Page 50 of All of You

“Oh, shoot.” Vivianna pulls away from me and holds me at arm’s length by my shoulders. She glances nervously toward the greenhouse and lowers her voice. “That’s a question for another day.”

I finish up in the shop and Viv asks me to help Langdon in the greenhouse for the last forty-five minutes. I’m nervous to be alone with him. I don’t know why. He’s been in my bed.

We aren’t school friends, but here at work, he’s more playful. I don’t understand it. It’s some weird game that only heknows the rules too and honestly, I’m so exhausted I can’t even muster up enough energy to care today.

“I brought you something,” Langdon says, his hand hidden within his back pocket.

I blink, surprise mixed with something sweet, twisting in my chest. “You did?”

He shrugs. So casual, so blase. His hand holds out an iPod. An old-school iPod. Skinny, thin and rectangular.

“It’s an iPod.”

I reach out to take it from him and when our fingers touch in passing a little zap of electricity shoots straight to my nipples. “I can see that. Why is it for me?”

“You don’t have a phone and it got me thinking, how do you listen to music? And then my brain ran down the rabbit hole of how much music makes me feel better when I’m going through shit and rounded back to, how do you listen to anything without a phone?” he stammers all in one breath. I try—poorly—to hide my smile.

“I mean, the radio generally. There’s a radio in my room. Not that I’ve turned it on.” I clutch the iPod in my hand and stare down at it.

“Well, that’s loaded with music, and um, if you have requests, you can let me know and I can put them on for you. But unlike a radio, it’s portable.” He shuffles his feet. “If you don’t—”

“No. I want it,” I say and grin at him.

“Cool. The charger’s in my backpack and headphones too.”

Langdon takes off to his bag and I stand and stare at the tiny device in my hand. My belly flutters a little at the sweet gesture. At the fact that Langdon was thinking about me. He hands me the headphones and charger and our fingers brush again. He quickly pulls his hand back like he felt the static shock too.

I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “Thanks. This is really nice of you.”

“I’m just happy you don’t look like the walking dead today.”

I quirk an eyebrow at him. “You saying I look good?”

Langdon scoffs and fidgets with his shirt. “Not even a little bit. You just don’t look like acorpse. Still a long way to go to good.”

I reach out my free hand and shove his shoulder. He takes a step back and feigns injury.

“Rude,” he snorts.

I shrug.

“You need a ride?” he asks, glancing at the wall clock.

I bite my lip and deliberate. I don’t need a ride, but I do want one withhim.

I shake my head. “Nope, headed to meet Lyra and Miles for dinner.”

Langdon deflates—just a little. “Oh. Cool.”

I almost invite him to join us.

“But hey, thanks again. I’ll let you know how bad your taste in music is at dinner, Sunday.” I turn toward the office to grab my bag but stop short. “Is Sunday dinner still on? I mean now that…”

“Now that…what?” he grins at me. “It’s just you and Heath? Cause we’ve been doing Sunday dinner with only Heath forever. So yeah. Headcount doesn’t matter. See you.”

“Tell Anderson we got a new puzzle for him.”

I wave as Langdon’s grin widens and his dimples appear as I head to the office to tuck my gift from Langdon in my bag before I walk to the diner.