Page 58 of Fundamentals of Being a Good Girl
Fern snickers as Leo gives her a wink.
“No sketchy donations,” Sloane says. “At least not yet. If Fern is going to win this thing, we need it to be above reproach.”
Leo rolls his eyes and Fern skips off. “I have to go tell Jules!”
“Love you, sweetie!” Bram calls after her as he yanks the orange T-shirt over his head and tosses it right in Leo’s face, which I’m sure is the first time his skin has ever come in contact with a polyester blend. “Cover for me.”
“I’m not a volunteer,” Leo clarifies. “I’m a sponsor.”
“What’s the difference?” Bram asks.
Sloane grins. “One has money and the other doesn’t.”
“Maddie and I are going to check on the kids,” Bram tells the Saint James pair. “Be useful.”
“Usefulness is so plebeian. You won’t even let me buy my goddaughter the student government office she is rightfully owed,” Leo calls as we press into the crowd and Bram’s hand innocently hovers over the small of my back, his head shaking.
Behind us I can hear Leo and Sloane arguing over the fact that Joey is Fern’s actual godfather. Leo calmly counters by saying that Joey is the royally appointed godfather and that Leo is the prime minister godfather elected by popular vote.
Terrell Farms is a historic working farm and former township just outside Mount Astra. It’s the sort of place that exists for the sake of field trips and events just like this. And for the occasional wedding, if barn weddings are your thing. There are endless activities. Apple bobbing, face painting, cider stands, and hayrides.
“The twins should be pumpkin bowling with Jules and Fern,” I tell Bram.
With his height, he only has to turn his head to confirm their location. But even with his memorable altitude, in this thronging sea of people, we are almost anonymous. It’s too crowded for anyone to notice when his fingers wrap around my wrist and tug. “This way.”
“What do you have in mind, Professor Loe?”
“We need to talk,” he says
Well, that doesn’t sound very sexy. Bram’s been on edge for the last week, but I chalked it up to each of the three kids passing around a stomach bug. We haven’t been alone together for days now, because if the currently sick kiddo wasn’t with me, they were with Bram. He’d been on all-night dad duty with puke buckets and a rotation of kids curling up in his bed, except for Fern, who insisted on medicating with couch-and-documentary time.
His fingers slide against my palm until they’re intertwined with mine. To an outsider, we might just look like two people together in a crowd trying to stay together, but this moment of us holding hands in public is not lost on me. An overwhelming part of me wants to let go and lose myself among the young families and rowdy teenagers, because even though I love the feeling of safety that comes with my hand tucked into Bram’s, I am also fighting a sense of claustrophobia that tightens my throat.
But we’re just fucking, I remind myself. He’s pulling me along so that I don’t get lost. He’s not trying to publicly claim me or cage me into another long-term relationship where I am solely defined by my partner. We are simply holding hands. And having sex. A lot.
“You make it sound like I’m in trouble,” I tell him in the hopes of distracting myself and getting a reaction from him.
“You very well might be,” he says as we turn the corner around the side of the corn maze. But his tone isn’t playful like it normally is.
In the distance behind the corn maze is a small white building that Bram seems to be walking toward. We’re free of the crowd, and still, he holds my hand.
“What’s going on?” A dozen different possibilities swirl in my head. Does the agency know I’ve broken their fraternization policy? What if Sara is pissed that I’m living in the house even though she seemed cool about it at first? Maybe one of the Andromeda Club members said something that made her change her mind?
“What do you want to do next, Madelyn?”
Next?
He asks it the same way your favorite teacher—the one whose attention you’re always starved for—would, making it sound casual. Except it’s not. It’s one of those big, impossible questions.
“Well, getting an apartment is the priority.”
“If none of that mattered,” he says. “It does, obviously. But in the future. Teaching... is that what you want?”
A gust of wind whips around us, and Bram lets go of my hand only to pull me closer against his side.
My body sags against his. “I’ve missed this.”
“It’s been a very long week.”
