Fall

“He just writes shit?” she repeated. “That’s your reason?”

Yeah, I should have come up with a better job for the guy, but it felt wrong to completely lie to her, especially when I was literally messaging her from the bathroom and hiding my identity. Damn, my life should be a movie. What I’d said was true, I had done screen writing and it was fun, I just liked acting more.

“New question.” I taped another box. “What’s he look like?”

Pris’s fingers fumbled with the box. “He, uh, has dark hair.”

“As well as half the population of Seaside. I need details. Does he look funny? Crooked teeth? Weird hairy mole by his mouth? Long nose hair? Come on I want the gory details.”

“Where do you come up with this stuff?”

“I have a scary creative mind,” I answered honestly. “I can’t help it, so?”

“So…” She slowly placed the stuffed animals in the box. “I haven’t actually seen his face.”

“So he’s a predator,” I joked.

A stuffed animal went soaring by my face.

“You missed.”

Another animal followed, hitting me directly in the balls.

“Good shot,” I wheezed, thanking my lucky stars that the bear wasn’t giant size and packing something sharp.

“He’s… nice.” She shrugged. “I need nice in my life.”

The hell she did. She deserved wild. She deserved crazy. She deserved an adventure. Nice? There was no room for nice in a relationship with a girl like Pris. A man should always be a gentleman, but nice? Nice meant boring, nice meant safe, nice meant two point five children with a white picket fence and a dog named Spot.

Nice be damned.

“I don’t know, we’re just talking, it’s not like anything would happen.” She scooted the full box over to me. “It’s just nice—” Okay, I was officially going to blot out that word from my vocabulary. “—to have attention, I guess. I don’t know, does that sound stupid?”

“No.” I grabbed the box and taped it. “It makes me want to murder every guy you ever went to high school with, but it doesn’t sound stupid.”

“Please.” She rolled her eyes. “I’ve done my fair share of dating, believe me.”

My blood pressure just skyrocketed. I laughed. “Oh yeah? How many boyfriends?”

“Twelve.”

The box began to crush beneath my hands.

“Kidding.” She winked. “I’ve had four boyfriends, only one of them tried to have sex with me and that didn’t end well for him.”

“So you cut him?” I taped the box and set it far, far away from me so I wouldn’t inflict damage on it again. Poor bears.

“Um, no, people don’t cut people here. It’s Oregon. We’re about peace.”

“So you hugged him to death?”

“Jaymeson!” She laughed and threw a pen at me. I ducked and returned her smile. “I just told him no.”

“And it worked?” I was stunned.

“Well… no.” She fidgeted with her hair. “But it gave me enough time to knee him in the balls and run away.”

“That’s my girl.”

And… utter silence.

“Anyway…” She laughed. “I think that’s all the questions for today. My schedule says I have you tomorrow too, right? We only have five more boxes, so we should be done by noon.”

“Great.” But it wasn’t. I was half-tempted to break into the church and unpack every damn box just so I could keep talking to her.

There I go again with the talking.

Beer. I needed more beer.

“Why don’t I give you a ride home then?” I suggested.

“I hope I’m not interrupting?” A knock sounded on the door. An elderly woman walked in. “Honey, I’m having problems with that old copy machine again, you think you could help me?”

“Sure, Stella.” Pris smiled.

“I can, um, wait?” I offered.

“Nah, Stella can give me a ride when she’s done, the office closes at three anyway.”

“Oh.” I nodded and forced a smile. “Right. Well, I’ll just see you… later?”

“Yup!” She walked past me and looped her arm with Stella’s.

I gave my best cool indifferent shrug and walked out of the room and down the hall, hating that the laughter from Pris brought more of a smile to my face than the promise of beer and more food.

Chapter Sixteen

Priscilla

“He sure seems like a rogue, that one.” Stella filed her nail and smiled. “He’s so… foreign.”

I rolled my eyes. “He’s British. He doesn’t count.”

“How so?” Stella stopped filing.

“Because…” I fidgeted with the top of the copy machine. “He’s been living in the States for a long time and he doesn’t say funny words.”

“Funny words?” Stella snorted. “Dear, what in heaven’s name are you talking about?”

“You know.” I slammed the machine shut. “Funny words like loo or…” Yeah, that was all I had.

“He’s quite handsome.”

“So was Satan, and look what happened to him.” I smiled sweetly.

“All men fall.” Stella took a long sip of coffee. “Remember that. It doesn’t matter if they’re fat, skinny, British, black, white, Chinese, German—”