The Crush (4 page)

“Our parents were really close friends,” Grier added in, speaking his first words directed towards me since we had met. Lexie definitely seemed like the controlling type and judging by the sour look on her face, didn’t appreciate him talking to other girls.

“Oh really? My mom never really talked much about her life back home besides my dad from time to time.”

“Yeah, my mom says she caught up with her a bit when you guys got into town. Our dads played together on the football team.”

“So anyways babe,” Lexie interrupted while she wrapped a hand around his neck, whispering in his ear as I watched the corners of his mouth turn up and the flash of dimples before they stood up and said goodbye to the group while I stared after them.

“She knows everything about everyone. That’s why her hair is so big, its full of secrets,” Hallie leaned over and whispered in my ear. Oh my god this girl was totally quoting from
Mean Girls
, we were totally meant to be BFF’s. I smothered a giggle with my hand and she continued on.

“None of us can stand her but do her wrong and she will make your life hell. Her daddy practically owns the whole town so she thinks it gives her the right to act that way and she leads Grier around like he’s a puppy on a leash. He follows her wherever she goes.”

Yeah I definitely noticed that one.

“Why? Grier could probably get any girl in this school, he is gorgeous.”

“Yeah,” Hallie replied, tapping her nails on the table and offering me a grape. “But they’ve been together like forever and everyone expects them to get married. I think Lexie figures she’s got her claws into him, he’s probably gonna make it pretty far with his football career, so she’s along for the ride.”

“So Wynn, where’s your next class?” Vance asked as he nudged his way between me and Hallie interrupting our very important conversation.

“Um let’s see,” I dug out the crumpled up paper through the mess my bag already was. I really needed to get organized. “Home Economics.”

“Awesome, exactly where I’m heading,” Vance stretched his long legs out and looped his arms through his backpack. I waved bye to the girls and let Vance lead me to my next class. Apparently he was one of the two boys taking this class. I handed Mrs. Early my schedule and she directed me to the only spot available in the class between Vance and Grier. This should be interesting.

                                                                                                                               ******************************

I managed to make it through my home ec class after dealing with Vance and his cheesy pickup lines that apparently worked on girls around here. I had heard all of them before and was not impressed.

I think I can die happy now, ‘cause I've just seen a piece of heaven.
You make me melt like hot fudge on a sundae.

And my personal favorite:
Baby, you are so fine I could put you on a plate and sop you up with a biscuit.
That one must be pretty original in the south.

It made me a little bit uncomfortable at first but after I figured out that he was doing a good job of keeping his hands to himself I felt myself loosen up and laugh at them a little bit. That boy was persistent I would give him that. Grier just sat there and shook his head the whole time engrossed in the sewing project that they were working on.

I made it through the rest of the school day before meeting up with Collins so we could head over to the Wakefield Diner. Grams basically ran the whole place by herself along with the help of Aunt Gracie and now my mom. Collins told me she waitressed there a few days after school and I was going to help out with that too.

“Hi sugar,” Grams wiped the flour from her hands onto the front of her apron before giving me a quick pat on the back. “Did all of the youngens mind their manners with you today?”

“Yeah everyone seemed to be pretty nice, it’ll just take me a bit to get in to the swing of things.”

“Good, good. Now honey just ask Collins what she needs to do, I’m sure you’ll be just fine.”

According to Collins the diner was the only restaurant in town other than the small Dairy Bar which was more like a fast food and ice cream type place, so we stayed pretty busy. The setup was kind of like a fifties style diner with a wraparound counter and swivel chairs spaced out. Booths and tables also dotted the interior with small jukeboxes attached at the base. The menu consisted of Grams homemade specialties and about 30 different shake flavors.

After following Collins around for awhile, flitting from table to table, where everyone seemed to be a regular customer, she gave me the responsibility of running the front counter and cashing the customers out. I caught on pretty quickly and found the chit chat with the customers came pretty easily. Of course, being new in town I was one hot commodity.

“Well you sure are a purty little thang,” an older man with a thick accent said as I punched his total into the cash register and handed him his change. “You look just like your mama did at your age.”

“How have you been Mr. Mallory, it’s been a long time,” my mom came up from behind me and leaned against the counter to chat up the old man who had a pretty good memory apparently.

“Ah there you are Cecelia Jane, good to see you here darlin’. I’ll be back soon to visit, we’ll have ourselves a nice chat. Need to get home to the missus. Good day ladies,” he said with a tip of his hat.

“It’s amazing how barely anyone in this town has changed,” my mom watched Mr. Mallory leave before turning to look at me.

“How you doin’ honey, catching on pretty quickly?”

I nodded my head while pocketing the tip Mr. Mallory had left for me. “Everythings good Mom.” She stared back into my eyes for just a second longer before quickly looking away.

“I just want to make sure your doing okay with all of these changes. I know it’s a lot with everything already going through your head. I did get an appointment set up for Thursday with a new therapist, I figured you needed to start back up with your sessions, they seemed to help some, right?”

They had seemed to help some in the few that I was able to go to before the move. It helped having someone to talk about with the new feelings I felt other than my mom. Anytime she brought up the topic I felt guilty for the way our lives were flipped upside down.

“Is it someone in town, I didn’t think they would have someone like that around here.”

“She’s one town over in Clay County. The appointments after school, so I figured you could run home and grab your grandaddys old truck out of the garage to make it on time.”

“Okay sounds great mom, thanks.”

Although I didn’t like to admit my problems I was looking forward to the therapy sessions. They seemed to calm me and I was able to get things off of my chest.

The school week quickly fell into a pretty easy rhythm. I seemed to fit in pretty well with Collins group of friends other than Lexie and Grier who seemed to live in their own little bubble. My home economics class was probably the most interesting part of my day situated between the two boys.

Even when Lexie wasn’t around, Grier barely glanced at me but that just meant more time for Vance to flirt with me which I tried to shield as much as possible. The boys actually knew how to bake pretty well though and we had gotten an A from the supposedly stringent Mrs. Early for our apple pie that she said had a perfect buttery crust.

“’Kay Wynn I’ll see you later at home, right?” Collins asked before she grabbed her blue and orange duffel bag holding her cheering gear that matched the schools colors. When Collins wasn’t working at the diner, she was either cheering at a game or practicing so she kept pretty busy. She didn’t ask questions about what happened back in Michigan but she knew the situation and that I was going to therapy sessions.

“Yup, have fun.”

I walked back to Grams house that was quickly becoming very familiar to me and felt more like home to me than the one with Richard ever did. Now that I thought back even though mom tried to warm the place up whenever Richard was around mom always seemed timid and toned down. She never admitted it but sometimes she would hint at little things and I wouldn’t be surprised to find out Richard had been abusing her over the years behind closed doors.

 The house was empty and I grabbed the keys off the hook in the kitchen to start up the ancient truck of granddaddy’s. He had passed a few years ago and the truck was his pride and joy. Even though it was old Grams said he was always in the garage tinkering away and it still ran really well. I followed the directions my mom had given me and made the fifteen minute drive over to the medical complex where my therapist was.

“Hi I’m here to see Dr. Snyde, I have a 3:30 appointment,” I explained to the graying receptionist with the nametag that read Shirley, who gave me a warm smile before checking me into the computer and coming out from behind the desk to lead me down the narrow hallway.

“Right this way dear,” she knocked on the door at the end of hallway and entered to reveal a woman around my moms age with dark brown hair pulled into a bun, glasses perched on the tip of her nose and a white doctors coat pulled over a navy dress.

“Wynn, so nice to meet you dear, please take a seat,” she motioned to the leather couch situated in front of her desk and took a seat herself while picking up her clipboard to scribble down notes.

“So, let’s get started. I know a bit about the situation but I would like to hear your version.”

We spent the next hour going over the basic details even though I was uncomfortable reliving those moments but I knew it had to be done and we made plans to meet up weekly.

 “You’re doing really well with the card you were dealt Wynn. These feelings you are having are perfectly normal. It will take you some time to warm up to people again but we’ll get you there. Give this card to the front desk and they’ll get you all squared away.”

“Thanks Dr. Snyde. See you next week.” I made my way back down the hallway to the small glass window, sliding my sheet across the counter while I fumbled through my purse to find my keys and phone.

“When did you want to make this for?” I heard a familiar southern voice float through the small opening that didn’t belong to the nice grandma who was here earlier and I looked up to lock eyes with Grier Daniels ocean blue ones.

Great. In a small town like this people were instantly going to know my problems and I’m sure his bitch of a girlfriend would be the one to spread the rumors, my cheeks felt like they were on fire by the way he was intently staring back at me.

“Um, I didn’t know you worked here. Where’s Shirley?”

Grier gave me a small smile with just a hint of dimples. “Shirley leaves around 4:00 to take care of her grandkids so I come in to help my mom out after school when I can.”

Oh so that’s how my mom knew Dr. Snyde and got me an appointment set up quickly. “Oh I didn’t realize Dr. Snyde was your mom since you don’t have the same last name.”

“Yeah well my parents split up awhile ago and my mom took back her maiden name,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders while clicking away at the computer.

“Don’t worry, patient confidentiality and all that, my eyes don’t see a thing,” he replied as if reading my mind. “So it looks like your having weekly appointments does this day and time work for you every week?”

“Sure,” I nodded my head even though I didn’t know if I would still be seeing Dr. Snyde, I really needed to have a talk with my mom, what was she thinking?

Grier tapped a few things into his computer, his hawaiian blue eyes framed by thick black eyelashes boring into the screen and then handed me a reminder card, our fingers touching briefly as I felt a zap of electricity right down to my toes before he quickly pulled away.

“See you later Wynn.”

“Bye Grier.”

I hurried out to the truck as quick as my feet could take me and slammed the door before sending my mom a quick text:
Need a new doc asap!

There, problem solved. I really couldn’t risk my personal information getting out there in such a small town and although Grier seemed like a nice guy from the little that he actually talked to me, Lexie was definitely not a nice girl. I had witnessed that several times my first week at Gulf Shores with the way she treated people that weren’t in our group. Even with me being Collins cousin she seemed to pick on everything from my clothes, the way I wore my hair, even telling me I was way too quiet to fit in with their group of friends and suggested I moved to a table with the band geeks.

I slid the keys in and pressed down on the gas that seemed to stick and before I knew it I felt a slam and my head bounced forward smacking against the steering wheel.

Oh shit, mom was going to kill me. I looked in the rearview mirror and saw that I had smashed into a telephone pole. Mom was always getting on me about paying attention when I was driving, I always seemed to get distracted when I did and I already had a few minor accidents under my belt.

I gripped the steering wheel trying to think how I was going to explain this one, when I heard a light tapping on the glass and turned to see Grier standing there with an amused look on his face, one corner of his mouth pulled up into a crooked grin. I reluctantly opened the door for him and he leaned in, overwhelming the small cab of the truck with the spicy scent of his cologne.

“Did that telephone pole run into your truck girl?” He asked with an uplift of his brow. He was actually trying to joke with me at a time like this, what is wrong with this boy?

“I’m sorry I wasn’t paying much attention, it seems to happen to me often. Is there much damage back there? Grams is gonna kill me.”

“Well it looks like the bumpers hanging off a bit, let me follow you home. I’ll make sure you don’t lose it on the way.” He reached over and ran his rough thumb across my bottom lip with the gentlest touch. “Damn girl, how hard did you hit that thing?”

He pulled his thumb away that had a few drops of blood on it and I looked up into the mirror to see that my scar had broken up on my lip when my face had introduced itself to the steering wheel.