ryan not being an idiot,” Emma added, then pointed her fork at him. “And to Taylor not running away even though my brother has the subtlety of a foghorn.”
“Hey,” Ryan said.
Taylor’s hand found his thigh under the table and gave a small, quick squeeze.
“Question,” a cousin said, already smirking. “Who asked who out officially?”
Ryan opened his mouth, but Taylor beat him to it. “He kissed me in my place of work like a hooligan.”
“Romantic hooligan,” Emma corrected.
“Criminal,” Taylor said, but she was smiling now.
“Spoken like a woman who has been kissed properly,” Aunt Lila said with great satisfaction.
