Maine Squeeze (10 page)

I couldn't get those shirts folded quickly enough. As soon as I was done, I marched straight past him to Trudy's back office and knocked on the door. “Trudy? Could I maybe change my schedule around?” I asked.

“Sorry. No changes for the first month,” she said.

“The first
month
? Why?”

“People need routine. A restaurant needs routine,” she said.

Yes, but I need a routine that doesn't involve seeing Evan every day,
I thought. Couldn't she be more sensitive?

“Why? Is there a problem?” Trudy asked.

“Yes. No—it's fine,” I said. I closed her office door and went back down the hallway into the kitchen. Evan smiled at me as he walked past, carrying a tray of desserts out to the dining room.

Drop them,
I thought, staring at the tray.
Drop them
.

After the lunch shift, Sam, Erica, and I headed down to the Landing. I was glad to be getting out of Bobb's for a while, and away from Evan.

The three of us were going to our weekly book club meeting with Haley—at least that's what we said we were doing when anyone asked, and occasionally we did talk about what books we were reading. But in reality we were going down there to watch the ferry come in. Later on Friday afternoons was when it got crowded with tourists coming for the weekend. Haley and I had started out as kids, watching people get off the ferry in order to write stories about them. We played a game of making up details about their lives; she wrote stories about them and I did sketches.

Then when we got older it became part celebrity watch and part looking for hotties who might be coming to the island for the weekend. We could also see people cruising into the harbor on their sailboats.

Not that I was looking for a guy now—in fact, I hadn't been for the past year, or for last summer, either. But that didn't mean I couldn't look. I mean, help my
friends
look.

We called it our book club so that we had an excuse for being there every Friday.
Book
was an acronym for “boys on our kiss-list.” Okay, so we came up with that in the fifth grade and it sounds dumb now, but at the time? It was brilliant.

“Where are you guys going?” Blair asked when we didn't turn off on the road to our house. “Or am I totally lost?”

“We're going to the Landing,” Erica said. “Want to come along? It's time for book club.” I cast a sideways glance at Erica. I wasn't sure if I wanted to invite Blair, but it was too late now to take back the invitation.

Blair looked confused. “But I probably haven't read the book. What is it?”

Erica quickly explained what our book club was all about.

“I like the sound of this. But how about if we stop by the house and change our clothes first?” Blair suggested.

“I don't know,” Sam said. “See, I kind of like letting people know where we work. Just in case, you know, it's Orlando Bloom for real this time, and he starts wondering where he should go for dinner, and he looks at our T-shirts and voilà. He's at Bobb's.”

“You have it all planned, huh?” Blair teased.

“Anyway, we'll get all bogged down in changing, and then we'll miss the three o'clock, and we'll have to come back and change before we go back to work at four thirty …”

“Hey, say no more.” Blair held up her hands. “Let's go! My parents are going to be so impressed when I tell them I'm in a book club.” She grinned.

I'm sure Ben wondered why Haley and I were always there hanging out on Fridays, but we never told him the real reason, because that would ruin everything. We said it was our Friday-afternoon book club. “Then why don't you have books with you?” Ben had asked more than once.

“We remember it all—we just read the book this week. What do we need the book for?” Haley said.

Not very convincing, but he didn't push the issue. He was nice, and trusting, like that.

Last summer Evan had been a little more suspicious. He'd always asked, “What book is it this week?” and I'd have to come up with something, and then if it was something he'd already read and I hadn't, I'd have to read it just to keep from blowing our cover. Yes, our cover
was
that important. It was a fun game for us that we didn't want to see end.

Evan had even pulled up a chair once last summer and tried to butt in on our “meeting.” Samantha politely told him it was a
female
book club.

When we got down to the Landing, Blair and Erica went over to Haley's window, while Sam and I sat down on one of the wooden benches facing the dock.

“So that was pretty uncomfortable at work today,” Sam commented, loosening the laces on her sneakers.

“Your feet?” I asked.

“Um, no,” she said. “You and Evan. There's so much
tension
between you guys—it's like painful to watch sometimes. Are you going to try to switch shifts, so you don't work with him so often?”

“I tried, but Trudy said she doesn't want anything to change for a month. She's anti-change. Which is odd, because lobsters get to molt, so shouldn't we be able to?”

“Molting isn't your problem, Coll. I mean, did you even
tell
Ben yet?” Sam asked.

“Tell him?” I asked.

“About Evan being here this summer.” She slid her sunglasses down her nose and looked at me over the top of the frames. “Oh, no. You guys haven't talked about it, have you?”

I shifted uneasily in my chair. “Well … no, not exactly.”

I was overdue on a couple of talks.

Evan and I hadn't had The Talk, or any talk, yet. Maybe there wasn't all that much to say, I thought. We were together … and now we're not. We were totally crazy about each other … and now we're not. We were in love … or so I thought.

It was all sounding like bad poetry. That was what bad poems were about: lost love, love in general. Of course, there were good poems about that subject, too. I'd had plenty of time to find them in my
Norton Anthology of Poetry
when Evan was not calling me.

And yes, I was procrastinating about telling Ben about Evan, and about the fact he was back and working at Bobb's with me. It wasn't as if I'd never said
anything
. I mean, before we went out the first time, I'd told him I'd had a couple of boyfriends before him. Of course, I'd focused more on Walter, my second grade sweetheart, and Clifford, who took me to our freshman winter formal.

“Walter and Clifford?” Ben had laughed. “You're making this up, right? Freshman winter formal? So what does that mean—down jackets and black ski pants?”

“It was a
very
sexy evening. Actually. Very sexy,” I insisted.

“Not exactly?” Sam was saying now. “Meaning what?”

“Well, I did tell Ben that there were lots of, um, familiar returning employees at Bobb's.”

Samantha raised her eyebrow. “
Familiar?
Is that seriously what you said?
Familiar?
How about extremely—”

“I know, I know,” I interrupted her. “Slightly more than familiar.” I tried to kick a rock with my sandal, but I ended up hitting it with my toe instead. “There just hasn't been a good time to talk to him about it yet.”

“Ahem. You've spent at least a couple of nights hanging out with Ben this week,” Sam pointed out. “Like last night. You've had time.”

“Oh, sure,
time
. But not … the right time.”

Sam laughed. “Listen to you—‘the right time.' There's never going to be a
good
time! Just get it over with, because if you don't, he's going to hear about it from someone else, and that'll be really bad.”

“I know. I know I have to tell him. It's just … I don't want it to be awkward. I don't want him to feel threatened. That's why I have to pick the perfect time. I know—why don't you come with me when I talk to him?” I said.

“Yeah. Right,” Sam said. “
That's
what I want to do.”

“Why not?”

“I don't even know Ben yet. Do you know how awkward that would be? And why would I be there for such a personal conversation?”

“Because you're nosy?” I suggested.

“What are you being nosy about now?” Haley dropped into a chair beside me and handed us both fudge bars. “Make it quick, I only have a ten-minute break. As soon as everyone gets off Moby, I've got to run back.”

“Oh, nothing,” Sam said. “Just talking about some people at work.” I knew she was covering for me so I wouldn't have to tell Blair and Haley what a coward I was being, which was awfully nice of her. Haley would be mad if she thought I was hiding
anything
from Ben.

“So I was wondering something. How come you don't work at Bobb's?” Blair asked Haley.

“It's kind of dumb. But my mother has this feud going with Trudy and Robert. I can't even remember how it started, but she'd disinherit me if I ever worked there. Not that there's anything to inherit,” Haley said.

“So about this club. Have any of you ever actually met a celebrity getting off the ferry?” Blair asked as we watched the boat approaching.

“I met a senator once,” Haley said. “That was pretty cool.”

“Oh, yeah,” Blair teased. “Bet he was a real hottie.”

“She,” Haley said. “And no.”

We all laughed.

“Speaking of hotties, you know who's really cute?” Blair took a sip of water. “That Evan guy.”

That Evan … guy
. It was weird to hear someone else talk about him that way. Was Blair interested in him? Should I tell her that we'd gone out? Or should I just warn her about what a jerk he could be?

Blair and Evan … if they got involved, I wouldn't be able to handle it, I realized. Why hadn't I thought of that before I asked her to live with us? I mean, I knew none of my close friends would date him … but what if Blair did?

“Colleen went out with him last summer,” Erica said before I could say anything myself. Because I was just sitting there having an anxiety attack and letting my Fudgsicle melt.

“Yeah, they had a
thing
. A pretty serious thing, actually,” Sam added while I rubbed at the melted chocolate with a napkin.

“Oh,
really
.” Blair gave me what seemed like a look of newfound respect. I smiled awkwardly. “A thing? Cool. So, what's he like? How long did you guys have this … thing?” She laughed.

“Um, well.” I wondered how much I should tell her. We'd only met a couple of days ago, so I didn't feel comfortable going into complete detail. “He's … well, he
can
be … fun,” I said. That was pretty vague. “We went out for a month or so.”

“No, it was longer than that, wasn't it?” Erica said. “Two months.”

“Yeah, I guess. But then summer ended and he went home, and so … you know.” I shrugged.

“No point keeping up a long-distance relationship,” Blair said. “That's exactly how I feel about things.”

I smiled. It wasn't exactly how
I'd
felt, but whatever. I really didn't feel comfortable talking about Evan with her. And even worse, now Blair knew about me and Evan, while Ben still didn't. That wasn't cool. What if it got back to Ben from her? Or what if Haley mentioned it? They were friends; they'd talk like that. But she knew I wanted to be the one to break the news, or at least I hoped she did.

The ferry pulled up and we all watched as first several cars drove off it, and then a varied collection of middle-aged-looking men and women strolled off the ramp and onto the dock. Small children screamed and raced each other to the end of the dock and were chased by their parents. A few teenaged boys were there, but they were boys we knew from the island—boys I knew nobody either would be, or should be, interested in.

In other words, no prospects.

“See you guys later!” Haley jumped up as she saw someone approach the takeout window.

I smiled as I saw Ben helping an older woman walk carefully from one surface to another. He was carrying her luggage for her, too.

“You know what? Out of everyone?” Blair pointed toward Ben with her red straw. “
That's
the best-looking guy here.”

I cleared my throat. Did we have the same taste in guys or what? “Blair? That's my boyfriend. Ben. You met him at the house the other night. Remember?”

“Oh, my gosh—I'm sorry. You're right—I didn't recognize him in his uniform. Sorry,” Blair said. But she kept looking at him—staring, in fact.

He walked right up to where we were sitting. “Hey, guys. How's it going?”

“Good,” I said, looking up at him and smiling. He leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. “How was work?”

“Crazy, as usual on Fridays,” Ben said. “How's the book club?”

“We were just finishing up our discussion,” Sam said. “Metaphors, similes. You know.”