I had been obvious with my gawking. I jerked my gaze away from Asa’s nice backside and looked at Brett. “Yes, no, kinda,” I said, not sure how to answer that. It wasn’t like I could tell him the truth. For starters, the night on the bridge was a secret I’d never tell. Second, the fact I’d been obsessed with Asa for years was embarrassing. His simple act of kindness one day had made me place him on a pedestal. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to remove him.

  Brett laughed. “Yes, you know of him, no, you don’t actually know him?”

  I nodded because that was a better explanation. “He used to come into the store,” I said with a smile.

  “And Asa Griffith the playah never hit on you?” he asked, looking surprised.

  I shook my head. Because no, not once had Asa flirted with me. Which was sad to acknowledge.

  “That shocks me.”

  I shrugged it off as if I didn’t care. When in reality, I did. I wished just once he had flirted with me.

  “My flat tire was damn lucky,” Brett said, then winked at me.

  I picked up the deli pizza we had come to get. “Why’s that?” I asked him, still distracted from Asa’s return.

  “Because I’d never been inside your parents’ store before. If I’d known you were in there, I’d have come in a hell of a lot sooner.”

  Brett was sweet. He said nice things. He flirted with me. The day his Mini Cooper had gotten a flat tire and he’d come inside to get a soda while he waited on the tire service to come change it, I had waited on him. He’d asked about what smelled so good, and I told him about my mom’s churros. He had bought three, then asked me if I had Snapchat. If it had been a few months earlier, my answer would have been no, and any other question he’d asked me would have been no.

  However, after the night on the bridge and Hunter Maclay’s murder, my dad changed. It was as if he feared he’d lose me the way he had lost my sister. Against my mother’s wishes, he had given me a smartphone and told me that I could attend a college out of state, but it needed to be in a safer place than Los Angeles. In fact, California was completely off-limits.

  I’d applied to other colleges already, and although I didn’t have a full ride to any of the ones in places he felt were safe enough, I had a partial scholarship to Walton University in Oxford, Mississippi. It was close enough to make them happy, and, well… it was in the same city as Ole Miss. Yes, it may appear stalkerlike, but I had made a lot of excuses as to why it was the best choice for me. They all sounded very good.

  Brett wasn’t Mexican, and my mother had issues with that. My dad had overruled her, though, and Brett was allowed to come over to watch a movie. Then I was allowed to go get a burger with him as long as we didn’t eat inside a restaurant. His charm soon worked on my momma, and now I was free to go to his house as long as his parents were there, and Momma would call and check on that. Today we were getting a pizza and some other snacks, then going to binge-watch a new series on Netflix. Brett had mentioned swimming, but I wasn’t sure asking my momma if I could wear a swimsuit in front of Brett was a good idea. That, and the only swimsuit I owned looked like something my momma would wear. I needed to buy a new one.

  A squeal snapped me out of my thoughts, and I turned to see a blond girl run and throw her arms around Asa. It wasn’t easy to hear what she was saying with her mask on, but the girl’s shorts reminded me of panties and her top wasn’t more than a bra. I watched as Asa put his free arm around the girl, but if he was smiling or not, no one knew with the damn mask covering up his face. He had a great mouth.

  No. Stop it. I looked away from them. “Skittles or Twizzlers?” I asked Brett.

  “Why not both?” he replied, and picked up a pack of each and put them in the cart I was pushing. I stared at the candy and tried to focus on what else we needed and not the feminine, high-pitched gushing to the left of me.

  “You do like both? Right?” Brett asked.

  “Oh yes, I do. Sorry. I was thinking about what else we needed.”

  “Chips and dip.”

  I nodded in agreement and followed him to the next aisle, chancing one more peek in Asa’s direction. His eyes met mine, and I would have stumbled had I not been holding on to the cart. The girl was still pressing up against him talking, but he was looking at me.

  Then Asa Griffith winked. At me.

  JUNE 16, 2020 Don’t Eat All the Damn Cookies

  CHAPTER 9

  ASA

  Nash had woken me up when he’d left for the field house to work out with the players. I doubted they were going to be playing football in the fall. Things weren’t looking hopeful at this point. Hell, it had been three months of lockdown, and we were now having to wear masks everywhere and most places were still closed. If it wasn’t an “essential business,” it was closed. For the most part. A few restaurants had opened up but only those with outdoor seating, and who the hell wanted to eat outdoors in Alabama during the month of June? No one.

  I drank a cup of black coffee and sat at the small table in the apartment’s kitchen. I was debating on eating the cereal or peanut butter toast for breakfast when there was a knock on the door. It was just after eight. Who did Nash know that was up this early and wasn’t at the field house with him? I grabbed a shirt and pulled it over my head. Then went to open the door.

  Nash’s girlfriend, Tallulah, was standing there with a large white box in her hands. “Good morning. Nash said you were awake; I hope I’m not disturbing you.”

  As if Tallulah could disturb anyone. She was as damn sweet as she was sexy. I’d been interested in her at the beginning of the year. We’d even gone out, but she had wanted Nash. Nash had needed her. Now I enjoyed the view, but that was it. She held out the white box to me. “My mom sent these. She heard you were back and here with Nash. She remembered how much you liked her chocolate mint cookies, and she also sent some muffins she had been wanting to try that she found on—”

  “Pinterest,” I finished for her, remembering that from my one visit to her house before I took her on our disastrous date to the field.

  She laughed and nodded.

  I took the box. “Tell your mom I said thank you and if she’s still single…” I trailed off and smirked.

  Tallulah rolled her eyes at me, but it got a small laugh from her. “I’ll tell her,” she replied. Then she added, “I’m glad you’re back. We all are.”

  “Yeah, me too,” I told her.

  Tallulah turned to leave and I closed the door behind her, suddenly feeling much more excitement over my breakfast options. Tallulah’s momma could bake like a champ. I set the box on the table, and my phone alerted me of a text message. Picking it up, I saw Nash’s name and: T is coming by with some stuff her mom made you. Don’t eat all the damn cookies. Save me some.

  I responded, She sent them to me. Imma eat them all.

  I opened the box, and the aroma made my mouth water.

  Another text. She’s my girlfriend.

  Smirking, I replied, T is your girlfriend but her momma ain’t.

  Picking up a cookie still warm from the oven, I shoved it in my mouth. The chocolate and mint melted on my tongue, and I groaned with pleasure.

  Leave me a motherfucking cookie! he sent back.

  Fine. You get one, I told him, then went to pour myself a tall glass of cold milk. My morning just got a hell of a lot better.

  When you’re locked down for several months and the world is essentially closed, you find yourself getting new hobbies. Mine was running. It got me outdoors, and it was good exercise since my abuela’s cooking and my sitting in front of the television weren’t the best combination for staying fit. After eating five cookies and two muffins, I looked down at my stomach and decided I had some calories to burn, not to mention I had nothing else to do.

  Changing into shorts and a T-shirt I had cut the sleeves out of, I prepared to go run. I should have been at the field house lifting weights, but I wasn’t ready to see everyone. They’d want to know why I left. They’d ask questions I didn’t want to answer. They had all been here adjusting to the death of Hunter, and to me it had been as if nothing happened. I’d been shipped off. I hadn’t lived in Lawton after Hunter. I hadn’t been here when everyone was sent home from school to quarantine in their homes. In my head, it was as if Lawton had kept on being Lawton while my weird new world was only happening in New Mexico, but it was clear that wasn’t true.

  The idea of going to that field house and Hunter not being there, his locker being empty, his jersey retired and hanging up in the frame that Nash had told me about, I didn’t think I was ready for that. Not being here had kept me from… mourning, like my friends had. I was back now and the reality was here.

  My parents weren’t inviting me to visit. They knew I was back, but they didn’t want to see me. Hunter was gone. The guy who shot him was behind bars for life. His accomplices were in there for twenty-plus years. There was a billboard in town about Hunter being a hero. Ryker was alive, and I felt guilty that deep down I was glad it hadn’t been Ryker who took the bullet. Hunter was my friend. But Ryker was one of my lifelong best friends.

  As I stepped outside, the warmth of the sun felt good on my skin. I took a few minutes to stretch before turning right and heading toward town. Turning left would have made more sense. Less traffic and more sidewalks. However, turning left would have taken me by the Maclays’ house, and I didn’t want to see it. I was dealing with the reality one step at a time. I wasn’t ready to see that house and remember what happened.

  I could have always turned left and then hung a right before getting to the Maclays’ house, but then I’d pass my parents’ house and I sure as hell didn’t want to see it, either. So, right it was. By the time I’d turn to come back to Nash’s, it would be fucking blazing outside, but the sweat was good for me. I normally ran earlier in the morning or late in the evening. Today the punishing heat seemed appealing. Maybe being back here was causing me to snap.

  Running always cleared my head, and soon I wasn’t consumed with Lawton and all its pain. My muscles were awake, and the breeze on my face made everything else fall away. I wasn’t focused on anything around me, which is probably why I was almost on top of Ezmita Ramos when I noticed her walking across the street in the opposite direction. Her hair was pulled up in a ponytail and was swinging with her swift pace.

  I slowed, then glanced both ways before crossing the street at a jog. She had stopped walking and was watching me as I came to a stop a few feet from her. Not sure if I needed to step back until we were a safe six feet apart, since neither of us was wearing a mask.

  “Hey,” I said with a smile as she gave me a quick once-over. She’d been focused too, and from the look on her face, she hadn’t noticed me until I’d almost reached her.

  “Asa,” she said, her eyes widening a little. “Uh, how are you? When did you get back in town?” She ran her questions together, and then her cheeks flushed as if she had asked something embarrassing.

  “I’m good and yesterday. I saw you at the grocery store.” I left out that I had seen Brett as well.

  Her cheeks burned brighter at the reminder. We had made eye contact and I’d purposely winked at her. Damn mask covers your mouth and smiling wasn’t an option. She couldn’t pretend she hadn’t noticed me.

  “Oh yes, I remember, I just didn’t, I mean we didn’t talk, or…” She trailed off and I wondered if she could be any more adorable. I was making her nervous. I wanted to think it was my sexy appearance, but I had a feeling it was the fact our last and only time together, I’d almost ended my life.

  “You were with Brett. I didn’t want to interrupt your, uh, shopping,” I said with an amused grin. Even if I hadn’t been amused.

  “Yeah, we were just getting things for an Ozark binge,” she explained, then forced a smile. “Are you still headed to Ole Miss?”

  I gave a nod of my head. “Yep. If they open their doors, that is. Who the fuck knows anymore? We may end up doing more virtual shit.”

  She sighed and her shoulders dropped some. “I know. I hope we get to start on time. I can’t take much more of this homebound stuff.”

  “It’s sucked,” I agreed. Then I realized she’d said “we,” and I knew she had been hoping to go away to college, but the last I heard, her father wasn’t letting her. “Did your parents agree to let you go off to college?”

  She grinned then and nodded her head enthusiastically. “Yes!” She looked like she was going to say more, then stopped and her excitement faded. That was odd and I wanted to know why. I started to ask her where, but I was interrupted by fucking Brett Darby.

  “Asa Griffith. I didn’t know you were back in town,” he said before not so casually slipping an arm around Ezmita’s waist. Where the fuck had he come from? He looked down at Ezmita, who was no longer looking at me but up at him. He gave her a soft smile. “You were late. I got worried.”

  “Momma had me unload the delivery in the back first,” she told him, relaxing under his touch. It appeared Ezmita’s life had gotten less restrictive since we last talked. What had happened to change her overprotective parents’ hold on her?

  He glanced back up and looked at me. “Heard you were in New Mexico. How did you like the desert?” he asked. He had no idea why I’d been there. That my parents had kicked me out.

  “I wouldn’t know. I was in the mountains. Didn’t make it to the southern part of New Mexico,” I replied.

  He frowned as if the idea of mountains in New Mexico was foreign to him. Not surprising. I doubted he’d been to New Mexico. “UCLA isn’t sure they’re opening up campus yet. I may be staying here a little longer.” He glanced down at Ezmita again. “I don’t mind that if someone else stays here.”

  Her cheeks flushed. She liked him. He was obviously into her. From the description she had given me of her life, Brett was probably her first real boyfriend. She was happy. She looked happy at least. Good for her. I was glad she wasn’t still being robbed of living a normal teenage life. Although there was a part of me that was a little jealous it was Brett she was getting to live this new freedom with and not me.

  “I gotta go,” I said, not seeing a point in holding them up any longer. I hadn’t stopped to chat with Brett. Just to check on Ezmita. She was important to me. In a weird way. I didn’t know her really, but she knew my darkest moment. It made me care about her happiness. She deserved it. She was a genuinely nice person and she was beautiful. That wasn’t always easy to find. “Good to see you both,” I added, then flashed a smile at Ezmita in parting before jogging on past them and back toward Nash’s.

  The tug of disappointment nagging me was hard to ignore. Pretending like it wasn’t there was a waste of time. Facing it and moving on was best. My feelings where Ezmita was concerned weren’t more than having a bond with her over my night on the bridge. That was it. She was a part of one of the worst days of my life. She had been there for me when no one else had. I’d thought about asking her out when or if I saw her again. My curiosity about the girl I knew so little about had been something that stayed with me during my time in New Mexico.

  But it seemed she had a life now and that was that. I’d go off to college. She would too. Probably to California with Brett. Rolling my eyes at the fact I was still dwelling on this, I ran faster and forgot about it. Them. Her.

  JUNE 19, 2020 They’re Reuniting

  CHAPTER 10

  EZMITA

  Wicks was fairly new. They’d opened up in January, and although they’d had to only do takeout for three months like every other restaurant in Alabama, they had stayed afloat. Now that the world was reopening, they were the ones with the best setup. Most of their dining area was outdoors but under a covering with fans keeping things cool enough if you ate there in the morning or in the evening. Middle of the day, though, it was tough.

  Brett loved their buffalo chicken sandwich and sweet potato fries. I thought both were just average, but not everyone had grown up eating their meals at my mother’s table. Her cooking made others pale in comparison. The waitress knew Brett’s order by heart and just asked him if he wanted his regular. He chuckled and nodded. I knew he liked that about this place too. He was a regular and they knew him.

  I, on the other hand, liked to try something different each time. I had been going down the menu items, and I was almost done with the second page. The menu was thicker than one would expect for a place like this. Another reason it was such a popular place in town. Especially on weekend nights. A Friday night during the summer in Lawton left little to do but come here to eat and go see a movie. No one went to the field anymore. I wondered if they ever would again.

  I hadn’t known Hunter, nor had I ever been to a field party, but even I thought the idea of partying there now seemed wrong.

  I glanced up, realizing the waitress was waiting on me to order. I’d gotten lost in my thoughts. “Oh, sorry, the applewood bacon smoked chicken wrap with the soup of the day,” I replied. One more visit here and I’d be on page three of the menu.

  “Soup today is tomato. You’ve had that before. Sure you want it again?” she asked, and I smiled realizing she had figured out my system of never eating the same thing twice.

  “Um, no, then let me try the…” I looked for a side I hadn’t ordered yet.

  “There is a walnut apple kale salad on the specials board tonight. It’s new,” she offered.

  “Okay, thank you, I’ll take that.”

  She nodded and took the menus before leaving us. I watched as she stopped at a cleaning station and sprayed down the menus, then wiped them thoroughly. Glancing at my mask on the table, which I’d worn until seated, I wondered if this was just the new normal.

  “Looks like the jock squad is back together again. Haven’t seen them out like this since lockdown ended,” Brett said, drawing my attention to the direction he was looking in.

  I knew all of them, but I didn’t know them. I had watched their lives play out from behind a cash register. Nash Lee with Tallulah Liddell, whose mother sent her to buy baking supplies from our store regularly and was really nice; Ryker Lee and Aurora Maclay; West Ashby and Maggie Carleton; Brady Higgens and Riley Young; and then there was Asa with a redhead I didn’t know, but she was stunning.