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“Can you ask Dylan to stop warning guys off, please?”
“I don't know, Claire. Are you going to keep asking out guys you barely know?”
“If I am, that isn't any of your business. I don't cock-blockyou.”
He laughs. “The guys who work at Brody's are good-time guys who can't offer you anything stable and predictable. You're better off staying away from them. They're not your type.”
And now my brother's calling me boring. Before last night, I might have believed Austin was simply looking after my best interests, and in his own way he is. But I'm starting to read between the lines. Because I want to put down roots and have a stable home life, people equate me with dull and boring. Staid, predictable, boring Claire.
But Sam gave me his number before he knew I was Austin's sister, and Dylan wanted to date me back in the day. And my friends certainly think I'm capable of letting go for a change.
“Thanks for the advice, but I can take care of myself.”
“Of course you can, Claire Bear.”
His tone is indulgent, as if he's humouring me.
“I can. So call your watchdog off, Austin. Or I'll tell Kara about the time you tried to steal that photo I took of her at Wet 'n' Wild.”
“You wouldn't.”
He doesn't sound so indulgent or fond of me now. I smile smugly. He knows I always keep a promise, especially when it's retribution for something he's done to piss me off.
“Wouldn't I?”
With that I hang up, satisfied that at the very least Austin will call Dylan and ask him to back off for a while.
***
“So, you talked to Austin?” Kara asks later that night as we sit at my small kitchen table eating a large pizza she brought over.
“I did.”
“And...” she says, gesturing impatiently for me to keep going.
“You know how I've always kind of hated Dylan?”
Kara rolls her eyes. “You didn't always hate him. At one point you liked him so much that you wanted to ask him out.”
“You remember that?”
“Of course I remember it. One minute, going out with Dylan was all you talked about, and the next, you'd made all Dylan talk off-limits because you'd suddenly decided he was the biggest jerk alive.”
“Didn't you ever wonder why I went from liking him to hating him at the drop of a hat?”
“Sure I did. But you refused to talk about it.”
“That's because...he turned me down.”
Kara was just about to take another bite of her pizza, but she stops with the slice halfway to her mouth and puts it back down, her eyes as wide as saucers. “Are you trying to tell me you actually asked him out?”
“Yes. Well, I told him my prom was coming up and mentioned how it would be cool if we went together.”
“And he shot you down?”
“Yeah.”
She reels off a few derogatory names for Dylan. “He has absolutely no taste in women.”
