“Um… hi. Just two?” Another smile.

“Depends. What time do you get off?” I ask her. “My buddy here wants to know.” I slap Oscar on the shoulder and know he’s not going to argue. He’ll get her a whole lot easier if I help him than he would on his own.

“An hour.” The blonde looks at Oscar, me, then back at Oscar again.

Which means that’s probably when the diner slows down, leaving only Delaney and the cook. It’s a Thursday night and I know they’re busier and staff heavier on the weekends.

“We’ll be here,” I tell her.

“Okay.” She leads us to our seat.

“Fuck yeah,” Oscar whispers in my ear, and I fight the part of me that wants to tell him it’s ridiculous. That all of it’s fake and not important and that he’ll forget her name in a week, but since I’m an illusion, too, I have no room to talk to him.

“Have a good meal,” she says before walking away.

I turn and catch her looking at Delaney, fanning herself and then nodding toward us. Delaney’s eyes follow hers. When she sees me, her feet plant to the floor, grow roots like an old tree, growing for all of eternity.

I nod. Smile. Game on, I want my look to tell her.

We sit in the booth and Oscar mumbles about the blonde and it being his lucky night, but I keep my eyes on Delaney. Watch her as she fills glasses of water. See her shiver and wonder if she knows my eyes are on her. Then as she comes toward me, there’s this confused look on her face. Maybe it’s not her who’s confused, but me. All I know is that I can’t read her, but she keeps coming and I know whatever it is, she’s going to play through it.

Good for her.

“Coffee?” Her voice cracks slightly. It’s still that sweet, girl-next-door tenor that tells the story that she’s always been good. That she’s fresh and innocent. If it weren’t for the ghosts in her eyes, I might believe it.

“Hot chocolate,” I reply.

The corners of her mouth tilt down slightly and her face tenses. She knows I’m trying to keep her on her toes. This might not be as easy as I thought.

“Whip cream?” she tosses back.

“Obviously.”

She turns to Oscar and he blurts out, “You are really fucking beautiful. Like unreal beautiful.” His tongue is practically hanging out of his mouth and I bite back a groan. Idiot.

“Simmer down, Romeo,” I tell him, and then look at Delaney. “You’ll have to excuse my friend. He loses his head in front of beautiful girls.”

This is the part where I wait for her to smile at me like the hostess did. Maybe watch as her cheeks turn pink or she shyly looks toward the ground. When none of that happens, I wait for the anger. For her to give me hell for being a sexist pig, but she doesn’t do either of those things.

She laughs.

It takes her a few seconds to settle down. Annoyance slowly rumbles through me while I wait to see what she’s going to say next.

“Really? Did you guys plan that before you came in?”

I shrug. “Maybe we did, maybe we didn’t. Doesn’t hurt for you to know the score up front, though. I came back here for you.”

She gasps and I’m not even sure if she realizes she did it. She pulls that bottom lip into her mouth and I know she didn’t plan on my words.

I don’t turn away, waiting to see how she’s going to reply next, and when I see her face pale slightly, I wonder if I screwed up. If I overstepped some invisible walls this girl has built for some reason.

Surprising me, she recovers quickly. “I’m sorry you wasted a trip.” She points to the menus in front of us. “While you look that over, I’ll go grab your drinks.”

“You know her?” Oscar’s playing with the sugar container.

“Maybe.”

“I hate it when you answer with that cryptic shit.” And then he laughs. “Though I guess I’d want to keep her to myself too.”

I don’t pretend to laugh. I’m running over our conversation in my head and trying to figure out how I’m going to swing it to my favor, when she comes back. I take the hot chocolate and order the pancakes again. Oscar gets a burger and soon we’re eating and some of the customers are starting to thin out.

Questions I have no business wondering climb the wall surrounding me before plunging over the other side, echoing as they go: Did, did, did, did, she, she, she, she, read, read, read, read, it, it, it, it? Before they smash to the concrete below.

The hostess gets off work, and Oscar tells her to sit with us. Her name’s Jamie and he tosses game at her that she gobbles up.

The whole time I’m watching Delaney, trying to ignore my question as it goes for the wall again. “I’ll be right back,” I tell them. She’s at the counter by herself. Only two other customers are in the place and the cook’s safely in the kitchen.

“You owe me a night out,” I tell her as I lean against the counter.

“How do you figure that?” She doesn’t look at me when she talks.

Because I want you out of my system. “You were going to say yes to the party. I could see it, but your brother came chomping at my ankles.”

At that she whips around. “How is it my fault you got scared away? And you’re not going to get me to go anywhere by insulting my brother.”

I shake my head. “Not scared. I was showing respect. That should earn me some points, right? As should honesty. I told you up front I came back for you. Come on. You’re obviously new to town. Let me show you a good time.”

Her shoulders slump, like my words sucked the air out of her. “Believe me, it’s not a good idea.”

I step closer, lean over the counter so my mouth is next to her ear. “It’s a very good idea. What time do you get off? I’ll come back for you.” I’m always up front with a girl. She’ll know exactly what this is about.

I feel the blast of ice shooting from her. See it in the set of her shoulders and the anger in her jaw. She’s fighting for composure before she talks—working through what she wants to say or maybe trying to fight the words back, swinging at them with a bat and hoping to hit a home run so they can’t get to her again.

“I’m not sure why I’m surprised that you’re like every other guy in the world. I thought…” She shakes her head. “I don’t know why I thought you might be different. If you’ll excuse me, I need to get to work.”

Shame takes root in my bones, breaking some as it travels through my body. I don’t know what I’m ashamed about either. Why it matters what this girl thinks. If it’s her that’s making me feel this way or because I know if Ash can look down on me, he wouldn’t think I have the power to hold the world up anymore. If anything, I’m crushing it. I have been for the past four years.

My feet carry me back to the table. The whole time I’m telling myself it doesn’t matter. None of it does. It’s not like I’ve never pissed off a girl before. It’s not like I haven’t pissed off a lot of people or they haven’t done the same to me.

“Let’s get out of here,” I tell Oscar. He looks surprised but follows Jamie out of the booth when she stands up.

“What are you guys doing tonight?” she asks.

“What do you want to do?” Oscar replies.

“My friends are having a party over by the campus, if you guys want to go.”

“You know it,” he says.

I don’t tell him I’m not going and wait while Jamie gives him the address. We don’t talk as he gets in the car, but then he starts going off about how lucky we got and though the waitress didn’t come through, it’s not like there won’t be girls at the party.

I pull up in front of the house and already hear the music pulsing and pumping on wind as it hits the car. I should go in there. Part of me wants to go in there, but it feels just like last night. And the night before and the night before.

Tonight, I can’t do it.

“I have something to do,” I tell Oscar.

He couldn’t care less. “More for me,” he says before laughing and nudging my arm. He’s out of the car and heads toward Jamie, who’s waiting for him.