Walking Disaster by Jamie Mcguire

Author:Jamie Mcguire
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atria Paperback

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Lowball

THE HARLEY TOOK US NOWHERE IN PARTICULAR. WATCHING out for traffic and the sporadic police cruiser that crossed our path was enough to keep my thoughts occupied at first, but after a while we were the only ones on the road. Knowing the night would eventually end, I decided the moment I dropped her off at Morgan would be when I put in my last-ditch effort. Regardless of our platonic bowling dates, if she continued to see Parker, eventually those would stop, too. Everything would stop.

Pressuring Abby was never a good idea, but unless I laid all my cards on the table, I stood a very good chance of losing the only pigeon I’d ever met. What I would say and how I would say it played over and over in my mind. It would have to be direct, something Abby couldn’t ignore, or pretend she didn’t hear or understand.

The needle had been flirting with the empty end of the gas gauge for several miles, so I pulled into the first open gas station we came across.

“You want anything?” I asked.

Abby shook her head, climbing off the bike. She raked her fingers through the tangles of her long, shiny hair, and smiled sheepishly.

“Quit it. You’re fucking beautiful.”

“Just point me to the nearest 1980s rock video.”

I laughed, and then yawned, placing the nozzle into the Harley’s gas tank opening.

Abby pulled out her cell phone to check the time. “Oh my God, Trav. It’s three in the morning.”

“You wanna go back?” I asked, my stomach sinking.

“We better.”

“We’re still going bowling tonight?”

“I told you I would.”

“And you’re still going to Sig Tau with me in a couple weeks, right?”

“Are you insinuating that I don’t follow through? I find that a little insulting.”

I pulled the nozzle from the gas tank and hooked it on its base. “I just never know what you’re going to do anymore.”

I sat on the bike and then helped Abby to climb on behind me. She wrapped her arms around me, this time on her own, and I sighed, lost in thought before starting the engine. I gripped the handlebars, took a breath, and just when I got the balls to tell her, decided a gas station was not the appropriate backdrop to bare my soul.

“You’re important to me, you know,” Abby said, tensing her arms.

“I don’t understand you, Pigeon. I thought I knew women, but you’re so fucking confusing I don’t know which way is up.”

“I don’t understand you, either. You’re supposed to be this school’s ladies’ man. I’m not getting the full freshmen experience they promised in the brochure.”

I couldn’t help but feel offended. Even if it was true. “Well, that’s a first. I’ve never had a girl sleep with me to get me to leave her alone.”

“That’s not what it was, Travis.”

I started the engine and pulled out into the street without saying another word. The drive to Morgan was excruciating. In my head, I talked myself in and out of confronting Abby so many times.

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