Page 39

“I'm peachy, Wyatt.” I scratch behind Pickles's ears. “You can stop apologizing.”

He turns toward me, a grin spreading across his face. “Peachy?”

Oh, no. I remember saying the exact same thing to him on the Ferris wheel.

“It's a totally normal expression, Wyatt. The cool kids use it.”

I know fully well it’s the opposite of cool, but hey.

He laughs. “Sure it is, Peachy.”

“Don't.”

“What? I like it.”

I grab a cushion and smack him with it. He laughs and catches it before I can hit him again. “You're so fucking annoying.”

“Yeah, but you like me.”

“I like your dog.”

“Right. Keep telling yourself that.”

He's still grinning when he tosses the cushion aside, and I hate that I'm smiling too.

Somewhere in the last thirty seconds, we've shifted closer together on the couch. His thigh is almost touching mine, and when he glances down at my mouth, I suddenly remember exactly what it felt like to kiss him.

Those soft lips. I bet he knows how to do other things with them, too. Hmmm.

He looks back up, catching me staring.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

His grin widens. “Whatever you say, Peachy.”

My plate's still balanced on my knee, fork resting against the rim, and I realize I've stopped eating entirely. The TV's on with the sound off, some highlight reel looping colors across the wall, and neither of us is watching it.

"You never answered," he says. "The lonely part."

"I had Pickles."

"Pickles isn't great conversation."

"He's a better listener than you'd think."

That gets a huff of laughter out of him, low, and he leans his head back against the couch cushion, turning it toward me instead of the ceiling. Close enough that I can see the shadow his lashes throw, close enough that the couch cushion dips under his weight and tips me half an inch closer without my permission.

"It wasn't lonely," I say, quieter now, because the joke's run out and there isn't another one waiting to take its place. "It was your place. Everything smelled like you. Pickles kept sleeping on the spot on the bed like he expected you to still be there."

"And you?"

"I'm not going to answer that."

"Peachy."

"Don't."