I’m such an idiot.
Maybe she actually is tired. She looked tired. Not that I would ever tell her that. She still looked beautiful, but she really didn’t get to rest over the weekend with her parents being here, and now, I’ve thrown this into the mix.
I should just lay it out in front of her. Maybe I will after Friday night.
20 Pepper
Friday night, I sit at the checkout counter, silently fuming to myself that Ben is going on a date. It’s my fault. I should have acted sooner. I should have told him how I felt. I should have taken him for myself, but no, I let fear win out, and here I am, a loser sitting at my job tonight, while Ben is out on a hot date. Probably with a six-foot-tall model type with large, perky breasts and a stick-thin body. The complete opposite of me. I’m short. I have curves. My breasts have become friends with gravity.
With my scowl, I’ve scared off half of the customers sitting and painting in the store, and now, no one is asking any questions.
Paint is right there. Can’t you see the station that is clearly labeled PAINT?
Okay, I admit that I didn’t actually say that, but I thought it.
I shove back from the counter and head to the room directly behind the checkout area to rearrange the pottery placed on racks for the third time since I got here. They aren’t perfectly aligned yet, and I need them to be. I’m itching to grab a piece of blank pottery and sit down at a table, completely losing myself to the creative task, but I’m destined to stay here and think that Ben might be on his last first date ever with the absolute love of his life.
What if they invite me to the wedding? Of course they would invite me to the wedding. I couldn’t say no. I would have to go. I think I would rather gouge my eyes out with the blunt end of a paintbrush at the freaking paint station than sit through a wedding where I had to watch Ben kiss a six-foot-tall bimbo.
The bell over the door chimes, and I sigh. I close my eyes and bring my hands up, shaking them out and visualizing all the tension leaving my body. I head back toward the counter, smiling as I begin to welcome the newest customers.
“Welcome to P—” My words cut off, and I’m pretty sure if I had been sitting on a stool, I would have fallen off and onto the floor.
Ben and his date are standing in front of me. I think my entire face drains of color, and a small layer of sweat breaks out on my upper lip. I covertly reach over for a tissue while their eyes follow my progress, and my hand slaps the desk several times before I find the tissue box. Ben’s face looks white, like he can’t believe he’s here right now but it’s his date. He shouldn’t be surprised.
I clear my throat and smile broadly. “Welcome to Pottery Palace. Can I help you?” I decide to go with a formal approach, especially given Ben’s weirdness to me.
“Hi, um …” The girl squints to read my name tag, and I shift, so it’s closer to her face and her apparent nearsightedness. “Pepper. What a fun name.” She says fun as if she doesn’t really mean it.
“Yep,” I say, somehow keeping a smile on my face after the entire fifteen seconds it took her to read my name tag and formulate her witty response.
“Hey, uh, Pep. What do we do?” Ben leans forward, placing his hands on the counter in front of us, not really looking at me.
I study the length and width of them as if I were memorizing them to sculpt later before finally dragging my gaze back up to his.
“Pep? You guys know each other?” His date cocks a finely manicured eyebrow on her attractive face, and she tucks a strand of her straight blonde hair behind one ear.
“I’m his roommate,” I say with another wide smile, probably one that looks like I could be a manic serial killer.
“Oh,” she says, furrowing her brow and looking between me and Ben before she steps closer to him and wraps a hand around his arm. Exactly where mine was wrapped the day he took me on errands.
That’s my spot on his arm, woman.
“I didn’t know we were coming here until I pulled up,” Ben says, and I’m not sure if he’s explaining himself to me or his date.
“So, you pick out what you want to paint, and then all the supplies—brushes, stencils, paint, and palettes—are over there.” I jerk my thumb toward the wall. “You pay once you’re done. It takes about a week to finish the cooking and setting process, and then you can come pick it up. Or I can bring it home to Benjamin, if you’d prefer.” I give the date another smile as she frowns at me.
“We can pick them up, no problem,” she says.
We. We, we, we.
“Great!” My voice sounds fake, even to my ears. “Can I get a name for the ticket?”
“Ben and Caroline,” Caroline supplies, a smirk on her face.
“Okay. Y’all are all set. Have a seat wherever,” I say, pasting a smile on. I mentally congratulate myself on keeping it together and not launching across the counter like a spider monkey and pulling every bit of Caroline’s blonde hair from her skull.
I busy myself with typing on the computer, cleaning up the desk area, filing paid tickets, and putting the containers, stapler, tape, and odds and ends in perfect rows. I most definitely do not watch them pick pottery—Ben gets a dog, and Caroline picks out a doughnut coffee mug—or paint—Ben’s dog
