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Colton’s big brown eyes sparkle. “Aren’t you even a little curious about what’s on the menu?”
“Okay, fine,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I’ll stay. But please tell me there’s no bacon involved. Don’t get me wrong, I love bacon as much as the next girl, but I’m starting to get the arteries of an eighty-year-old man.”
“Bacon is a way of life here.”
“Well, it’s also the way to an early death in the quantities we’ve been eating out on the trail.”
“True.” Colton tips his head toward my family’s table. “You should probably get going.”
“Do you have a place to sit?”
“There’s an employee table next to the kitchen.”
It’s hard to force my feet to move. My hand reaches out and grabs Colton’s. He gives it a reassuring squeeze before dropping it quickly.
“I’ll see you after dinner?” I ask.
“I’d like that, but…” Colton shrugs. “I still have some work to do. I need to check on Chance and the other animals again, and see if Dad’s got anything for me to prep for tomorrow. Leave your window cracked and if I can stop by before it gets too late, I’ll holler up?”
“You could always toss pebbles.”
“I might be a horrible shot. What if I wake your parents? Or the Stones, who are right next door?”
“And you think hollering up at me like Romeo is going to be any better?” I give his arm a playful smack. “If you can toss a lasso, you can chuck a few pebbles, Colton Walker.”
There’s a flash of heat in his eyes. He leans in until he towers over me and says, “I’ll be seeing you again real soon, Riley Thomas.”
It’s pointless to fight the grin. “You better.”
Mom and Dad are unusually quiet throughout our dinner of chicken, rice, and some sort of garden green that could have started out as spinach or kale, but after extended sautéing is now a lumpy mass on my plate. Caleb has spent most of our meal swiveling back and forth in his seat to shove food in his mouth and then turn away to chat with a few of his buddies who are conveniently at the table behind him.
Now I know something’s up with our parents, because they would have been all over him for bad manners any other night of the week. Not gonna lie—I’m curious to know what has Mom and Dad so quiet and somber, but after almost a week of avoiding them, it feels weird to ask.
After tentatively poking at the green glob, I scoop up a bit on the tip of my fork and try it. It’s not as bad as it looks, but I still can’t tell what it is. Colton would know and would probably have a story about how the first Nebraska settlers survived on dandelion leaves, foraged wild onion, and cattails, and how Chef Ignatius’s re-creation was featured in Traditional Cuisine of the Midwest.
Given the weird vibe at this table, I really wish Colton were here to offer up one of his comforting nods or one of those half-smiles that are starting to grow on me. If I tip forward and lean to the right, I can just barely make out the top of his head from all the way across the room.
When I sit back in my chair, Mom is looking at me with a half-pained, half-sympathetic look.
“What?” I ask, shifting in my seat.
Mom shakes her head as if clearing away a thought and forces a smile. “We got an update from the movers. Our stuff should arrive Monday.”
“Okay.”
“Oh, and the painters will be available a week earlier than expected. Your dad and I were thinking of painting the house a neutral color throughout. This weekend, we can head to the paint store and look at samples for your room. You can pick any color you want. Lavender. Teal.”
“Black like your heart,” Caleb chimes in.
My foot connects with his shin under the table.
“Ouch.”
“Thomas family,” Dad says in a warning tone.
Mom continues. “Maybe you could do one of those cool geometric pattern things, with painter’s tape? I saw it in a magazine.” To anyone else, I’m sure she sounds enthusiastic and authentic, but there’s just a little too much brightness to her voice and the smile she has pasted on doesn’t quite make it to her eyes.
I glance over to Colton’s table, but he must have ducked out early to finish his chores so he could meet up with me later. I tug at my suffocating high collar and force in a breath of stagnant air. I get that there was no AC back in the day but would it have killed someone to install a ceiling fan or a hidden ventilation system or something?
