Page 35 of Love at Full Tilt
Mason shakes his head. “Apparently I’ve been doing this all wrong.”
Nora ruffles his hair and flies off to get our drinks.
“See, you’d be lost without me.” I can’t help but smile as I flip open the menu.
“I have been,” he whispers. “It sucked not talking to you allday.”
The shift in his voice draws my eyes back to his face.
A hundred feelings crash into my body at once, so I’m basically an emotional ten-car pileup.
I slide my hand across the table to clasp Mason’s fingers.
Part of me is afraid he’ll recoil here, outside the park, in what’s clearly his real life, but his hand meets mine urgently.
“Who’s Nora?”
“My mother’s best friend.”
My hand tightens around his.
Sadness clings to his edges, but he smiles at my surprise. “She’s the closest thing I’ve had to a mom for the past ten years.”
I search out Nora’s blond hair across the room as she pours our milk at the counter.
Over her head hang framed pictures of smiling people.
Others decorate the walls of the café. When I glance at the photo beside our table, I find myself staring at a younger version of Mason.
He couldn’t be more than five, and hadn’t grown into his ears or long limbs yet, but that closed-mouth smile and the haunting intensity of his gaze are a mirror image of the boy in front of me.
He stands between a younger version of Nora and a tall, dark-haired woman who looks about the same age as her.
She’s beautiful in the same way Mason is, otherworldly.
Without hearing her speak or seeing her move, I get the sense that she was utterly graceful.
My heart hiccups a little, and I can’t help myself, I lightly brush her face with my fingertip.
I look up to find Mason watching me. His eyes are bright. His thumb sketches a circle across my knuckles that sends a shiver down my spine.
“Is that your mom?”
He nods. “That was the day Nora opened this place. Mom and I came to the Nook every Sunday for breakfast until she died. We always sat here.” His eyes leave mine to find Nora.
“She doesn’t let anyone else eat at this table but me.
It probably loses her so much money, but she refuses.
‘That’s Lily’s spot,’ she says. I think it’s the only way she can think of to properly honor Mom.
” When he looks at me again, his eyes are glassy. I reach for his other hand.
I want to ask him so many questions about his mom, about Nora, about how long they knew each other, how they became friends, but I don’t want to overwhelm him.
He inhales slowly and deeply. Then he raises my right hand to his lips and sets them gently upon my knuckles, and I die in five hundred different ways.
“On my days off, I come over here and stay all day. When Nora closes up at five, I’ll wander the secondhand bookstore a few doors down for hours.” He hasn’t moved his mouth away from my hand, and every brush of it ignites my veins like a strike of a match.
“And then he calls me to open back up so I can make him an egg sandwich for dinner.”
I jump as Nora appears before us like she’s materialized out of thin air. I’d been so lost in Mason that the world faded away. Beside my elbow, my phone blinks with new message from my mother. Across the street, the blue lights of a police car parked on the side of the road flash.
I swipe open my texts. “Do you have an unnatural relationship to breakfast food I need to know about?”
Mom
I hope you and your friends are still having fun.
(1:48 PM)
Lia
This place is the BEST.
(1:49 PM)
Mason’s eyebrows dance up. “This from the person who called pancakes heavenly pillows earlier.”
“I said fluffy clouds. ”
He snorts. Or maybe it’s more of a chortle. Either way, it’s my second-favorite sound after his laugh.
My screen flashes again. I roll my eyes.
“Your mom?” Mason asks.
I nod.
Mom
What park are you in again?
(1:55 PM)
Lia
Hero’s Quest.
(1:57 PM)
Lia
We’re about to get on a ride so I will talk to you at 4.
(1:59 PM)
I don’t dare not answer her, even though it’s been barely an hour since she called Issy. She’s too stressed out, and I’m still afraid she’ll make good on her threat to come down here.
Flashing an apologetic smile at Mason, I shove my phone back in my purse. My mom can wait until four now.
Nora has her pad out like she’s ready to take our order, but she’s looking at Mason. “Has she met Waffles and Toast?”
“Excuse me, who are Waffles and Toast?” In my enthusiasm, I lean across the table, almost sloshing my milk everywhere.
From the glare Mason gives Nora, you’d think she pulled naked baby pictures of him from her pocket. He’s still holding one of my hands, so I clamp down on his wrist with the other. “Tell. Me.”
A blush has crept into his cheeks. “My dachshunds.”
“Wait.” My fingers cinch his wrist so snugly red marks are forming. “You named those adorable hot dogs after breakfastfood?”
His lips curl into a sheepish grin.
“Oh my God, you’re amazing.” My voice is too serious, as if I’m admitting something more than those words suggest. Heat flashes in my cheeks, and I want to drop my forehead to the table.
“I’ll…uh…come back in a minute,” Nora says. With a play at nonchalance, she lets out a low whistle and wanders away.
People leave and new ones sit at the vacated tables. We haven’t even ordered yet. My mind fixates on that. Ordering’s good. It’s active. It will propel us out of this moment, push us toward a new one where I didn’t basically confess how I feel about him.
I grab the menu again. Tess taught me that there’s no situation you can’t extricate yourself from if you just keep talking.
“What’s good here? Of course, you promised me pancakes.
So maybe I should go with those.” Then I start reading the menu out loud because I don’t know what else to do.
“The Cheesiest of Cheese Omelets. An Omelet Only a Meat Lover Could Love. Grannie’s apple bread French toast. Cinnamon swirl French toast. Philly cheesesteak frittata.
Okay, seriously, who the heck orders that for breakfast? ”
Mason lets me keep going until I list everything on the page. Until my heart has flown up into my throat. Until my eyes water from concentrating so hard on the glossy pages or from the terror of not knowing what he’s thinking.
It’s been four days. He shouldn’t be anything to me but a crush fueled by his perfect face and muscles.
Yet when my mind drifts to Mason (which is basically all the time now), all I can focus on is how funny and thoughtful he is.
How he pays attention. How easy it is to confide in him.
How I want him to know me in every way possible.
How brave and courageous and determined he is, and how all of that makes me desperate to change things I’ve always accepted.
How I want him to win every bit as much as I want to.
How I don’t want this to end just because I’m leaving.
I’d always believed that feelings like this took time. That they grew slowly as you discovered a person’s secrets, as they gave you access to their tiny corners and hidden rooms, as that gradual openness made them new to you.
But maybe feelings can take other shapes as well. Fire. And lightning. Bright flashes that burn up the sky. Maybe they can snap into existence with the smallest spark, and flare every bit as brightly.
Maybe four days can be enough to know someone. Really know them. Care about them in ways you didn’t mean to.
“Lia.”
I force myself to look at him. I wish Nora would take our order so I can put some food in my mouth to shut me up.
“I’ve thought you were amazing since the first time you made me laugh.”
“Yeah?” My cheeks find a brand-new shade of red, and my skin redefines the word heat.
“Yeah.”
“Well, I’ve thought you were amazing since you snuck us into Reddingshire Castle.”
His eyes have fallen from my face, and they scan the table as if he’ll find what he needs there. The air between us tingles.
“But I’m leaving,” I say softly. It’s time for us to acknowledge this. To figure out what it means. What we’re doing here.
Mason still doesn’t look at me. “I know.”
“In two and a half days.”
He clears his throat. Scrubs a hand over his face.
When he looks at me, he’s grinning, but that smile doesn’t dance in his eyes as usual.
“Then we should make the most of them.” He nods toward the menu.
“Let’s get your heavenly pillows. We’ve got more to do before I have to get you back to your friends. ”