Between the Boys (The Basin Lake Series Book 1)

by Stephanie Vercier

  The next few days pass in much the same way as that first breakfast. Evan is always smiling and cooking for me and asking me about how I like my classes and if I’ve made any new friends. In return, I ask him the same, skirting around that night or Garrett. Even if our conversations come easy, maybe even bringing some laughter, they don’t feel very real or satisfying.

  And so I turn back to Garrett, desperately wanting to hear something real. At first I’d been afraid to talk to him, thinking he’d hear some sort of soft shake in my voice and know that I’d done something wrong. But as our calls to each other have increased, it’s gotten easier to shove those concerns away and to just feel the comfort in the sound of his familiar voice.

  He tells me about his teammates, about how he’d gotten the air knocked out of him at camp and slept for fourteen hours, how he missed his parents and me and that he was afraid for the future. He tells me the good and the bad, his dreams and his anxieties. His honesty about his life draws me back toward him and further from Evan who is only willing, or able, to talk about the superficial.

  And yet, I’m still desperate to know what Evan felt about that night. The questions that roll around in my head are numerous, and the answers I create for myself are almost always contradictory. All I want to know is what he truly, deeply feels about me, a question that even when posed to myself terrifies me.

  Wouldn’t it be easier to just avoid that and commit one hundred percent to Garrett? He’s a good guy, the type you read about in books and movies, honest, hard working, beloved son, small town sports hero and faithful boyfriend who never got kicked off of a team for drug use.

  He’s everything I should want.

  But sometimes Evan feels like everything that I need.

  And I still feel a thrill when I notice Evan’s car in his parking space, knowing that he’s home. If he’s over the stove, cooking up another dinner for us, my heart skips a beat, and I long to talk to him. I want to hear things beyond how his day was, but he guards himself against that with his smiles and funny stories, never giving me even a hint of something deeper, some sadness or disappointment or maybe even elation at having the spell broken between us and being glad to move on. But there is nothing of that high and low, just the sterility of the in-between.

  I long to push him to say more, to give me more, but I don’t.

  I can’t.

  Considering how guarded I’m being about my own feelings, I feel like I’ve got no right to.

  So, after we eat, I help wash up dishes and then excuse myself to my room to study, calling Garrett and hearing him say, “I love you Paige,” perhaps the only real thing I’ve heard all day.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  PAIGE

  First Day of Work

  I’m up early for my first scheduled day at Creek’s Coffee. It’s silly, but I’m even more nervous than I’d been before my flight to Charlotte or my first day at Well’s Creek College. Everything in this town and at school is new to me—it’s exhilarating but equally overwhelming at times, this being one of those times. Coming from such a small town, I’d known pretty much everyone that had come through the doors at Pamela’s. I knew that if I’d messed up an order, they’d be understanding because they knew me, Paige Kessel, the girl with two boy best friends, the girl from the track team, the girl whose mother teaches at our one and only high school. In Well’s Creek, I won’t have that luxury, and I’m scared that if I get an order wrong, that some man or woman that I’ve never met might yell at me or tell me I should be fired or find a new job.

  I’ve nearly worked myself up into a frenzy until I finally walk through the front doors and see Dean with his wide smile and feel relief. It’s not that Dean’s smile is responsible for relaxing me but rather that I’m finally here and can dig in. If anyone is going to yell at me, I might as well get it over with.

  I’m emboldened a bit more when Dean treats me like I’ve never worked in a coffee shop, telling me how to do things I’ve done a million times before. I feel like I could do half the stuff he’s trying to teach me with my eyes closed, so I know that everything is going to be just fine as long as I keep those nerves in check. When Dean gets flustered as more customers pour in and he’s still trying to teach me what I already know, I decide to speak up.

  “I’ve got this, Dean,” I say.

  He puts his hands up in surrender, and his smile disappears from his face, but I’m at least able to attend to the woman who’s been standing in front of us for like three minutes without even getting a “hello.” And I think I impress Dean a little when I make small talk with her while she waits, weaving in an apology and telling her it’s my first day and thanking her for her patience. It even earns me a tip.

  Eventually, the day gets more hectic with the ebb and flow of customers, a lot of them college students and a few I recognize from sight. I do end up having to ask Dean for help with the register, but that’s about it. He appears to be satisfied with my abilities and perhaps a little bit unsatisfied with his own. Somewhere along the line he asks me if I have a boyfriend, and I emphatically say yes. His eyes lose a bit of their shimmer for a moment before he flashes his smile again. By hour four, we’ve come to some kind of mutual respect, and he starts making fun of what he calls my “Northern accent,” and I give him just as much shit about his “Southern” one.

  With a half an hour to go, things really quiet down, and I’m just about to text Natalie about meeting her after my late class when a trio of guys walk in. Dean is on break, so it’s just me for the next fifteen minutes. I take my position in front of the register and put on a welcoming smile.

  “Well, hey there,” the first guy says in an overly familiar way. He’s tall, bearded and looking like he’s probably just out of college but doesn’t want to commit to a real job yet.

  “Hi, what can I get you?” I ask sweetly.

  “Hmm…” he crosses his arms and studies the menu and then turns to his friends. “Have you ever seen such a pretty girl working at one of these places before?”

  Oh, lord.

  One of his friends, just as tall but without a beard and looking slightly more professional, laughs. The other one, a bit shorter but with bigger muscles just kind of shakes his head like he’s embarrassed for the bearded dude and his lame attempt at flirtation.

  “What can I get you guys?” I ask again, wanting to get beyond the personal assessment of how cute I might or might not be and back to my job.

  “Man,” tall bearded guy says, “There are a lot of things I’d love for you to be able to get me.”

  “Dude,” shorter, muscled guy says. “Leave it alone.”

  “If you don’t want to order anything, you should probably just go.” I can hear the faint shake in my voice and feel the speeding of my heartbeat, and I just hope they don’t notice it and use it against me. Something like this would have never happened at Pamela’s, and I’m quite honestly having a hard time believing it’s even happening now.

  “I’d love your number,” bearded guy says. “Or your hand in marriage.” He laughs like it’s supposed to be funny. Even his more professional looking buddy sort of turns his head away.

  I’m about to tell him again that if he’s just here to make comments about me and not order coffee, he should probably go, but before I can, the door chimes and Evan walks in.

  He’s got a huge smile on his face and is wearing his usual cargo shorts with a pink polo shirt and of course flip-flops. He takes his sunglasses off, and I’m glad to see a friendly face.

  “Seriously, do you guys want coffee or not?” I ask this as quickly as I can, hoping to shut down the verbal harassment before Evan can hear what’s going on. I so want to be able to handle this situation on my own.

  “I’ll just have a small mocha latte,” muscle guy says.

  “And just a regular coffee for me,” friend number two adds.

  I flash a quick smile toward Evan who is standing at the other end of the counter, his arms crossed, seeming to enjoy wa
tching me in action and waiting until I have a free moment.

  “Okay, and you?” I look back to the bearded guy and really just want for him to tell me his coffee order or get the hell out of here.

  “If you agree to go on a date with me, then I’ll order something.”

  “I’m not going on a date with you,” I say, not even attempting to look toward Evan as the words leave my mouth.

  “Then I’m just going to have to stand here and look at that gorgeous body of yours until you finally relent.” Bearded guy steps back and looks me up and down. I don’t know if this is some kind of prank or dare or secret shopper setup to see how I’ll deal with it, but it’s beyond annoying, and I feel like a failure for being unable to shut it down because I know Evan is going to intervene. Accepting this reality, I turn slightly to my right.

  Evan is already less than a foot away from bearded guy. “What did you just say to her?” He’s the same height as my harasser, but somehow Evan looks bigger, taller, and his voice is strong and defensive.

  “Excuse me?” Beard guy takes a step back from Evan.

  “I asked you what you just said to her?”

  “Evan, I—”

  Evan throws his hand up at me, as if he’s telling me to shut up, and it throws me for a bit of a loop.

  “I was just making small talk… Jesus.” Beard guy takes another step back.

  “We don’t want any trouble,” his friend says.

  “What’s going on?” I turn to my side, and Dean is walking out from the back room.

  Great.

  “And where were you… Dean?” Evan says, pointing at Dean and his name badge. “This douche-bag over here was hitting on her like some kind of Neanderthal while you were taking a fucking break?”

  “Evan, you really need to stop.” I love him for coming to my defense, but he’s going one step too far, and I can see my job ending before my shift is over.

  “Who is this guy?” Dean asks me.

  “Yeah, who the fuck are you?” beard guy asks. “You can’t be her boyfriend with that faggot pink shirt of yours.”

  His friends are starting to pull him away, one saying, “So not worth it bro,” when a flash of anger crosses Evan’s features—he pulls his fist back and punches beard guy right in the middle of the face. I hear a crack and think he’s probably broken his nose.

  “Fuck!” beard guy yells.

  “You need to leave,” Dean seethes, picking up the phone like he’s going to call the police or something.

  I run around the counter. “Evan! Stop!”

  “Make them leave first,” Evan says to Dean, like he doesn’t even hear me. He’s pointing at beard guy and his friends.

  “We’re going,” muscle guy says while the other friend hesitates, like he wants to take a shot at Evan or something.

  “I’ll sue this fucking place to the ground!” Beard guy is yelling as his two friends guide him out of the shop.

  Evan is shaking his fist out, and Dean hangs the phone up.

  “You okay?” Evan turns to me, his eyes still awash with anger.

  I shake my head. No, I’m not fucking okay. You just broke a guy’s nose in front of my boss, and now I’m probably going to get fired.

  “You need to leave, right this very minute,” Dean says, somewhat frantically as a few more customers come in.

  Evan looks at me with a crooked grin, sort of like he can’t believe what this Dean guy is saying. “That asshole was harassing you, was he not?”

  “Evan, you need to go cool down,” I say, as kindly as I can.

  He looks at me like I’ve just stabbed him in the heart. “Oh, okay, because I was out of line there?”

  “Please just go,” I say, not wanting to tell him all the reasons why knocking a guy out instead of verbally asking him to leave is not always the best move, especially when it happens on my first day of work.

  “Okay, whatever.” He shakes his head, and I know he’s mad at me.

  “Evan…” I make a lame attempt to go after him, but he’s out the door so fast, and so I turn back to Dean who is looking at me with unmistakable disappointment.

  He doesn’t actually say anything to me, so I grab a bunch of napkins and wipe the small drops of blood left by beard guy off of the floor as discretely as I can. After washing my hands, I tend to the new round of customers that have come in, jumping into action while Dean stands by, as if he’s trying to decide how well I work under pressure and if he should fire me or not.

  “Am I done here?” I ask Dean once things have settled down at the end of my shift and I’m taking my apron off.

  “I’m not happy, not happy at all,” he informs me, “but I’m not firing you if that’s what you’re worried about. Just make sure he never comes in here again.”

  “Evan?” I’m plenty upset with him, but somehow I never would have imagined he’d earned a banishment from my workplace.

  “If that’s your boyfriend’s name,” Dean says.

  “He’s not… oh, never mind.”

  I accept this caveat to my continued employment, though I’m not happy about it. It feels like I’m abandoning Evan in doing so.

  Leaving Creek’s Coffee, I head over to the library to meet Natalie before my afternoon classes, and am still a little dumbfounded by everything that just happened. She’s already hard at work.

  “You look spent,” she says, looking up as I slide my book bag on the table. She’s wearing glasses today, making her look extra studious.

  “Gee, thanks.” I pretty much collapse into the chair across from her.

  “Bad first day at work?”

  “The work part was great.” I slowly pull my books and laptop out. “It’s the other stuff that blew.”

  “What other stuff?” Her eyes are wide, and she looks genuinely concerned.

  “These guys came in at the end of my shift, and one of them was the most cliché kind of asshole I’ve ever met in my life. He was like hitting on me with these bizarre lines that I could tell even his friends were embarrassed about.”

  “Was he drunk?” she asks.

  “At noon? I don’t think he was. Do people do that around here?”

  “Oh, Paige,” she laughs. “This is a college campus. The time of day doesn’t stop people from getting drunk or high or whatever else, and I’ve had my share of bizarre guys hitting on me too. It’s sad, but it sort of goes with the territory.”

  “I’m just not used to it,” I say.

  “What, guys hitting on you? You can’t be serious, girl. Were the guys in your town blind?”

  “It’s just not like that in Basin Lake. Everyone knows everyone, and every guy knew who my boyfriend was and they also knew if they gave me trouble, Evan or Garrett would have my back.”

  “Okay, so, are you going to sick Evan on this guy? I mean, sounds like he’d pummel him for you just like he would have in Basin Lake, right?”

  “He already did.” I sigh and open up my notebook, wanting to relax my mind enough so I can study.

  “Did what? Beat him up?”

  I nod. “I almost got fired.”

  “No!” She says it loud enough that someone at another table gives her a dirty look.

  “He came in right when this guy was being a total ass, but his friends were handling it, and my boss had just come out, so it would have been fine, but Evan kind of overreacted, and I think he broke the asshole’s nose.”

  Natalie bites her lower lip, and she looks like she’s imagining Evan throwing the punch in her head. “He was defending your honor.”

  “It’s not the Middle Ages, and it was being handled. Besides, I don’t want him to get in trouble. The guy said he was going to sue, and Dean said Evan can’t come into the shop anymore.”

  “Dean’s your boss?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The guy who’s always smiling?”

  “That’s him,” I say.

  Natalie sits back in her chair and taps her lips with her pen. “Having a guy defend you is
still a good thing in the South. Having a guy as hot as Evan defend you is pretty much the best thing a girl could hope for.”

  I’m a little stunned that Natalie doesn’t see a problem with Evan’s quick temper, but maybe I’m the one in the wrong. “I guess, yeah, maybe? Plus the guy called Evan a gay slur, and we’re both kind of sensitive to that.”

  “Hell, I’m sensitive to it too. My older brother is gay. What’s your connection, other than being just a decent human being of course?”

  “Ex-boyfriend. He’s one of Evan’s good friends too.”

  “Really? How have I not gleaned this information from you yet?”

  I shrug. “I like to dole it out slowly.” Then I laugh a little, and I’m beginning to feel like maybe Evan wasn’t so out of line.

  “You’re just full of surprises, but I’ll tell you having a guy that will not only defend you but also genuinely cares about you is a huge deal. And it really helps that he doesn’t put up with any homophobic bullshit.”

  “You’re right,” I say. “I mean, it was hard for Mike to come out because, well, obviously people can be dicks.”

  “And Mike is the ex-boyfriend, right?”

  “Right,” I say.

  “And you chose this Mike guy over Evan?” She’s looking at me hard, like she can’t quite fathom the possibility. “I think I need to see a picture.”

  “Of Mike?”

  “Yes, of Mike. I need to do a comparison analysis, and you might as well show me one of this Garrett guy too.”

  I’m not really in the mood, but I pull my phone out and dig through my pictures. If I hadn’t realized that besides pictures of landscapes and my family, most of them are of Evan, then I certainly realize it now. I actually have to flip through a number of them before I find one of Mike, a couples selfie pic we took last summer around sunset. We’re sitting on the trunk of his car.

  “Here,” I say, turning the phone. “Me and Mike, and Evan and I are just friends. He had a girlfriend too, you know?”

  She takes my phone and studies it. “Yeah, well this Mike guy is cute, but he’s not Evan cute. How long were you with him?”