A Little Like Love (Robin and Tyler 2)

I lift an eyebrow. “I do stuff.”

“Yeah?” I watch his lips as they slip over the bottle and take another long drink of beer. “Like what?”

“Like…stuff.” I can’t stop watching his lips long enough to know that my answer was stupid.

Tyler sets the bottle down, thank god, and leans forward. His smile hints that he knows something I don’t and I am dying to figure out what it is. “Oh yeah? Stuff?” he says as his eyes settle on mine. “Stuff like go on a date with me?”

I am silent for an entire five seconds. You’d think my hesitation would make him retract his offer, but he doesn’t. My mouth opens and I stumble over my reply. “I don’t exactly…date…”

“People you rent apartments from?”

I shake my head. “No, just…anyone.”

“Really?” He frowns. “Can I ask why not?”

I look at the bar and run my fingernail down a scratch in the polished wood. “It’s just a thing I started doing ever since I was in this situation where I was engaged and well…it didn’t work out.”

He smiles, tilting his head when he looks at me. “Ah, okay. Well I know how that is.”

“You do?”

“Well, no. But I get it. You have to do what’s right for you.”

I nod and gulp down half of my beer at once. Tyler laughs and signals for the bartender once again. “Now that I’ve made this sufficiently awkward, how about another drink?”

I hold up my bottle and we clink them together in a toast, although I’m not sure what we’re toasting to. “Sounds like good plan. I’ll ignore the elephant in the room if you will.”

I swear I see his tanned cheeks blush. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “Consider it ignored.”

Chapter 5

I sit on the back porch steps and watch the bluebonnets sway in the breeze. Beyond the vast field of blue lies a small pond and then an old barbed wire fence. The Texas land is mostly flat and I can see for miles, but the patch of bluebonnets is more beautiful to me than miles of what lies beyond it. Marcus said they would all die soon because of the approaching cold weather and this makes me a little sad. I can’t imagine the back yard without all the blue. Still, even empty it would be more beautiful than my view of buildings and public transportation busses from back home.

Just thinking about it makes me depressed. Before long, I realize I’ve been sitting here with my toes in the grass, staring at bluebonnets and contemplating the meaning of life so long that it’s yielded no epiphanies and just a whole lot of depression.

I can’t get a job around here because I’m only qualified to sell real estate and there isn’t much of that happening around here. I don’t have many friends yet because I’m unemployed and don’t meet anyone. What I need is a hobby. Hobbies could lead to friends and maybe even a job. At this point I would take almost anything because it doesn’t matter how much money it made. I just need to tackle my to-do list and get a grip on my new life already.

I hear footsteps from inside the house which means Miranda probably came home for lunch again, although I can’t fathom ever getting tired of the diner’s food. Maybe she’ll have an idea for a hobby I can take up to help me pass the time. Something other than back-porch-sitting, for which I’m already incredibly talented. Unfortunately, back-porch-sitting doesn’t give me any intellectual stimulation. If anything, it makes my situation worse.

“Randy, I need a hobby!” I yell, calling Miranda by the nickname she hates as I bounce through the back door.

“You could try fishing,” a voice calls back. “But my name’s Tyler.”

I stop short at the sight of him standing in my living room, in a clean pair of dark jeans and black T-shirt. He holds a tape measure in one hand and a strip of floor molding in the other. “Sorry for the intrusion,” he says, taking a carpenter pencil out of his back pocket. “I just talked to Miranda and she said you wouldn’t be home and I could stop on by.”

“Sure thing,” I say, pulling open the refrigerator door and burying my face inside to help me cool off from what I’m assuming is a flushed face. Miranda knows I’m home today and that I’ll be home all day. I bitched about it as she was getting ready for work. She did this on purpose. Mentally, I vow revenge then grab a soda so I don’t look like a freak with my head in the fridge. “You want a drink?” I ask him.

He’s on his knees, nailing in that last floor board. I lean against the counter and watch him work. I could get used to this view. “No thanks,” he grunts. “I’ve got a beer in the truck.”

“Lucky,” I mutter under my breath as I walk past him and sink into the air mattress pretend couch. I’d love to stare at his ass all day but that’s never gotten me anywhere in life. I’d also love to have a beer, but again—that didn’t work out too well for me last time I had a drink since I was asked out by my hot landlord and then denied him like an idiot.

“So, you coming fishing?” Tyler asks, dusting his hands on his jeans.

“You were serious?”

He nods. “I was about to hit the lake back there. I have an extra fishing rod if you’d like to join me.”

“I’ve never been fishing in my life,” I say. Somewhere in the back of my mind, my libido is jumping around and telling me to shut the hell up and let him take m