Page 128 of Down Bad

“Maybe I had your hot mechanic pegged down all wrong,” my sister says after a while. “I’ll give him a chance. Cross my heart. Especially if you really are doing the nasty with him.” She lowers her voice. “Also … are you seriously letting me win at chess? What the actual hell, Wyatt?”

I blink at her, speechless.

Would anything else like to come at me today? There’s a line.

Then the three of us are smack dab in the middle of the busy restaurant, occupying an island of silence as Diego sips coffee and takes one contemplative bite of crepe at a time, Connie scarfs hers down like she’s storing up for winter, and I’m drawing shapes on my plate with my butter knife through the maple syrup.

And we are still getting glances.

Curious ones. Excited ones. Women whispering to friends and looking over at us, writing our fan-fics before our eyes. Flower boy and the mysterious newcomer to town. Unless the sleuths already worked out who he is, roping Lottie and Marcos into the gossip. They’re probably already plotting out our wedding. Or taking bets on which of us is the top.

I don’t have to be in on any of the gossip groups.

Sundays were already the worst without being the subject of the whispering and peeping.

“I’m not sure what to be more pissed about,” says Connie after a sip of her orange juice. It’s the first thing she’s said since we sat down and ordered. “That you think I’m that bad at chess, or still think I’m the detention-getting troublemaker I was in high school who can’t get their life together and needs ‘wins’ in life.”

I guess she was listening at the front door a lot longer than I thought. Why she chose not to say anything until now, I can only guess the sight of Diego was enough to wipe her brain earlier.

It’s anything but wiped now.

“Guess that’s just family for you,” she mumbles. “Always stuck seeing the younger, unrefined versions of each other. Never the … vastly improved … mature … capable adults we become. Mom and Dad probably look down on me the same. They’d be gagged if they saw how well I’m doing. Do you even know how well I’m doing? Or am I still just your sister who couldn’t hook a doctor ‘cause he was too busy poking the blonde at the front desk?”

“The fuck?” grunts Diego. “You were with some doctor who cheated on you? For real? What an asshole.”

“Almost married the bastard, too. Mom was over the moon.” She shakes her head. “Then she sorta blamed me. In a nice way. She didn’t mean to. But she did. Thought I was repeating my bad teenage habits at the ripe age of thirty-something. She can’t let go of the old me any more than my little brother apparently can.”

“Connie …” I try.

“You leave your knights undefended,” she says, “and always sacrifice your bishops way too soon when it could’ve cost you just a pawn. No checkmating me for three months? Really? I basically already knew you were letting me win. Just didn’t wanna believe you’d also feel the need to coddle my sensitive ego like Mom does.”

“That wasn’t what I was doing. I was just—”

“No way! Miss Becky? Yes, I’m in town! Hug me!” Connie’s out of her seat. “Are the boys with you? Show me to the boys!” And off she goes to see her Becky, leaving me and Diego at the table.

He takes a sip of his coffee, sets it down, then glances at me.

I’m already looking at him like I’m waiting for something.

He goes for another sip.

“I didn’t mean I don’t want you to be my boyfriend.”

He stops at the sound of my words.

I cringe. What the hell am I saying? “I-I mean … I wasn’t saying I do, either. I know you’re … only here for now. Leaving the second that house is sold. I just … I just meant that … that currently we’re not boyfriends. Like … literally. Literally not boyfriends.”

“Alright.”

I shut my eyes and face forward. I’m not making this any better.

“Well, at least I came.”

I pop my eyes open and look at him. “Huh?”

“When you sent your SOS.” He’s holding his coffee again, sips it, then eyes me. “I came. Whatever that makes me, don’t care. I’m just the guy who comes over. When I’m needed. Wanted.” He looks ahead. “I’ll come anytime you send an SOS. Even if we’re nothing.”

That’s all he says. All he leaves me with.