Nothing But Trouble (Malibu University 1)

She shrugs. “I could eat.”

Alice

“Hope you like seafood,” Reagan mentions as we get out of the Jeep in front of a restaurant called Neptune’s, a cute open-air restaurant made to look like a shack with picnic tables and a very long line of people waiting to order.

“I do. But I’ll try anything,” I tell him as we take our place in line.

Skepticism crosses his face, closely trailed by bewilderment. “You’ll try anything?” he repeats. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard a girl say that.”

The arched, disapproving brow cannot be helped. It’s an automatic reaction when men get stupid. “Welcome to the twenty-first century where shit like that no longer flies. I didn’t peg you for a meathead.”

He rolls his eyes. “I’m not, believe me. Nothing’s hotter than a woman that knows what she wants and goes after it. But I honestly have never heard a woman say she’ll try anything, especially when it comes to food.”

I shrug, satisfied with his answer. “Why not, right?”

“Why not?” he repeats. He’s back to disbelief. “That’s another thing girls never say. You’re full of surprises, Jersey girl.”

“What’s the harm in trying? I mean…you may never get another chance. Carpe diem and all that stuff.”

He shoots me a strange look. I’m about to ask him what it means when the person in front of us steps aside. It’s our turn to order and we both go for the fish tacos, Reagan’s meal three times the size of mine. He hands the guy behind the counter a fifty-dollar bill and when I argue and try to hand him money, he body-blocks me and murmurs, “I don’t like eating alone. You’re doing me a favor.”

I highly doubt it, but I’m too tired to argue.

Carrying our food, he leads me to a table on the outer edge of the lot and sits on the tabletop. “Up here. You’ll see why.” When I’m slow to move, he smiles down at me and pats the spot next to him.

I get up on the table next to him, park my crutch against the side, and what I see next takes my breath away. A galaxy of flickering lights spilled against a patchwork of midnight blue and gunmetal gray. From our modest perch, we have a perfect view of the darkened coastline.

“Wow.”

“I know. Almost as awesome as it is during the day.”

“I’ll have to come back with my camera,” I say and bite into my fish taco. Eyes rolling to the back of my head, I moan. “Almost better than sex,” I mumble with a mouthful and wipe the sauce that drips out the corner of my mouth with my napkin.

“If food is almost better than the sex you’ve had, then you’ve been having it with the wrong people.”

Uhhh…Am I discussing my sex life with him? No. Not happening. Should I tell him I haven’t been having any other than with myself? Definitely not. I let his comment slide away nice and easy. Silence is my friend and I embrace it. The inevitable strange awkwardness happens for a while, but I ride it out until he ends it.

“Why did you say you may never get another chance earlier? That was kind of dark.”

I shrug casually. Little does he know there’s nothing casual about this topic for me. “We all assume we have a long life ahead of us, but you never know.”

His face twists, so I elaborate.

“My mother died at twenty-nine of ovarian cancer.” His face falls, his taco suspended in mid-air and all but forgotten in his hand. “My grandmother died of the same thing at forty…” I made peace with the knowledge that life is fragile and temporary long ago. It hardly fazes me to discuss it. “Time is a gift, not an entitlement.”

He puts down his taco and swallows, face wrecked by sympathy for me. Sympathy’s the one thing I have no use for.

“I’m sorry,” he says in a low raspy voice.

At fifteen, Nancy sat me down and explained that it could very well be hereditary and I would have to get regular checkups. It’s then I decided that I wasn’t going to waste one precious minute––whether there were a million of them or less. That I wouldn’t let an expiration date hanging over my head rule my life.

“It’s why I live my life without shame or regret. As long as I’m not willingly hurting someone else, I do what pleases me.” I take another huge bite of my taco. “Eat what pleases me.” And smile around it. I’d like to add fuck who pleases me but that would be a lie.

Staring at my mouth, Reagan reaches out, and before I have a chance to move away, he wipes a spot of sauce from the corner with his index finger. Then he sticks the same finger in his mouth and sucks it clean.