“I know what I look like, Luke,” I snapped.
“Doesn’t sound like it to me, babe.”
I bucked again. “Get off.”
Luke didn’t move. “My Ma said it, your Dad said it. Jesus, even my Dad said it. You were always the prettiest one of that f**kin’ cat’s den. Why do you think they were all so goddamn mean to you?”
“Hardly,” I snapped. “I was fat and ugly, I had bad hair and I wore glasses for God’s sake.”
“You were never more than chubby, babe, not until you grew older and they had plenty of time to get under your skin. And you had beautiful hair, fantastic eyes and the best f**kin’ smile I’d ever seen in my life. You still do.”
I stopped struggling and stared at him mainly because he sounded like he meant it and I couldn’t believe that. Even though I couldn’t believe it, nothing about him was suggesting he was feeding me a line.
He went on. “Worse for them, you were smarter, funnier and nicer. People liked to be around you.”
Ho-ly crap.
He sounded like he meant that too.
“My Dad used to say that the man who got you would be the luckiest and unluckiest man alive because he’d have you for a lifetime but he’d also have to put up with them.”
All of a sudden, I was finding it hard to breathe, like I’d been kicked in the gut.
“Your Dad said that about… about… me?” I asked breathlessly.
“It was the only thing he and I ever agreed about.”
Okay, it was then I totally forgot how to breathe.
“Now let’s talk about the rest of the shit that came out of your mouth,” Luke continued.
Uh-oh.
I wasn’t even finished dealing with all he’d just said. I didn’t want to get into me blurting out that I’d had a crush on him since forever, I was a sure thing and that he’d won.
I was such a f**king dork!
Immediately, I said, “I need to brush my teeth.”
His eyes narrowed.
“No f**kin’ way,” he clipped.
“I need quiet space,” I tried.
He shook his head.
“Luke, you told me any time I needed something –”
“Quiet, Ava.”
I decided, from his deathly tone, it was prudent that I be quiet.
Luke stared at me while I mentally zipped my lips and then he started talking. “I’ve been straight with you since the beginning, something, I might add, you haven’t been with me. But I’ll be even straighter ‘cause it’s obvious you are just not f**kin’ gettin’ it.”
Oh no, not this again. Luke being “straighter”.
Ee-yikes.