pointed out the windshield to a run-down pawnshop in front of the truck.
“What?”
“You don’t know what that is?” She grinned.
I looked back at the storefront. Just a tired shop. “Nope. What?”
She leaned over and whispered in my ear, “I ain’t through with you by a damn sight. I’ma get medieval on your ass.”
My eyes flew wide. “No fucking way.” I jumped out of the truck and stood in front of the pawnshop, examining the windows and sign. She climbed out after me.
“Is this…?” I asked in awe.
“Yup. The pawnshop from the gimp scene in Pulp Fiction.”
I grinned up at the yellow sign. “Wow.”
“I know.”
I knew the movie had been filmed in California, but it never occurred to me to look for the landmarks.
“Are there more?” I asked.
“Yeah. There’s the street where Butch runs over Marsellus. And the outside of Jack Rabbit Slim’s is actually a vacant bowling alley in Glendale. We could drive by that sometime if you want. Most of the landmarks are gone though. The restaurant from the Honey Bunny scene, the apartment where Vincent gets killed—all torn down.”
I furrowed my brow, but not because of the demolished landmarks.
This was the best date I’d ever been on. And it wasn’t even a date.
I looked at her, balancing on the balls of her feet off a concrete parking lot divider. She had no makeup on. Sweats. Hair in fucking curlers. Hell, she didn’t even change out of the shirt with the enormous lasagna stain on the front before we left the house. And she was a thousand times better than the drop-dead gorgeous yoga instructor from a few hours earlier.
Fun. Witty. Smart. Beautiful.
The cool girl.
And nothing that I could have.
TEN
Kristen
My cohabitation situation with Josh was on day five. I stayed in Mom’s empty beach house the two days he went to work. It wasn’t ideal. My inventory was at my house and I had to be there to get any work done. The commute was two hours. But he was right—I couldn’t be in my house alone at night. It just wasn’t safe.
Josh and I had developed a sort of routine. We ate almost every meal together, watched marathons of shows, took turns walking Stuntman, and did late-night food runs. I had planned to stay away from him as much as possible, but there was only the one TV in the living room and the coffee table was my unofficial office. And if we both needed to eat, it didn’t make any sense to do it separately. So we just kind of fell in together.
Every morning he’d patrol the yard for evidence of my creeper. It was seriously fucking hot. Then he’d make us eggs and we’d sit at the kitchen table talking until he had to get to work.
He had just come back over for another two-day stretch. I sat on the steps of the garage talking to him. I wore a tie-dyed shirt I’d made at summer camp, like, nine years ago with Sloan. I also wore the matching scrunchie. I’d been digging deep to maintain my homeless-chic wardrobe. It was becoming more and more necessary.
I liked him. I liked him a lot.
He was fun. When he left for his two-day shift, I missed him. Big-time.
This wasn’t good. I needed Tyler to come home.
Josh was telling me about a call he went on, and I zoned out watching him carve an ornate design into the side of a step. I loved that he worked with his hands. It was beyond sexy. I wondered how those hands would feel on my bare skin. Strong and rough.
I thought about that stupid piggyback ride so much you’d think it was foreplay. The press of those back muscles and the warmth of his skin against my breasts. The way he smelled. How easily he’d lifted me. I bet he could do push-ups with me sitting on his back. Then I imagined him doing push-ups over me while I lay on a bed under him.
God. I’m going straight to hell.
I stuck a finger in a tiny hole at the waist of my shirt and made a tear.
Tyler called. Coincidence? Or did he feel the threat from halfway around the world?
“I gotta take this,” I said.
The phone call was like an emergency broadcast test breaking into one of my favorite shows. I’d sit through it because I had to, waiting impatiently for it to be over so I could go back to watching what I was before the interruption.