One Night Stand-In (Boyfriend Material #3) - Lauren Blakely Page 0,24

concede. “But my point, woman, is this.” I slap a hand on the table for emphasis. “We met in class, but you insisted on arguing about whether we actually met at the museum. It was this long, ongoing thing.”

“Because we met at the museum,” she says, laughing. “You yourself acknowledged we met there.”

I shake my head, digging in like the stubborn bastard I am. “Nope. We never exchanged names at the Pollock. Therefore, it was not an official meeting.”

She tosses her hands in the air. “See? You are exasperating. Why does it need to be official? We talked for ten minutes before your lacrosse buddy—the guy with red hair, Jimmy or whoever he was—rolled his eyes and pulled you away with an art is boring line or whatever.”

“Jimmy was the boring one. Which explains why I never stayed in touch with him. Anyway, Boring Jimmy pulled me aside before we exchanged names, which means that you and I didn’t officially meet till the graphic design class.”

She shakes her head, but she’s clearly amused. “It’s a wonder we were ever friends at all.”

What I wonder more about is what would have happened if we hadn’t fallen out of friendship.

But that’s the past, and it ought to stay where it is, since my present is just fine, thank you very much.

“Fine, we’ll agree to disagree over our first meeting. Just like we did back then,” I say with a smile as the waiter brings our drinks. We thank him, and then I clink my glass to hers, the sound drowned out by a ball toppling all ten pins somewhere nearby. When it quiets, I say, “To agreeing to disagree.”

“I’ll drink to that. Besides, I suspect if Harrison heard us arguing over where we met, he’d throw out our stuff too.”

“He’d definitely have grounds to,” I say, chuckling. “For a split second this morning, I did wonder whether this was all some big practical joke staged by Rowan.”

Her brow creases. “Like a setup for some reason? Or a prank?”

“Yes. But that thought lasted all of ten seconds. He’s not a prankster.”

“I thought the same thing for about the same amount of time. But Luna’s not like that either. It’s too much work.”

“Agreed. Rowan would never play that sort of joke, and if he was trying to get us to talk to each other . . .”

I trail off. Because if Rowan wanted me to reconnect with Lola for some reason, he’d just tell me to. He saves his energy for songwriting, Luna, and his volunteer work. Not for games. At least, not beyond Monopoly. I swing the conversation in another direction. “I wonder . . . if Harrison had thrown out our stuff—would Luna and Rowan have gone hunting for our things?”

Lola smiles, and it’s a knowing kind of grin. “Ah, that raises another question, though, doesn’t it?”

I know what she’s getting at. “Why do we both look after our brother and sister like they’re our kids?”

She taps her nose. “Yes, that one indeed.”

Because for all the bonding we did over the misery of our required business classes, for all our wonderfully meandering conversations about the meaning of art, the thing that connected us most was our shared background.

Or rather, the sense of responsibility we each came away with.

Different reasons. Same result. We look out for our younger siblings.

I take another drink of the beer, then set it down. “I guess some things never change, do they?”

Sighing, she shakes her head. “I wish they did, but I don’t know if they will. I don’t know how not to look out for Luna,” she says, and there are no barbs in her voice now. She doesn’t have to add the details I already know well.

When she was sixteen and Luna was twelve, her parents separated, headed straight for a split. But then they decided to go to therapy, and somehow they worked through their troubles. Except once they got back together, they became laissez-faire parents, ignoring their kids.

“You know what happened,” Lola continues. “My parents were all about themselves as a couple. Like, they could justify ignoring Luna because they needed to reconnect or have another mommy-daddy vacation. I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to be the one who was there for her, since they weren’t.”

“I know exactly what you mean.” I get it completely. I get her. My parents moved here from Brazil when I was five because my father landed a finance job in New York. He became a workaholic,