Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 103104 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103104 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
I tuck it in my apron to look at later.
My thoughts go to Knox. He texted me earlier today and told me he was sorry he had to leave school, but Dane wasn’t feeling well, and he’d text me later tonight when I got off work.
Tyler comes in and rushes over to me, and I give him a tight hug.
“How was school? Did you learn anything cool?”
He grins. “They showed me new ways to remember stuff, like I know all the letters. Just say one—I know it.”
“T.”
“Yes, that’s one. Say another.”
“Y.”
“Yep!”
“L.”
“Know it!”
“E.”
“Yeah.”
“R!”
He squints. “Balls. Did you spell my name?”
“Don’t say balls, and yes I did!” I ruffle his hair. “Do you know what order all the letters go in?”
He adjusts his glasses.
“It’s a song, bozo. You used to sing it.”
He tugs at his shirt. “A, B, C, D…” He goes all the way to T before getting a little confused, but he eventually finishes with Z.
I swing him up and he squeals. Lou and a couple of customers clap.
Sister Margaret smiles. “He regaled the entire wing of boys this afternoon.”
I feel myself glowing from the inside out.
On my dinner break, I place an order for us and we take a table in the back. I’ve just gotten the first French fry in my mouth when in walk Wyatt and Piper. I texted them earlier to see if they had dinner plans.
Piper bounces over and gives Tyler a squeeze. “Give me a hug, big boy!”
They order food at the counter and take a seat with us. Sister Margaret murmurs that she has emails to catch up with on her phone and wanders off to the front. Lou’s eyes widen as she approaches, then he scurries off to the back.
“Why are you smiling so much?” Wyatt says dryly, flexing one of his muscles again so Tyler can watch the hummingbirds on his bicep flutter.
“No one called me names today, I’m seeing Tyler, and Lou is terrified of nuns. It’s been a great day.”
“Sooooo, Knox,” comes from Piper. “Is this serious?”
I have no clue. “It’s a one day at a time kind of thing.”
“And it’s really true that he paid for your housing? Isn’t that kind of weird? I mean, do you feel like you owe him?” I confessed in film class today about Knox being my donor.
“Not in favors, if you get my drift, but I’ll pay him back. I’ve gotten almost three thousand in tips saved this year,” I say.
Piper looks around at the dingy diner. “Girl, you’re gonna have to wait a lot more tables to get to ten grand.”
True, but I can do it. It will just take some time.
“He wrote you that secret admirer letter, so I’m not so sure he wants you to pay him back,” Wyatt says with an eye waggle. “He’s rich—let him take care of you.”
Let him take care of me? Um, no.
Piper scowls. “I don’t know about him. He’s the Shark, and he was mean to you last year. Remember that time he scared you in the locker room after the game?”
Hmmm, I remember, though maybe I wasn’t actually that scared.
She continues. “I mean, you’re not very experienced, and everyone says he’s this bad boy who only has sex from—” She throws a hand over her mouth and looks at Tyler, who’s humming his ABCs. “Crap,” she whispers. “Little ears. I’ll rein it in.”
Wyatt laughs, sipping on a Coke. “So, Ava, does he only do it that way?”
A slow blush steals up my cheeks when I think back to last night. “I plead the fifth.”
Piper rolls her eyes. “Well, enough about the Shark. I have news! It’s incredible! It’s…” She pauses, takes a drink, and holds up her index finger in a wait a minute motion.
“What is it, bozo?” Tyler asks, and I snicker and elbow him.
“Piper likes to drag things out for maximum effect. Give her a drumroll.”
Tyler beats his hands on the table, and Wyatt and I pick it up.
Piper lets her straw go. Purses her lips. “Well, you know how bad I want to go to Vandy, but we don’t have the money, and since most of the scholarships are only half of admission, I wrote a letter to my uncle in Seattle who went there and became a doctor. Never got married and is filthy rich. You met him at Christmas once, Ava.”
She has a ton of relatives and I’ve met several at holiday functions.
She titters. “I asked him very prettily if he would consider making up the difference on a scholarship and he said…YES!”
My lips part. Visions of Vandy dance in my head and jealousy rises up for half a second before I battle it back. Piper deserves the best.
“Whoa,” I say, totaling up a year in my head. Tuition is roughly $48,000; room and board is $18,000; books and miscellaneous is $1500; other random expenses are $2500. A year at Vandy is over $100,000, so half of that would be $50,000. She has a nice uncle.