two years had included some of my best work. Most of my costumes were homemade. Put together by hand and glue-gun, rather than bought online or in some random store.
“Harley Quinn?” he breathed.
“Yeah,” I laughed. “That was an easy one.”
“Not on your ass,” he smirked, still staring into my phone. “Those shorts are short.”
I chuckled as he tapped the screen, then pinched his fingers to zoom in on what I could only assume was my ass. Most of my outfits were rated PG, but I had to admit the Harley costume had been exceptionally slutty.
“You done?” I smirked. I put my hand out, pretending to be annoyed.
“Not yet.”
He punched a few buttons, and I heard the sound of a text-message being fired off. Somewhere in his pocket, his phone dinged. I tilted my head as Brett laughed.
“Sorry not sorry,” he said. “I had to have that one.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“Seriously though,” he said leaning back. “I need to tell you something important, so brace yourself.”
I raised an eyebrow, intrigued. Sipping my tea again, I cupped it in both hands. “Okay. Braced.”
“You’re the perfect girl,” Brett blurted immediately. “The girl of my dreams. The girl I’ve been looking for all my life.”
“Is that so?”
“You play games. You dress up. You go to Cons…” he said. “Right there you’re almost a ten.”
“Almost?”
“But then you code, too! You know Perl. You write Php scripts. You make most of your living online, doing the things you love.” He threw up his hands. “The things I love.”
“I play a mean game of Zelda too,” I chimed in. “If that helps push me towards that elusive ten.”
“See?”
“I’m halfway through my replay of the Ocarina of Time,” I smiled. “Still stuck at the lake. Haven’t caught the Hylian loach yet.”
Brett folded his hands together, his big arms flexing as he set them on the able. The combination of biceps and triceps stretched the sleeves of his shirt all the way to the max.
“Maybe you should invite me over,” he said slyly. “and we’ll catch it together.”
I looked down at the table for a moment, blushing shyly. Picking at one of the flaky, delicious donuts that Lou’s always baked daily.
“I— I want to, but…”
“Senan?”
A strange silence settled over our table, amplifying the background noise around us. We could hear people talking, chatting excitedly. The clatter of silverware against plates. Eventually I just nodded and shrugged.
“I could always bring him,” Brett said, his smile turning a little wicked. “That would be fun, especially for you. But when it comes to playing Nintendo, I’m pretty sure—”
“Tell me about his sister?”
The words just sort of tumbled past my lips. I blurted them more as a question than a statement, although I immediately regretted it. Brett looked suddenly uncomfortable.
“What’s wrong?”
“You should probably ask him about that,” he said evenly. “About Kylie, I mean.”
Kylie.
“O—Okay.”
“I mean, it’s not like it’s a secret,” Brett stumbled. “But it’s, well…”
“I get it,” I said. “It’s personal. And I want to ask him. He mentioned her, although not by name. And he sort of, well…”
“Well what?”
“He sort of used the past tense.”
Brett nodded thoughtfully, without saying anything. It only deepened the mystery.
“Is she…”
“No,” Brett said. “She’s still very much alive. He sees her just about every day, actually. Ander and I do our best, too.”
Relief flooded through me, for a girl I didn’t even know. My mind wandered to Senan, and the choice of words he’d used. All of a sudden I wanted to speak with him very badly.
“I’ll talk to him,” I said at last. “Tonight, maybe.”
“Well don’t wait too long,” winked Brett. “I want to hang out with you. No, scratch that. We’re going to hang out.”
I laughed softly. “Okay.”
“Promise?”
I nodded solemnly. “I promise.”
“Good enough,” he said, standing up. I watched as he slung his backpack over his shoulder, then stopped.
“By the way,” he said. “About your class…”
I glanced up at him from my seat, my tea still unfinished. “What about it?”
“Is it tough?”
My eyes dropped from his face to his chest, then down over the flat of his stomach. They lingered at his belt for a moment, then dropped lower still.
“I have a strong feeling you’re going to do really well,” I smirked, then sipped my tea again.
Thirty-Two
SENAN
The whole thing played out in slow-motion, as it always did, whenever I remembered it. There was no recollection otherwise. Almost like it had actually happened that way, instead of real-time.
“Look out!”
I remembered my sister’s scream, so loud and piercing it felt like it should shatter the windows outward. The