Charming as Puck(50)

It feels like hanging with one of my best friends.

And I like it.

“Do you ever feel like the dumb one in your family?” Kami asks as she pushes away a mostly-empty plate and sighs happily with her hands on her belly.

“No way. I have like, four entire hockey plays up here all the time.” I tap my temple. “Bet you Felicity doesn’t even understand one of them.”

Kami shakes her head and laughs. “Sorry. Forgot I was talking to Ego Man.”

“You feel dumb?” I ask. “You’re a doctor.”

“I have one doctorate to Atticus and Brynn’s two each.”

I don’t know her brother or sister well, but I know one’s some kind of astrophysicist who writes bestsellers and the other does something with DNA that’s so over my head I don’t even try. Neither one lives in Copper Valley now.

“You still have one up on your cousin,” I point out.

“No making fun of Muffy. She started Muff Matchers after having a nervous breakdown in medical school.”

“I’d have a nervous breakdown in medical school too.”

“No, you wouldn’t. You’d bluff your way through it and convince people the heart actually pumps urine to help the kidneys out when they’re stressed.”

I grin. “You really do know me well.”

“No, you’re just simple.”

I laugh over my orange juice, and she slides her foot up my calf.

I’m hard in an instant. Raging, uncomfortably hard. So hard I can barely swallow the mouthful of juice I’m almost choking on.

She grins at me, and fuck, if I’d known she had this devious side, I would’ve just married her eight months ago.

Whoa.

Whoa.

I sputter out a cough and catch her ankle under the table. “Gonna have to wait,” I tell her as I stroke the ball of her foot, since she slipped her shoe off. “We still have plans.”

“If you’re taking me to the zoo, we can skip it and head back to your place.”

I scoff. “The zoo? Totally unoriginal. And we could head to your place.”

“But I like hanging out with your parents.”

Her eyes are sparkling, her cheeks flushed, and that smile—god, it’s so radiant.

For a dumb old puckhead like me.

“C’mon,” I say, rising to my feet and offering her a hand. “We don’t want to be late.”

“Is this what the keys were about?”

It totally is. “What? No. I just ran out of ideas. Tomorrow you’re getting paperclips.”

“Nick.”

I wave to Elmer, who waves back from the kitchen. I paid him two days ago when I talked him into opening up just for us tonight.

“You need paperclips at the clinic, right? For paperwork and shit?”

“Not the size or quantity of paperclips you’d send if you were actually sending paperclips.”

She might be right. I might be pretty simple to understand.

We leave the building and a blast of cool fall air swirls leaves around the parking lot. She shivers, and I take full advantage of the opportunity to wrap an arm around her shoulder. “You don’t really feel dumb, do you?”

“No, but…I do feel less smart. I thought you might—never mind.”

“What?” I press.

She sighs. “I always thought your ego was overcompensation for being the dumb one too. Not that you’re dumb. Or unsuccessful. You’re just…not Felicity-smart.”

“Or talented,” I agree. “I tried talking without moving my mouth once, and I strained my tongue.”

“You did not.”

She’s hiding a smile as I unlock her door and boost her into the Cherokee. But instead of shutting the door, I lean down so we’re at eye level.

“I didn’t want to be smart,” I tell her, and my heart gives a weird jolt, like it knows what’s coming.

“Not even a little?” she teases lightly.

“Smart kids get bullied. I—” Fuck. I have to clear my throat, because even though it’s been twenty-something years since it happened, it still feels like yesterday.

But if Kami needs to hear why I’m a shithead, then I’m going to tell her.

No matter how much I don’t want to think about it.

She tilts her head, brows drawing together.

“I was little,” I tell her. “For my age. It’s part of why my mom’s so…like she is. I was short and scrawny and I never gained enough weight for the doctors. And the other kids noticed.”

“Did you get picked on?” she asks softly.

“Well…yeah.” And shoved. And kicked. And mocked. Crazy the things the right first-grader will say to make you feel like shit. Especially when you’re a little peewee and your dad’s a huge fucking retired hockey player. “A little.”

“Nick.”

I roll my shoulders back. “Kids are mean. And my dad was fucking huge. Not just tall and built, but known, you know? So I asked to play hockey when I was four so I could learn to be huge too, even if I was little. So, no, Felicity being smart didn’t bother me. Me being a pipsqueak bothered me. I wasn’t gonna be a nerdy pipsqueak on top of it. Especially once I realized how much Felicity needed a tough older brother to protect her, no matter how big I wasn’t. But you—” I squeeze her arm. “You’re perfect. So quit thinking you’re not. Okay?”