Page 62 of The Publicity Stunt

I’m unsure how to respond to that. Not because I don’t think I’m up for the task, but because I don’t think I ever fell out of it to begin with. “Sure, Parker. I’ll do that.” I grab my beer bottle and take a swig.

The rest of the night is spent partaking in an exchange of phone numbers and life-changing information. He tells me he hasn’t dated anyone since me. I try to sound unaffected and tell him I’ve had three semi-serious relationships. He tells me his mom sold their house in Cooperstown and used the money to get an RV. He jokes about it being a mid-life crisis, but my heart aches a little. We shared countless memories in that house. I like to believe that we might’ve fallen in love in that house too.

He tells me he’s a proud father of a six-month-old kitten named Dog. Obviously, he’s the only one who finds this funny, and I respond with, “I killed four succulents in two weeks.”

The entire time he’s relaying all this information, I feel like a little girl peeping through a glass window, unwittingly trying to find my place amidst his new life. The memories we shared come back in tiny flashbacks every now and then, and I wonder if he sees my smile flicker at a particularly heartbreaking one.

We order some food—grilled chicken burger for him, and a house salad for me—and continue making small talk. Monochromatic and outlined.

Neither one of us is brave enough to bring up what happened that one night, eight years ago. Not yet.

ChapterFourteen

Twelve Years Ago

HAYDEN

“The Getty? Three p.m.?” April asks.

I look up from my comic. She’s sunbathing on the blue beach mat next to mine, where I’m sitting in my shorts.

Every Sunday for the past two years, we’ve come up to the campus hill in our swimsuits. She scrolls through something on her phone. I read a comic. She occasionally clicks ugly photos of me. I promptly snatch the phone from her and delete them. She whines about it for exactly three seconds and goes back to her scrolling. I go back to my reading.

It’s tradition.

The only thing different about this year is that I can’t seem to focus on Wolverine and Cyclops. Not when my girlfriend is lying right next to me. God, I can’t believe I can actually say that now. I have a girlfriend.

April Moore is my girlfriend.

Fucking unreal.

She’s wearing a tight blue swimsuit. It melts over her skin so perfectly that I want nothing more than to rip it off. Every time I look at her, my eyes inadvertently travel down to her lips, then to the soft plunge of her breasts, and all the blood in my body rushes straight to my dick.

Ever since our kiss at last year’s Halloween party, we’ve done … other stuff. She’s let me explore her body. And I’ve let her do the same. But we haven’t had sex yet. Which is okay. I don’t want to rush her. I’m careful to take things at her pace.

And quite frankly, I’m a little nervous myself. Don’t get me wrong; I’m dying to touch her. To be inside her. I want to memorize every inch of her skin and count every little freckle. I want to know her body as well as she does. April has had sex before. I know that. But I can’t let my impatience fuck up the first time we have sex.

I cannot fuck it up.

“Parker?”

“Yes, Chere?”

When she realizes I’m shamelessly checking her out, she gives a small smile and turns on her stomach, giving me a perfect view of her ass. “The Getty?” she repeats, fake innocence dripping from her voice. “Three p.m.?”

I slam my book shut and lean on my arm. “Hard pass.”

“Oh, you have something better to do?”

“Someone,” I correct.

She turns her head and gives me a coy smile, and my dick throbs. Hardening more. “I want to see your comic,” she says.

I frown at that abrupt change in conversation. “What?”

“Your comic,” April repeats. “I want to see it.”

“I’m not showing it to you.” My eyes trickle down her face again. Ah, hell, is that fucking lip gloss?