Craft (The Gibson Boys 2)

The boiled-down truth is sitting on the tip of my tongue. There’s a peacefulness that goes along with finding it in the rubble of everything else.

With one last reconsideration, I go for it. “Before this weekend, Lance was Lance. It wasn’t hard to compartmentalize him in a box in my head. We’d flirt or whatever at work but there was a line and it wasn’t crossed. It started at eight and ended at four. His personal life was his thing. It didn’t involve me. His conquests didn’t matter.”

“But they do now?”

I consider her question. Neither answer, yes or no, is right. It doesn’t matter because I’m still the girl from work. But it does matter because it doesn’t feel like he’s the guy from work anymore. All of that is muddied up now because the guy I told I wanted to feel his tongue on my pussy while his cock was halfway down my throat is the same guy who hugged me in front of my mother.

Whitney laughs when I rest my head against the cool counter. “You should’ve just fucked him. That would’ve eased some of this tension.”

“Right.” Standing up straight again, I go back to my lemon bars. “I’m going to have to pretend it didn’t happen. Erase this entire weekend from my brain.”

My friend looks at me like I’ve officially lost it. “You can do that?”

“I’m going to have to.” With a cup of flour balanced in the air, I look at Whitney. I should just make the lemon bars and be done with it, but I don’t. With a hefty sigh, I just stop pretending like it’s not going to happen. “Want to make some red velvet cupcakes?”

Fifteen

Lance

She’s always early on Monday mornings. It’s one of the few parts of her schedule I can predict and one the nerd in me loves. Most people struggle on Mondays. Mariah is at the school at least an hour early on the first day of the week.

While I don’t always start the week on a low note, today I was late. I could say it was the extra two minutes it took for the shower to warm up or the fact that I didn’t sleep last night. I could even situate the blame on Machlan’s shoulders for coming over and making me some rocket fuel shit that went down way too easily, but did help the story of the afternoon come together with less prompting.

Truth is, it was intentional.

The staff meeting about homecoming festivities would’ve put Mariah and I across from one another in a room full of people. On the surface, that seems like the perfect way to break the ice. Assumptions are often wrong.

The third rule of history is silence is not louder than words. When things get too quiet historically, they’re forgotten. The chaotic moments, the ones filled with passion and emotion—they’re the ones remembered. When I see her again, it won’t be in a room full of people. I won’t be forced to be silent. The words I’ll use aren’t formulated yet, they likely won’t be until the moment comes because I’ve tried to find the right thing to say since I left her yesterday and I keep coming up empty. But they’ll come. They always do with her.

“Make sure you finish this tonight,” I tell the sophomores as they gather their things. “I will take this for a grade tomorrow. You’ve been warned.”

“Have a good day, Mr. Gibson.” Two girls, who are going to cause some poor boys a lot of trouble, wave as they strut past my desk.

“Bye, ladies.”

It takes everything I have not to get up and shoo them out the door. Glancing at the clock, I have four minutes until I usually trek up the stairs and slip into Mariah’s room while she’s getting her lunch. On most days, I’d slide my phone out of my pocket and see what my inbox looks like. Today, I slip it in my desk.

I toyed with deleting the app last night. Machlan pointed out there’s a chance she could message me and if I answered that, I wouldn’t be out of line. So, I didn’t. But I haven’t checked it since the parking lot of Peaches.

My hands undergo a quick sanitizing with some gel. I’m getting up to go upstairs when I see Ollie head away from the cafeteria. Puzzled, I go to the hallway and watch him take a long drink from the fountain. The clock ticks to ‘go time,’ but my feet remain in place.

“Hey, Ollie. Can you come in here a minute?”

He spins around, looking surprised. “Sure, Mr. Gibson.”

Stepping by me, the same tattered shirt he wore on Friday hanging from his thinning frame, he stands next to a bust of President Kennedy.

“It’s none of my business,” I say. “But why aren’t you in the cafeteria?”