After the chugging contest was over, Randal headed outside
to start the van – it gave him a chance to light up a cigarette before heading home. Kaitlynn and Ethan made detours to the
bathrooms, and it looked like Josh – root beer all wiped off of his face – was
about to get a phone number from the gal working the register. Poor girl.
Ashlynne sat at the table sucking on ice cubes and wishing she
could warn that girl of Josh’s jerky nature.
“She’s in for a shock, huh?” Colt quipped.
“Yeah, poor girl,” Ashlynne chuckled. “She has no idea.” She tipped her glass to her mouth and sucked
in another piece of ice.
“Yeah,” Colt chuckled, then turned away from watching Josh
woo the girl – she was currently laughing and tossing her blonde hair over her
shoulder Could she be any ditzier? –
and looked at Ashlynne instead. “Are you
ever gonna tell me what was wrong Monday?”
He looked straight into her eyes, face serious, no winking eyes or
crooked grin playing on his lips.
“Uhm,” she muttered around her ice cube. A small trickle of water leaked out the
corner of her mouth, and Ashlynne crunched the ice cube as she reached for a
napkin. A pink blush heated up her
cheeks. You sound like an idiot, ya know. Look like one, too.
Colt brushed the trickle of water away before Ashlynne
managed to get the napkin to her face. Her
blush deepened and her heart fluttered as his calloused hand smoothed across her
chin. She sucked in a breath as his hand
lowered. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. Ashlynne pressed the napkin to her face and
tried to regain her normal pale color.
“Bullshit,” Colt countered.
“Something was really wrong, and I heard your mom talking to you earlier. What’s going on?” Ashlynne crumpled the napkin in her hands
then folded it on the table, trying to smooth out the wrinkles. Colt’s hand on hers stilled her nervous
fidgeting, and he leaned in close, talking quietly next to her ear. "Really. You can talk to me if you want.” His breath brushed her cheek and fluttered
her hair. He smelled like onions from
the combo pizza.
“What’s happening here?” came Ethan’s voice behind them. He laughed when Ashlynne jumped in her seat; Colt
slowly slid his hand away.
“Just talkin’,” Colt drawled. “Shootin’ shit, ya know?” He stood up and pushed his chair into the
table. Any recovery Ashlynne had made
from her earlier blush was gone as she turned a deep shade of crimson.
“That all?” Ethan asked, looking from Ashlynne’s beet-soaked
face to Colt’s smirk and back again.
“Yeah,” she said.
“Shootin’ shit.” And both boys
chuckled at the sound of a swear coming from her mouth. She wasn’t in the habit of cussing. Audibly, anyway.
“Well, Mom’s just come out of the bathroom, so we’d better
go,” Ethan said before he headed over to Josh, who was slyly waving a napkin
that Ashlynne assumed had a name and phone number curlicued across it. Dumb
blonde. Yep.
Ashlynne stood up from the table, took one more sip from her
glass of melting ice, and saw Colt pull out his wallet. “Oh, Mom paid and gave the gal a tip
earlier,” she told him.
“Yeah,” he said as he threw down a fistful of dollars on the
table. “I know. But I had a good time with you tonight,” he smiled
and walked toward the door. Ashlynne followed
him out to the front of the restaurant, where he held the door open for her.
She walked quickly over to the van, unsure what to say to Colt’s
comment. She had assumed he’d come tonight
to hang out with Ethan, but he’d ended up spending at least as much time
talking to Ashlynne as he had talking to her brother. She didn’t want to puzzle over what he meant,
though. Parts of tonight were fun, but
dealing with Josh was stressful; Ashlynne just wanted to go home, stretch, and
fall asleep.
Ethan and Josh were stretched out in the back seat as much
as they could, the two of them taking up all three spots in the seat. Too much greasy pizza followed by a chugging
contest didn’t seem to sit well in their stomachs. Ashlynne sat behind Randal in the driver’s
seat. A faint smell of tobacco lingered
on him. Ashlynne hated what his
cigarettes must’ve been doing to his lungs, but there was comfort in the
cigarette’s lingering scent. Her nerves
relaxed after a few deep inhales. Colt
sat next to her and closed the door.
Josh leaned forward and said something in Colt’s ear,
snickering as he plopped back in his seat.
Colt muttered a “can it, man,” and buckled his seat belt.
Ashlynne buckled up, then leaned forward and tapped Kaitlynn
on the shoulder. “Can we listen to the
radio, please?” Her hope was that the
music would dull any more pesky antics from the backseat. It gave her something to focus on,
anyway. Kaitlynn even tuned the radio to
a country station instead of the standard oldies she usually blasted in the
car.
Ashlynne stared out the window while Randal took the side
streets toward the old country roads that led home. He didn’t care for the busy freeway. Ashlynne lost herself in Martina McBride’s
“Broken Wing” as she searched the darkening sky for the night’s first
stars. The sun was still dipping down
over the horizon as they left the city lights behind, and flip-book fields
filled her window. The cool glass was
comforting against her cheek, and she couldn’t help a little grin from playing
on her lips.
Luke Bryan sang about crashing a party and Colt said,
“Pretty, huh? Those fields?”
Ashlynne sat up and looked at him as he looked out the
window next to her. He looked as
peaceful as she felt. “Yeah, they look
like –”
“Flipbooks,” they said together, and Ashlynne chuckled. “They’re beautiful,” she breathed as she rested
her head against the window again. The
sun was almost set now, and stars were beginning to dot the night sky.
Tim McGraw’s “Where the Green Grass Grows” played on the
radio and Ashlynne felt Colt’s hand rest above her knee, just like he’d taken
to doing during lunch, and like he’d done on the bus. “Beautiful,” he agreed, and squeezed her leg
a little. He let his hand rest right
where it was as Randal wound around curvy country roads, past pastures full of
horses and cattle, fields of corn and alfalfa.
The sky darkened to indigo and God let loose all the stars in the
heavens. Ashlynne closed her eyes and
tried to focus on the words drifting from the radio, but couldn’t focus on
anything but Colt’s hand on her leg – how it felt like the most natural thing
in the world – and how Colt had said earlier he had a good time with her.
She’d almost drifted asleep when a cold breeze hit Ashlynne’s
leg. She startled away from the window
and looked at her lap. Colt had moved
his hand – both of his now resting by his stomach. The door slid open and Ashlynne realized they’d
made it to Josh’s house. Josh leaned in
close to Colt and whispered something
she couldn’t catch. But she did notice Colt’s
hands clench into fists. Josh did, too,
and he chuckled, walked backward towards his house and called out to Ethan that
he’d see him tomorrow. Colt reached over
and closed the door. Randal backed out
of the drive and headed toward Colt’s place.
Commercials drifted from the radio, and Colt’s hands
remained balled up in fists. It was too
dark in the van to see his face in clear detail, but his jaw seemed to be
clenched. In an uncharacteristically
bold move, Ashlynne slid her hand on top of one of his fists and asked, “You
okay?”
His fists jerked away from her hand, and she settled her
hand on her thigh instead, surprised at his reaction. He ran his hands through his hair, tousling
his auburn curls. Then traced her wrist
with an index finger. “Sorry,” he
mumbled. “Josh is just such an ass
sometimes. Drives me nuts.”
Ashlynne nodded her agreement and Colt stopped tracing her
wrist, letting his hand settle on top of hers instead. “What did he say?” she whispered, staring
down at his hand on top of hers on top of her thigh. His calluses were rough, but not
ungentle. They just accentuated the softness of her own skin.
Colt sighed and squeezed her hand. A smirk played on his lips when he said, “I really don’t want to talk about it.” Ashlynne suppressed a laugh at his playful
mockery – he wasn’t going to talk to her about Josh just like she wouldn’t talk
to him about everything that had upset her Monday.
They rode the rest of the way to Colt’s house in silence,
his thumb slowly rubbing against the outside edge of her thigh next to her
pinkie.
When Randal pulled into his gravel drive, Colt took his hand
away from Ashlynne’s and leaned forward to thank Kaitlynn and Randal again for
dinner. They assured him it was their
pleasure, and told him to be sure to give their best to his parents. With a “yessir,” he opened the door and
started toward his trailer.
No sooner had Colt closed the van door than Ethan was
leaning forward next to Ashlynne’s ear asking, “What’s going on with you and Colt?”
a light accusation hanging in the air.
Yeah, really, added
Ashlynne’s usually-sarcastic companion, the snarkiness gone from her voice. Up until tonight Ashlynne had thought
Colt was just a friend – Ethan’s friend, mostly. A familiar face on bus rides. Tonight, though – lately, really – he’d been
more attentive, more defensive. It hit her
then – the gentle touches, the way he just wouldn’t let Monday go – maybe Colt
was trying to move away from friend territory.
Duh, dummy. Or, maybe Ashlynne was reading too much into
it and he really was just trying to be a good friend. It was hard to not overanalyze the situation. “I don’t know,” she finally said, folding her
arms over her chest and leaning against the window to look at the stars
again.
“You’re not seventeen, ya know. You can’t date yet, and Colt’s a really good
guy. Don’t lead him on, okay?” Ethan sat back in his seat and Ashlynne fumed
internally. Are you kidding me?! Of course I
know I’m not seventeen. That was the
magical number Ashlynne had to reach until she was deemed “date-able” by Randal,
though Ethan was currently allowed to date.
But never mind that sexism. And
“leading him on?” Come on. She’d been nothing but polite to Colt – except for screaming at him like you’d
broken loose from an insane asylum and calling him a jerk the next day. Ah, there’s the sarcasm. Alright, she hadn’t discouraged him when he
reached for her thigh or her knee or hand, but was that leading him on?
“Whatever,” was the only response she could conjure as Randal
drove home. Ethan huffed. Ashlynne just wanted to get back home and go
to sleep as quickly as possible.
Ashlynne was the first in the house and quickly brushed her
teeth and washed her face. She retreated
to her room before Ethan could offer any more of his opinion, then brushed her
hair until her frustration disappeared. She
turned her radio on low and got lost in lyrics about good women, hard work, and
simple living. Changed into shorts, a sports
bra, and a tank – she’d be able to bolt outside for a good jog before she and
Kaitlynn headed out for groceries. Her lingering
nerves calmed as she stretched and rubbed lotion across her body, then settled down
to dream.