turning to the glove box in hopes of finding an owner’s manual or registration I can snoop through. Just my luck—a red, lacy thong slips out and falls at my feet. I really don’t want to pick that up.
“That’s just great,” I mumble, staring at the tiny piece of lingerie nestled between my shoes.
“Probably Abby’s,” Hudson concludes. There’s no probably about it. A BIC pen pops into my field of vision. I glance to my left and meet Hudson’s stare.
“Make-shift tongs. You know … for the …”
“Thong,” I finish for him, mouth forming a wry smile.
He chuckles and shrugs. I take the pen as he pulls into the intersection, and I cringe as I scoop up the undies with the tip of the ballpoint and fling them back into the glovebox. I slam it shut and drop the pen into the cup holder between Hudson and me.
“Caleb and I used to be pretty tight,” he says. I get the sense that he’s trying to transition away from what just happened to make me more comfortable. It’s sweet.
“Oh yeah? Did he come visit you a lot over the summers or something?” Caleb has been in my grade and in most of my classes since kindergarten, so I know he hasn’t lived anywhere else.
“I spent a lot of summers here. Actually…” As if I can sense him looking at me, I turn to meet what looks a bit like a boy blushing.
“What?” I’m totally blushing too.
His head swivels to glance at me then the road a few times before tucking his full bottom lip under his front teeth.
“You know what? Never mind.”
What he doesn’t know is that I’m like a police canine, and what he’s just done is the equivalent of dangling a bag of dope in front of my nose. You can’t almost tell me things and then just … not!
I slap at his arm, the first time we’ve touched since--well, we seriously touched!
“Ow!” He rubs his bicep for a moment and when our eyes meet, I give him my famous glare. “What? That hurt!”
“It so did not, and you cannot get away with that, Mr. Hudson Walsh!” My lecture draws out that laugh that’s been clawing at my heart little by little.
He slows in the left turn lane at the next stoplight, and when we stop I shove at him lightly. His hand reaches over quickly and grabs mine before I can completely recoil and we both freeze to stare at the sloppy way our hands have become tangled, fingers flexing in battle as if this is a major thumb-wrestling bout.
His eyes flick to meet my gaze, and my body feels as if someone has poured glitter down my spine.
“Okay, well … ” He relaxes his grip, gently weaving his fingers around mine in a more natural and dizzying way. “I’m kind of surprised that you don’t remember me.”
Words fail me, so I offer a dented brow begging for an explanation. A green arrow draws his attention and my hand falls flat on the console where he abandons it.
“Do you remember the birthday party at Roll and Bowl?”
I sit back and conjure up the bits and flashes that I have from that day. Caleb turned ten, and it was the first time I really noticed that he was cute--that any boy was cute, really. I know Shay was there, and her and I spent most of our time skating, trying to choreograph something to the Maroon 5 song we were obsessed with at the time.
“I can see you need a little help,” he says through a chuckle.
“I’m sorry. I remember it, but barely.” The blank spots are where he should be, I’m guessing, and I feel bad. I’m scanning my memory of the various faces but his just isn’t showing up. A seven-year difference for a guy is really like comparing two totally different people.
“I’ll give you a clue,” he says, just as the Mustang rocks over the pitted curb that leads into the Shoney Meadows Tennis Center. A glimmer tickles my gut as we pull in and park. A few older couples are volleying balls back and forth, but most of them pause and stare our direction when the Mustang roars. He kills the engine.
Hudson lifts his left knee up against the door and shifts so his elbow rests on the steering wheel. His smile is tight, maybe a little guilty. We came here after roller skating that day. The sun was going down, and it was warm out—the