One & Only (Canton) by Viv Daniels Page B

collection of vague and confusing statements he’d thrown at me in the last few days. “So, the BFG?”
    “And a Coke.”
    I put in his order and busied myself chopping lemons the bar didn’t need until I delivered his meal. But as I was about to turn away, he stopped me.
    “Are you so very busy?”
    “Did you come in here just to hang out with me?”
    He unfolded his napkin. “Truth?”
    “Truth.”
    “Maybe.”
    I smiled. “What, five hours a day Monday through Wednesday isn’t enough?”
    He looked at me. “No.”
    I caught my breath. This wasn’t fair. The bartender reaction would be to keep things light and flirty—friendly enough for a tip but not so friendly that the customer thought there was something really going on between you two. The lab partner reaction was to tell him we’d have plenty of time to work when we were actually in our lab. And the ex-lover-trying-to-be-friends reaction was to tell him to go home and call Hannah.
    I did none of it. “I was about to take my lunch break as well. It’s cooling down here and I get a free salad with every shift.”
    “Eat with me?”
    So I did. For the next forty-five minutes we sat across from each other at the bar, talking about our project, about our classes, about our favorite foods and movies and what we thought of current environmental regulations regarding GM foods. Dylan joked about how hard it was to be simultaneously a foodie and a budding bioengineer.
    “I can appreciate an heirloom tomato without trying to ban all other types,” he said with a laugh.
    “I think you might be wasted in biofuel.” I pointed my fork at him. “Obviously your calling is food.”
    He shrugged. “Still that fat kid on the inside, I guess.”
    I let my gaze travel over the part of his chest and arms I could see over the bar. Trim, lightly muscled, like a runner. “Don’t worry. It doesn’t show.”
    He said nothing, and I dragged my eyes back up to his face. He’d stopped eating and was staring at me, watching me look at him, an expression I didn’t dare to identify in his deep blue eyes.
    “I mean—”
    “I know what you meant.” He popped the last bit of his sandwich in his mouth and wiped his hands on his napkin. “I should probably head out. Hannah will be back in town this evening.”
    Inwardly, I flinched. “Okay. Have a nice day.”
    “And I have some work to do before then,” he finished awkwardly as the ramifications of his words sank in. “Tess, I didn’t mean ‘my girlfriend’s back, so, later…’”
    “I know what you meant,” I echoed, clearing away his plate. And boy, did I ever. How many weekends had my father spent in our apartment when his wife was away on a spa trip with her rich friends, or off on a shopping weekend in Manhattan with Hannah? How many Sunday afternoons ended with him saying those exact words to us?
    “Thanks for lunch,” he said.
    “Don’t thank me,” I said. “You’re paying for it.”
    “I meant for you having lunch with me.”
    “Oh.” I actually hadn’t known what he meant that time. “Well, like I said, I was taking a break anyway.”
    “You didn’t have to take it with me.”
    “You didn’t have to come to Verde.”
    “I did,” he said, and from the tone of his voice, he sounded like he wanted to say so much more. “If I wanted to see you.”
    After Dylan had gone, I opened the leather folder. His bill had come to twelve dollars. Inside was a twenty-dollar bill. I swallowed. Had it been anyone other than Dylan, I wouldn’t have thought twice about that tip. Sure it was big, but it wasn’t outlandish, and it wasn’t that unusual from a single diner who’d gotten some extra conversation from the wait staff. Yet from Dylan it felt like he’d paid me to have lunch with him, like he was saying, “Poor Tess, not rich enough to attend Canton without filling your days with menial labor, not nearly as rich as the girlfriend I should be spending my time with.”
    Sometimes, when Mom was