Page 10 of About Yesterday (Foothills #5)

Take a raincheck

H aley gave her a break on the short drive to the restaurant. A very, very short reprieve.

Thanks to the recent renovation—which she had watched progress through several first dates—the restaurant was rather glam. Black walls and burgundy accents and glinting silver fixtures, frames, mirrors. Trace had to shield her eyes from the shininess as they were led to their table.

The moment Trace’s butt hit the chair, Haley moved the leather-bound drink menu out of her way and set her elbows on the table, leaned as far forward as her dress would allow, and stared at Trace like when they were little and were about to share the greatest secrets the town had ever known.

A lot of wine was going to be needed to even get started.

Lips pursed tightly together, she ignored Haley and plucked up the drink menu.

They both politely and calmly ordered drinks when their server came by.

“Think we can walk home if we have too much wine? Two miles? My boots are comfy, but yours…?” she asked Haley.

Haley moved right back into interrogation position as soon as the server disappeared to fill their drink orders. “We can hitch a ride home with Finn if we stay out late enough. Or I’ll bet your dad would come get us. Or… your imaginary friend?”

She snorted a laugh and shook her head. At this point, she wouldn’t be surprised if she’d completely invented an attractive male companion for herself.

Dire. Fucking dire. “I wish you’d been around when I started learning how to sneak out at night.

I’d get to pretend I was going to your place.

They never believed me when I’d claim I was going anywhere other than out with Finn. ”

“You know, I think it’s getting less weird,” Haley said, finally sitting up. “I confess, it took me longer than I was willing to acknowledge, to accept that I am now engaged to your ex-boyfriend.”

“I am so glad you said that. As much as I am totally over Finn, I’m still working on being over the idea of him.” Eyes rapidly warming, she fanned her eyes. “Wow, why isn’t the wine here yet?”

“Oh, Trace,” Haley quickly said, reaching across the table and squeezing her hand. “I thought… I—“

Trace squeezed back, releasing as she saw the server heading their way with their drinks. “Nope. Don’t. I liked having a boyfriend who was also a friend. Did Grady ever tell you that he and I went out once?”

“What? No.”

The server slid their glasses onto the table and inched away as he realized they weren’t even close to being ready to order.

Trace plucked up her long-stemmed glass of pinot grigio and watched Haley’s reaction over the rim.

“Yes. It was your mother’s idea. I think we all had been hoping for fireworks, but, like the second time around with Finn—as it seems with everyone I’ve dated over the last few years—it just wasn’t there.

” She cringed, picturing the number of failed dates over the last decade.

“But, I mean, at least we had fun, unlike last weekend with Draven. Not a spark of anything.”

“Ugh, I’m sorry. Maybe you’re, I don’t know, looking in the wrong places?”

“Maybe.” Trace’s posture slumped, her mind shuffling through the uneventful dates and relationships like doom scrolling her news feed, but there wasn’t even a funny cat meme to break the monotony.

“Or the wrong guys? Draven sounded too uptight for you. Finn was—“

“Literally your dream guy.”

“Not your type, I meant. He’s a total jock, which I like, but you fit better with guys who are… deeper.”

Trace snorted a laugh, devious delight filling the hollow of her mood. “I’m so telling Finn you don’t think he’s deep.”

“Shush. You know what I mean. Finn is Finn. Mysterious, he is not.”

“I love you, Haley. I always wanted a sibling, and I consider you the closest thing I will ever have to a sister. But we were fourteen when you moved away. Maybe I was into brooding, adventurous, dreamy artist sorts back then. But I grew up. Practicality won. I had a lovely, appropriately obsessive, first love relationship with Finn through high school. I’ve had nothing but blasé since.

So when he moved back to town, I hoped that I would feel like I did back then, but…

I didn’t. He didn’t. When there were no sparks with the only guy I have ever sparked with, it hit me.

“ Trace lifted her drink off the table and air toasted unglamorously. “I. Am. Boring . This dress? These boots? I wouldn’t even own them if you hadn’t talked me into them. ”

Haley sat back and slowly spun her glass, studying Trace with a curious, mournful look.

“I don’t make first moves. I hope my lips look kissable enough for him to kiss me.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying Finn and I would have worked this second time if I had been gutsier.

I’m saying that I’m not grabbing any bulls by any horns, and I’m realizing it’s the cow with the problem, not the bulls.

Sorry if that didn’t make sense, I don’t know much about how cows mate. ”

“It’s not you. It’s just that you need to meet the right guy. Someone who sees past your phony smiles and sweet outfits—I mean—“

“Nope. Sweet is putting it gently. I’d call it lackluster.”

“You could use a little variety.”

Trace kicked her leg out and pointed her toes, admiring one of the few cute pieces of her wardrobe. “When I branch out, I don’t know, I feel like everyone stares and judges, thinking I think I live in New York or something.”

Haley groaned and nodded. “Right? We’re not much for cute outfits around here, but I’m wearing what I want anyway.”

“See? You pull that off. It’s a confidence thing.”

Out of nowhere, sort of, Haley threw her napkin across the table at Trace.

Mouth gaping open, she gasped and plucked it from the center of the table, the light piece of fluff having only made it that far. She chucked it back harder. “What was that for?”

“What happened to you? You’re hot, you’ve got great taste, and you just need to break out of that shell. You’re not boring, and guys don’t think so either. You just need to, I don’t know, have a little faith in yourself.”

Wine glass rapidly reducing in volume, Trace drained it faster, letting it burn her throat and coat her empty stomach.

Haley leaned forward on her elbows and swirled the wine in her glass. “The shirtless man you were groping in your parents’ craft room. Did you conjure your imaginary boyfriend into reality? Remember when we decided we needed boyfriends, we fictionalized entire diaries about them?”

Trace covered her hand with her mouth, wincing as she remembered the entry about the thrill of said imaginary boyfriend proposing with flowers and chocolates, down on one knee and professing his undying love for her, gushy and immature as shit.

But they’d been twelve. “Never bring that up again.” She bit her lips together, warming as she was grateful for the distraction.

“Then I’ll have to see this man in the daylight, maybe someplace public, so I know he’s real. Did you meet him in Paris and forget to mention it? A stray you brought home and begged your parents to keep him? A sexy alien, like Superman, who crashed into your backyard?”

She lifted her glass again and hid behind it, wishing she’d ordered a jug of red wine rather than a glass of white, so she’d have something more substantial to block Haley’s view of her floundering.

“No. Yes. Maybe.” She gulped a sip and burned her throat with the fire of it. “None and all of those things.”

“Disappointing. I was hoping for a spy that you’re harboring so the Russians can’t find him. Or even a notorious criminal who’s really more of a Robin Hood but he’s turning legit because of his undying love for you,” Haley said before delicately taking a sip.

Trace shook her head and set her glass down, twirling the stem between her thumbs. “Cole is polar opposite from my imaginary boyfriend in that old diary, and he’s not Robin Hood turning legit because of…” She trailed off and took a long drag of wine.

Imagine, if he had come back for her?

Guys didn’t come back for her.

Or, if they did, they came for polite lunches and polite tongue-less kisses and polite hints of equally dull future dates.

“Cole was one of my family’s foster kids.”

“Seriously?” Haley scowled and nibbled her bottom lip as she calculated. “That must have been after I left? I thought your parents were done taking foster kids.”

“Sophomore year, my dad got a call from this social worker friend who knew what a sucker he was. Said this kid had been out of juvie for about three months and had been in six different homes since.”

“And your dad agreed to take him in? How did he know he wasn’t going to hurt you ?”

“He was in for car theft. And I think there was a fire incident, but that was never proven.” It hadn’t taken long to learn why he’d done any of it.

“When he got out, one of the foster parents was abusive, so not his fault and it was awful that he had to go through that, on top of everything he’d already been through.

Other places he’d landed, well, there were curfews and house rules and so many things he…

didn’t care for. Maybe a few fistfights, but he usually had a good reason. ”

“Wow. You’ve got a soft spot for him,” Haley said, confusion pinging in her curious smile. “And I know Jeremy can find the good in anyone.”

“You know it. I slept downstairs in the guest bedroom the first month, while we still thought it was temporary.”

“Holy shit. How did it go? I mean, he’s there now, so something must have clicked.”