Accidentally Amy(51)

Izzy: Oops I just made the guinea pig sound.
Blake: On my way.
Izzy: YESSSSS.
Blake: I seem to recall you saying that a lot last night.
Izzy: I pretty much chanted it.
Blake: Fucking amazing night, Shay.
Izzy: That reads like a verb. Also - agreed, Phillips.
Blake: I’m pretty sure I saw God that last time.
Izzy: No, that was me, silly.
Blake: My mistake, Goddess.
Izzy: #newnickname
Blake: #youwish
Izzy: #drivecarefully
Blake: #iwill

Chapter 16

Blake
“Pleeeeease?” Izzy squealed, shaking his arm with both her hands as she grinned up at him. “Come on; you know you want to.”
Blake looked down at her upturned face and wondered if he was capable of telling her no. “You just told me that your legs cramp if you don’t run a slow mile cooldown.”
“But,” she said, blinking fast as she tried to convince him. “I ran slower than usual today so I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
“That was slow?”
“Sure,” she shrugged, clearly lying through her teeth.
The run had been entertaining, with Izzy trash-talking the entire time about how fast she was while simultaneously telling him to slow down. So she could beat him. She was competitive and quick, childish and funny, and he kind of never wanted to run alone again.
But he’d made the mistake of convincing her they should run to the Old Market, which was his favorite route on weekend mornings, but and now he couldn’t get her to move.
Because it was the first day of the fall festival.
The brick roads of the downtown area were all shut down, transformed into a cacophony of autumnal offerings that were punctuated by hay bales and scarecrows. Vendors lined the streets with their gourds, pumpkins, face painting and potted chrysanthemums, and small crowds of people were already strolling the area with steaming cups of hot apple cider and freshly-brewed coffee in-hand.
“Look,” she said, pointing to a food stand on the other side of the road. “If you do this, Chesty, I will buy you one of ‘Paula’s Protein-Packed Breakfast Sandwiches.’ I bet that sounds yummy to someone like you, right?”
She grabbed his hand, lacing her fingers through his, and begged, “Come on, Blake – festival with me.”
Something about the feel of her small hand, sliding against his and squeezing, made his chest tight. He looked down at her freckled nose as she squinted up at him, and he wondered if she could see everything he felt for her on his face.
He swallowed and said, “First of all, festival isn’t a verb.”
“Debatable,” she said as she started walking, pulling him along with her. A woman with a golden retriever in a pumpkin costume walked past, and two kids with footlong corn dogs ran in the other direction.
It seemed to Blake that corn dogs before noon was a mistake.
“Second of all,” he said, “I love Paula’s PPBS’s and will absolutely take you up on your offer. I’ll even buy one for you.”
“Ugh, no, thank you,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “I’m holding out for a donut.”
“You can’t get a donut,” he said, clueless as to how she could stand eating so much garbage. “Everything here is either seasonal or organic.”
“Says you,” she muttered, leading him toward a bakery booth. “With God as my witness, I will find a donut.”
And she did. Five minutes later, she sprinted down the block to the gas station and emerged with a cold, hard, day-old donut that made her beam.
“Doesn’t count,” he said, shaking his head. “Not a festival donut.”
“Really?” she said, taking a huge bite and saying with a full mouth and laughing eyes, “Because I think it does.”
“Did you actually eat half of a donut in one bite?” he asked, genuinely in awe of her as she attempted to chew the enormous mouthful.
She just nodded and chewed.
After that she bought him his sandwich, and he was eating the last bite when Izzy stopped at a booth full of fresh flowers. She was standing on her tiptoes, pointing toward a huge bouquet of sunflowers – damn, her legs were gorgeous – when the vendor pointed at Blake and said, “It’s you!”
Izzy looked back and forth between the vendor and Blake with raised eyebrows, and he stopped chewing and felt his face get warm as he realized who she was. The woman working the flower stand was the woman he’d bought flowers from the day before.
“Hello,” he said.
“Did she like the flowers?” she asked him, then turned her attention to Izzy and repeated, “Did you like the flowers?”
Izzy’s mouth slid into a wide smile and she nodded, looking like she wanted to laugh. “I loved them – they were gorgeous.”
“Of course they were,” the woman said, speaking to Izzy in a conspiratorial tone, as if Blake wasn’t there. “He was a real poo-poo about picking them out. I showed him four bouquets before finally finding one good enough for this guy.”
“Is that right?” she asked, giving Blake a huge grin and handing the woman a ten dollar bill.
He rolled his eyes.
Izzy did laugh, then, grabbing the flowers. “He is a poo-poo about his flowers.”
Blake grabbed her free hand and yanked her away from the booth, saying, “Come festival with me, Shay.”
That made her cackle, a sound that made him burn.
She got a calf cramp on the next block, which was how he ended up giving her a piggyback ride. Never, in his wildest dreams, would he have imagined that hauling a woman with an armful of flowers around on his back while dodging face painters and balloon-animal artists would go down as one of his very best days.