Laughing, I sit back in the chair and watch my sister fiddle with her watch. “How are things going around here?” she asks. “Anything you need help with?”
“Nope. Everything’s peachy.”
She assesses me quickly. “I’m gonna have to call you out on that, Barrett.”
“Call me out on what?”
“That little ‘peachy’ comment. You don’t say things like that,” she smirks, “and your face just gave you away. So . . . tell me. What’s up?”
“You’ve earned your nickname, Swink. Such a meddler.”
“It’s what I do. Now spill it, Barrett,” she prompts.
Sighing, I try to consider getting around it, but I know she’ll pick at it until I come clean.
“All right,” I say, folding my hands on my desk, “I’m going to give you an opportunity to give me some advice.”
Her jaw drops. “Really? You’re really going to open up to me? Wow. Wait,” she says, shaking her head, “don’t overthink this. It’s a monumental day for sure, but you just talk and I’ll revel in the excitement afterwards.”
I roll my eyes. “Let’s say a guy you like says something that, I don’t know, offends you. Nothing terrible, just . . . said things he’s used to saying, but he obviously should’ve known better. And now he wants to apologize.”
“Oh, God, Barrett. What did you do?”
I toss her a look and she motions like she’s zipping her lips.
“How do I say I’m sorry?” I ask as she lifts a brow.
“Well,” she says, “the fact you didn’t just chase this girl and make her bend to your will is throwing me a bit. You’re usually a more ‘I’ll take what I want’ kind of guy.”
“Maybe I’m changing tactics.”
“Maybe I need to know who she is.”
“Maybe not.”
“Fine,” she groans. “Okay, you should apologize. But here’s the thing—you can say you’re sorry all you want, but words are pretty useless. Everyone says they’re sorry but rarely means it.”
“So what do I do? I mean it, Camilla. I’m sorry as fuck. I feel . . . I think I feel guilty.”
“Wow,” she breathes.
“Yeah,” I nod. “Wow.”
“Okay, so what you need is a grand gesture,” she exclaims, her eyes sparkling. “You need to convince her you aren’t the douchebag you presented yourself to be. Make her think you were just having a bad day. And if she believes you, you can’t go back to douchebag mode, okay?”
I sag. “Of course not. I . . . she . . . I . . .”
Camilla giggles at my stumbling.
“I don’t want to make her feel like I think I did. I hate feeling like this,” I admit, throwing a pen across my desk.
“You have to win her over and you do that by showing her you’re still thinking about her. You need to demonstrate that you listen when she talks, that you care about what she has to say. That is, of course, if you really did listen to her.”
Camilla flashes me a look like she expects me to laugh it off. I don’t.
“Of course I listened to her.”
“Well then, if that’s true, find something she loves, something she’s mentioned in conversation. Something small that she wouldn’t expect you to remember, and then act on it.”