handspring. His fingertips whisper across my forearm, and my eyes close. The low hum of cars passing by outside seems to calm my rapid heartbeat. My hand reaches for him without my permission, no matter how wrong I know hooking my finger into his jeans pocket will be. Logan leans closer, like he knows what I’m about to do, and I’m pretty sure I’ll never be able to breathe again when I open my eyes and see how he’s looking at me.
And wouldn’t you know it, that’s the moment Dan realizes he has no idea how to run a cash register.
“Dude!” he yells from the front of the store. “How do I get this S-O-B to open again?”
Logan clears his throat and steps back. “I’ll be right back.”
When he leaves, I fan my face, then lay both palms on my warm cheeks. Well, that didn’t take long. I haven’t even been here a full five minutes, and I almost mauled him.
What’s wrong with me? One second, I’m concerned about whether or not someone will see my name in his phone contacts, and the next, I want to strangle Dan for interrupting what could have been the hottest, nerd-boy kiss of my life. I have a boyfriend. A boyfriend who wouldn’t like me kissing another guy. Probably.
Logan’s voice drifts through the door from the front counter. “What did you do to it?”
“I didn’t do anything. It hates me, that’s all,” Dan says, and then it sounds like he slams his fist on the buttons. The register makes a lot of dinging sounds, and then there’s a strange noise like whurrrrr, tick, tick.
I might be here for a while.
…
I end up on the floor surrounded by comic books, having opened the nearest box and rifled through it. I could seriously live here. All I would need is some water and maybe some of that dehydrated astronaut food.
I suddenly get the feeling I’m being watched and look up. Logan is leaning against the frame of the open door.
“Looks like you’re having fun.”
“Is this okay? I promise I’ll put them back in order.”
He laughs. “It’s fine.” He reaches up and turns a little white knob on a panel by the door. Music starts playing from an ancient speaker in the corner. The sound quality is kind of crackly, but I like it. The whole atmosphere seems to meld together into a piece of my own personal heaven. Vintage comics, music that hasn’t been autotuned to hell and back, and another person who likes all the same things to share it with? It doesn’t get better than this.
I realize the music isn’t coming from a CD but from a radio station when the deejay announces the next song.
“Keep listening, all you wonderful people stuck here for the summer. You’re lucky I’m one of you.” A kind of reggae song starts.
“Is that the college station?” I ask.
He plops down on the other side of my increasing wall of books. “Yeah. You listen to it?”
“Not really. You were listening to it last night in the car.”
“Oh, right. I have my own show this summer so I’m trying to make sure I don’t copy any of the other personalities.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal, but I can tell he’s proud of the fact.
“Wow, cool. Did you have to apply to NU for that?” I pull out another comic as casually as possible, but I really want to bury my face in it.
“Kind of. I wanted to get started as soon as possible in the business so I went to the professor who’s in charge of the station and asked if I could help out over the summer. He gave me my own show. Figured I might be able to drum up interest from the high school kids. I doubt that will actually happen, but I didn’t want to tell him that.”
“Why don’t you think that’ll work?”
He shakes his head. “People don’t listen to the radio anymore. It’s all digital downloads, iTunes, and YouTube. Besides, it’s not like I have a loyal fan-base or anything.”
“I’m sure it’ll be awesome. When’s your show on? I’ll listen—it’s the least I can do.”
“It’s a nightly show from seven to nine.”
“That’s a good time spot, right?”
“Yeah, one of the best, actually. I have no idea why he let me have it.”
I watch his every move now. He stacks and unstacks the comics. He studies one cover, then moves onto another, trying his best not to glance at me. I know that’s