Butternut Summer (15 page)

“About overthinking things?”

She nodded.

“Not really,” he admitted. “I'm more of an underthinker myself.”

“Well, maybe that's better sometimes,” she said musingly. “Overthinking definitely has its drawbacks. But that's probably not the only reason I'm . . .”

“A virgin?” Will said, getting the hang of it. “Why, what's the other reason?”

She smiled, then paused. “Well, what it comes down to, I guess, is expectations. Because either mine are too high, or most men's are too low.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, take our date, for instance,” she said, picking up another one of his french fries and taking a bite of it. “I mean, was that the whole plan, Will? The beer, the backseat, the . . .”

He sighed inwardly, but he decided to go with honesty. It was the simplest, if not always the best, policy. “Yeah, that was more or less the plan.”

“And you thought that was enough for a first date?”

I've never had any complaints before
, Will almost said. But he caught himself. His plan was not to antagonize her; his plan, in fact, was to do the opposite. So he raised his shoulders, noncommittally, in an answer that was no answer at all.

Again, Daisy saw through it. “Huh,” she said thoughtfully. “I mean, no offense, Will. It just seems that today, in the twenty-first century, you might offer a woman a little more than that.”

“Well, don't knock it till you've tried it,” Will said, without thinking, and he was instantly annoyed with himself. He watched warily as the surprise registered on her face, and he waited for that surprise to turn into annoyance. Or anger. But after a moment, she laughed. “You may have a point there, Will,” she said. Then she glanced over at Frankie, still standing at the grill, and some wordless communication passed between them.

“Look, I've got to get back to work,” she said. “But, Will? Thank you for stopping by. And, um, apology accepted.” She smiled then, a smile that was so pretty and unaffected that it immediately reminded him of the other reason he'd come here.

“Yeah, about that,” he said, quickly, as she started to slide out of the booth. “There was something else, too.”

She hesitated.

He took a swig of his Coke, plagued by an unfamiliar feeling—nervousness. “I wanted to know, Daisy, if you'd like to go out with me again.”

She raised her eyebrows. “On another date?” she asked skeptically.

“Yeah, but not like the first one. We could go out for dinner or—”

But she interrupted him. “Will, don't. Really. It's not necessary. You apologized. You don't need to take me on some pity date now.”

“Pity date?” he repeated. “I don't know what that is.”

“You know, a second date to make up for the lousy first date. So when you never see me again after the second date, you can have a clear conscience.”

He shook his head. “No, I don't mean a pity date. That's not what I had in mind. I wanted to take you out again on a real date.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Why?” he said, caught off guard by her again. She was such an odd combination of shyness and directness. “Well, because . . .” But he struggled a little here, unsure of how to put this. She was waiting, though, so he said, “I want to take you out again because I like you, Daisy. And because I've been thinking about you. I've been thinking about you
a lot
.”
To the exclusion, it turned out, of almost everything else in his life
.

He watched now while she blushed, her cheeks a lovely mingling of creamy white and soft pink. “Well, I've been trying
not
to think about you,” she said softly. “But I've been doing it anyway.”

“Good,” he said, and he wanted to lean over and kiss her, right here and right now, but he sensed the cook was still watching him. “So what do you say? Could we try that again?”

She studied him thoughtfully. “We could, but . . . I'm not going back to the beach with you, Will.”

He smiled at her double meaning. “No, we won't go back to the beach,” he said. “In fact, let's take that whole subject off the table. But I have to warn you, though. What you said about dating, and about our expectations being different? Part of it, Daisy, is that I don't
have
any expectations. I've never really dated anybody before.”

“No?” she said, surprised. But then something occurred to her. “So this is one area where I have more experience than you?” she asked, a smile playing around her lips.

“Definitely.”

“All right, then. Yes, I'll go out with you again, Will—on one condition.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“You let me plan what we do on our date.”

He thought about that. “Yeah, okay,” he said. Why not? It wasn't like he had anything in mind anyway, other than just being with her.

“Good.” She smiled. “When should we go out?”

“Tomorrow,” he said, without hesitation.

“Okay,” she said, and she seemed suddenly shy again. “Do you want to come here around eight o'clock?”

He nodded.

“I'll see you then,” she said, starting to slide out of the booth again.

“Oh, wait,” he said, reaching for his wallet. “Let me give you some money for my lunch.”

“No, that's okay. It's on the house.”

He shook his head and took some bills out. But when he put them on the table, Daisy pushed them back. “Will,” she said, “I wish I could say that giving away the occasional free meal was
one
of the perks of working here, but the truth is, it's the
only
perk of working here.” She smiled again, and then she was gone. And Will was left there, eating a cold french fry and thinking about the fact that, for the first time in a long time, he had no idea what he was doing.

S
torm's coming,” Jason said, later that afternoon, leaning against a car in the service bay.

Oh, a storm is definitely coming
, Will thought, looking up from the engine he was working on. It had been hot and overcast all day. But since he'd gotten back from Pearl's a few hours ago, it had gotten even hotter and the sky had gotten even darker. And now the air was so heavy and still, so full of the hum and taste of electricity, it had you almost praying that the rain would start and break the tension. Will put his wrench down, pulled off his gloves, and, sliding his cell phone out of his back pocket, checked the latest text from Christy.
I'll be there in five minutes
. He sighed. It was going to be one hell of a storm.

“Jason,” he said, wishing now more than ever that Jason actually worked during his workday. “Isn't there something you could be doing in the office?”

“Probably,” Jason said, “but you're better company than the radio in there.”

“Yeah, that's great,” Will said, coming over to him. “But Christy's going to be here soon, and we'll need some privacy. To talk,” he added pointedly.

“Oh, right. Because you two spend so much time talking,” Jason said with a smirk.

“Out,” Will said, exasperated, pointing in the direction of the service bay door.

“All right, all right,” Jason said, holding his hands up in surrender. “As it turns out, I do have some work to do. I need to read some new video-game reviews.”

“Knock yourself out,” Will said, searching for a bottled water in the cooler and wishing Jason would leave.

But when he left, Will wished he would come back, if only to take his mind off the conversation he was about to have with Christy. He was nervous again, for the second time that day, and nervousness was an unfamiliar feeling for Will, who rarely left his comfort zone.

He walked over to the door to the service bay now and looked out at the ominous sky. In the distance, he saw a first flash of lightning, followed several seconds later by a low rumble of thunder. And, as if on cue, Christy's silver Mustang sped into view and turned, a little too fast, into the service station driveway. It was a beautiful car, Will thought, watching her park, but judging from the faint rattle he heard coming from the engine, there was a loose heat shield in the exhaust system. He wondered if he should offer to tighten it up for her while they talked, but he decided against it. Given that he'd never worked on her car before, now was probably not the time to start.

“Hi, Will,” Christy said, opening her car door. She unfolded her long, baby-oil-soft legs and followed them out of the car.

“Hi, Christy,” Will said, and if his voice sounded a little strange to him, it was probably because he was surprised by her appearance. She was wearing a short, tight dress that barely skimmed the top of her thighs and high-heeled sandals. Her blond hair was piled up on her head, and in place of the pink lip gloss she usually wore was bright red lipstick. She looked . . . she looked like a woman with one thing on her mind, and one thing only. And for once, it wasn't the same thing that Will had on his mind.

“Is anyone else around here?” Christy asked, glancing over her shoulder as she came into the service bay.

“Just Jason,” Will said with a shrug.

“Good,” Christy said. “I told Mac I had to run some errands.” She smiled mischievously.

In that dress?
Will thought.

“You know, Will,” she said, turning to face him once they were inside, “it would have been easier if you could have waited for Mac to leave on Wednesday.”

“Yeah, I know. But it couldn't wait that long.”

“That's what I thought,” she said, looking pleased, and Will realized he needed to choose his words more carefully.

“Well, I'm glad you couldn't wait to see me this time,” she said. “Because the last time you saw me, you got mad at me for interrupting a game of pool.”

“I wasn't mad at you for that—”

“I know, Will,” she said, stepping closer. Close enough so that he could smell her sweet, fruity perfume. “But you were mad. And you know what?”

He shook his head.

“I don't blame you. I know it's been hard for you—all of this. Especially the part about not being able to see each other whenever we want to. It's been hard for me too.” She pouted, then reached out and put one perfectly manicured hand on his arm.

He looked down at her hand, feeling a strange sense of detachment and wondering if this conversation could be going any worse than it already was. Or if he could have expressed himself any more inadequately than he already had. How was it, exactly, that he'd planned to tell her what he needed to tell her? He couldn't remember now, but he needed to say something else—fast.

“Christy, I'm seeing someone.”

She blinked.

“What?”

He said it again.

She took her hand off his arm. Her pout straightened itself out into a thin line, a thin red lipsticked line.

“How long?” she asked, quietly.

“Not long. Not long at all,” he said, which, God knows, was the truth.

“So it's not serious, then?” she asked.

He hesitated. “No. It's not.” So why did he feel, in some strange way, that he was being disloyal to Daisy by discussing it with Christy?

“Who is she?” Christy asked now, and the thin red line that was her mouth got thinner.

“That's not important.”

“It is to me.”

“Well, that's too bad,” he said, feeling the first spark of irritation. “Because I don't owe you that information.”

A flush spread across her face then, overlaying her too-tan cheeks. “Oh, right, Will. You just spend the night with me, what, like a hundred times? And now you don't owe me anything?”

“I didn't say I didn't owe you
anything
, Christy. I just said I didn't owe you
that
.”

“What
do
you owe me, Will?”

“Well, I think I owe it to you to be honest with you,” he said, although as he said this, it occurred to Will that it was a little late for that in a relationship that had been built on dishonesty.

She thought about this for a long time, and he saw a muscle working in her jaw, like she was concentrating. Hard. He heard another rumble of thunder, closer this time.

Then Christy did the strangest thing. She put her hand back on his arm and gave him a light, caressing touch. “Okay, that's fair,” she said, brightening a little. “I get it. I do. I mean, obviously, there are certain . . . limitations built into our seeing each other. And I don't blame you for feeling frustrated with them, and for wanting, sometimes, to see someone openly. But, Will, I don't understand why we can't keep seeing each other, even if you do have a girlfriend now. I mean, I won't tell if you won't tell.” She gave him a little smile and leaned closer to him.

“What? No,” Will said, shaking his head.

“Why not?” she said, her fingers running suggestively up his arm. “That way, we'd both have a secret.”

“Christy, no,” he said. “That wouldn't . . . that wouldn't be fair to her.”

“Fair to her,” she repeated softly, like she was testing out the words. Christy took her hand off Will's arm. She was angry now, very angry, as angry as he'd expected her to be. And for some reason, it came as a relief to him.

“And what about Mac, Will? Was it fair to him all those times we were together without him knowing it?”

“No, Christy. It wasn't.”

He saw her whole body tense with anger, and, for a second, he thought she was going to haul off and hit him. But she didn't. Instead, she leaned closer, so close that she was almost touching him, and she said, very quietly, “Go to hell, Will.” And then she turned on her high heels and walked rapidly out of the garage.

Will didn't go back to work after she'd driven away. He didn't do anything except listen to the sounds of the approaching storm. It was getting closer now, bringing with it gusts of wind that shook the trees out front and smelled like cool, damp earth. It was raining somewhere, not far away, and soon it would be raining here, too.