“We can’t very well turn him loose in Halstead alone.” I laughed as I followed Brett to his truck. Letting Brett go into town alone would inevitably result in one of two things. One, he’d end up in jail. Two, he’d end up hitting on the wrong girl and end up in a fight, which would probably still end with us picking him up at the County Sheriff’s office. I sure as shit didn’t feel like posting his bail… or seeing Sheriff Harden again—if he was even still the Sheriff around here. It was just as easy to go with him and stop him from stirring up trouble to begin with. Plus... Nora. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her since she’d hauled ass down the lane.
When we pulled onto the town square and found a parking spot outside of Vera’s Tavern, Brett practically jumped out of the Expedition and skipped to the door. I, on the other hand, took a minute to look around. Not a damn thing had changed. A few of the businesses that I remembered were gone, but as a whole, it was still the same. A large gazebo sat on a grassy lot at the center of the square. A few pieces of park equipment were to the left and a large concrete slab that served as dance floor during the town’s annual Founders’ Day Picnic to the right. If I hadn’t been going into the bar to drink beer I would have thought I’d somehow stepped into a time machine.
I held her hand walking down these streets many times. I’d kissed her on the dance floor in front of the whole town one night. We’d made memories that didn’t seem to want to let up their constant replay in my head.
“You coming?” my brother asked when he saw me staring off into space. I’d gotten pretty good at getting lost in my own thoughts over the past twelve hours.
“Yep.” I nodded and followed him inside. Brett had already ordered a bucket of Miller Lite and had secured us a high top table to the left of the bar. The sticky floors and stale beer smell was exactly what I had always imagined Vera’s was like on the inside. I was still underage when we moved and never did venture into any of Halstead’s hotspots. A few of the bar patrons looked our way, but didn’t give us a second look once we sat down and started drinking. That was the nice thing about motocross. On the circuit we were recognized, but we could still live a pretty normal life in the outside world. It was only occasionally that a fan recognized us and that was fine by me. The only place I cared about being recognized was on a track.
We ordered from the small offering of Vera’s menu and within the hour we’d consumed burgers, cheese balls, and an order of loaded nachos. Coating your stomach with greasy bar food was the best way to avoid a hangover, right? That’s what I told myself when we ordered our second bucket of beer. To be honest, I needed the alcohol to stop the nervous anticipation of seeing Nora again. At least if she didn’t show by the end of the night, I’d be too drunk to remember.
“What do you mean Reid’s back?” Georgia wanted a play-by-play of my meeting with RTR Incorporated. I’d already replayed the encounter on a continuous loop in my head the entire drive home, so I was familiar with the storyline. “Like… back for good?”
“Who knows? I’m betting no, but he’s here for now,” I answered as I changed out of my work clothes. I suggested to Georgia that we stay in for our “Sister Date.” Ice cream, pajamas and a Netflix marathon sounded like a much more appealing evening to me, but she wasn’t having it.
“What happened? Did you talk to him?” She rambled on, tucking a piece of her chin-length bob behind her ear. The two of us looked alike, but her hair was shorter and blond. My hair used to be closer to Georgia’s shade, but I let the highlights go a long time ago—along with a whole lot of everything else. “Is he hotter now? I mean, I was young when he left, but he was hot then. He’s got to be hotter, right?”
“He’s something,” I mumbled. Of course he was hotter. Unbearably hotter. Thinking about the way I looked at him when we were teenagers, it seemed impossible that he could get better looking, but damn did he ever. “I mean, he looks the same I guess. More muscles. Maybe a little taller.” My lips went dry as I described the returned version of Reid Travers. “Oh, and he has tattoos now.” Visions of the ink that wrapped around his midsection and arms when I got that too-brief glimpse of his mid-section drew out a sigh from deep in my chest. “Like a lot of them.”
“And how exactly did you see said tattoos?”
“I had to go out to his property,” I answered. I could tell by the look on her face that she assumed I’d went running out there the second I heard he was back in town. “For work.”
“Sure you did,” she teased. “It’s not every day the love of your life comes back to town.”
“Love of my life? No.” I shook my head. “I swear.” I went on to explain exactly how my afternoon had played out. “He purchased the land his parents sold,” I said. “Believe me, the last person I thought I’d see today was Reid. I can’t even tell you the last time I thought about him. And, yeah, I may have loved him a long time ago, but that ship has long sailed off.”
“Really?” Her skepticism was evident. “You never think about him? Not even when you’re wearing one of the five-hundred Fox Racing T-shirts you own? Or when you just happened to be “flipping through” the photo albums you left at mom and dad’s house? Don’t bullshit a bullshitter, Nora. I know you better than you think I do.”
“I may...” I hesitated, “on occasion, look at Mom’s albums. And a T-shirt is a T-shirt. I sleep in them. That’s it.” Georgia’s astute observation of my behavior was alarming. I’d be buying new pajamas immediately. And, the photo albums, well those were special. I’d taken most of the pictures that filled the pages. Back when I thought a camera and Reid Travers were all I’d ever need. Before I grew up and realized that young love was a learning experience and nothing else. I’d learned how to avoid getting my heart broken among other things. When he left, I retired from photography. I just didn’t seem to have the drive to do it anymore. Especially when my favorite subject was racing and the guy that served as the model in the majority of my pictures left me crying and confused.
“Okay.” Georgia said from her perched spot on the edge of my bed. The two of us had rented a little house a couple years ago. Our parents argued that neither of us needed to move out. The two-story house we’d grown up in did have room for us, but no privacy. At least not the kind of privacy two twenty-something young women should have. Mom said, “You should stay so you can save your money. Or at least wait until you’re married.” I think she thought that at least I would be settled down by now. I kind of did too, but I just hadn’t had that itch to get married yet like most of my friends had. I was content living with my sister and just having a boyfriend. Wedding bells would ring one day, but not in the near future as far as I could tell.
“Okay, what?”
“Nothing. Please, continue describing this new delicious sounding version of Reid Travers.” She smiled sweetly. “And keep denying the obvious,” she added with a wink.
“I don’t know about delicious and I’m not denying anything.” He was definitely fun to look at, I’d give him that. But, that didn’t change anything between us. “He’s still the same guy that dumped me. And with no reason, I might add. Just because I like to reminisce every now and then doesn’t mean I want to get back together with him.”
“It doesn’t?” She raised her eyebrows. “You sure about that?” I didn’t even bother answering. Instead I picked up the towel I’d used that morning and proceeded to throw it at her head.
“Okay, I’ll quit,” she giggled as she pulled the towel from her head. “It was shitty,” she agreed. “The dumping part. He was moving, though, and you were not. Maybe that was his reason.”
“Whose side are you on?”