Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 59713 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 299(@200wpm)___ 239(@250wpm)___ 199(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59713 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 299(@200wpm)___ 239(@250wpm)___ 199(@300wpm)
“Yeah. Who was it with? You didn’t even tell me,” I said.
She grinned, and I knew there was only one option for who it was.
“Gus,” she said, confirming my suspicions. “He finally asked me out.”
“That’s great,” I said. “I’m so happy for you. Did you have fun? What did you do?”
“Well, the date didn’t end until this morning.”
I giggled and got another pancake out of the takeout container to eat while she gave me all the details. This was fantastic. I was so damn happy good things were happening to us. I just hoped they could last.
CHAPTER 16
ALEX
All day yesterday I spent my time with my family mostly with my phone in my hand. It was an unwritten rule that Sunday dinners at Noah’s house were supposed to be technology-free, or at least during the meal portion of it. But when my phone buzzed in my pants, I made an excuse to get up and go shoot off a return message. Around the third time, Noah passed me coming back on his way to the kitchen and smirked.
“Why don’t you just keep the phone out at the table?” he asked. “Honestly, it’s less distracting than thinking you suddenly have a bladder the size of a walnut.”
I laughed and stuck the phone in my back pocket.
“All done for now,” I said. “Promise. No more messages until we’re on the couches.”
The usual transition from dinner table to couches was punctuated by a series of phones being picked up and emails and social media being checked. As the resident tech guy of the household, it was also when my brothers asked me whatever question they had about why their device wasn’t working correctly, or which new phone would be the better one for them to buy or if I had any insight on tech stocks to watch.
It made me feel good that they valued my opinion as much as they did, but it was also a little trying at times. Cameron was pretty tech savvy, on account of being on his phone rather often checking his investments. Noah was more comfortable with old flip phones and still thought everyone was referencing the robot from Return to Oz when they talked about TikTok. Derek was a bit more tech savvy than Noah, but mostly only in that he could look up recipes on his phone and operate streaming video and music services. Otherwise, he had no clue. That left Kane, who was also pretty tech conscious, especially when it involved grapes or wine. However, that’s pretty much where it ended. If it didn’t have to do with wine or making wine, he didn’t care about it. I kind of admired his one-track sensibility.
Still, it didn’t fully stop the teasing comments from my brothers about who and what I was texting about. At least they had moved on from the sick-girl angle and on to the general comments about how my phone was already in my hand so much that now it had grafted into my palm or how I was part man-part Samsung now. Some of the comments were genuinely funny, and as the game on the television wound up, they died down somewhat, focusing more on the game than on me.
Monday morning came, and they were right back at it though. I didn’t mind so much. The text thread with Camilla had been one of the more interesting and entertaining ones I’d had in a long, long time. Not even Jax or Kent could keep up with how consistently fun it was to answer those messages. Usually with Jax or even Leo, it became kind of a chore to see what new thing they were blabbering on about.
Sometimes it got better when they drank. And sometimes when they drank, it got so much worse.
I was glad to not have any of them bug me that morning though as I found myself running a bit late into work. None of the other brothers happened to see me, and I was the only one other than Cam who ever saw the timecards, so it didn’t matter much to anyone other than myself. I hated being late, but that was the way things worked out when two eighteen-wheelers decided to have a reverse drag race, spending ten miles going twenty miles an hour. At least that’s how it felt.
Still, I was in a good mood. The texts from Camilla had started before I even woke up, and I had gotten at least two since being in the car. My car was connected to the phone wirelessly and read out the comments, though I couldn’t respond to them. She was funny, and the messages made me laugh through the aggravation of traffic.
I wondered if this was what it was like to have a real relationship. I had never really had one of those. Not one that started slowly at least. As in one that didn’t start with ending up in bed with someone and then trying to figure the rest of it out afterward. And then they fizzled out within a week, mostly because I stopped communicating because we had nothing to talk about. Other than sex.