“Oh, I see,” Hollis says, turning to face me. “Using me to get to Florida isn’t enough. You’re going to use me to get back at your ex too.”
The smile that crept onto my face while imagining Josh’s annoyance fades.
“I’m kidding.” His words fall out in a hurry, as if realizing how fiercely accusatory he sounded. “Just kidding. Besides, now that I know what Josh did to you, I’m extra into anything that will piss him off.”
“Even if it might make you straight-up enemies instead of frenemies?”
“Especially if it might do that.”
“Okay. Cool,” I say, trying not to let Hollis’s apparent allegiance to me make me feel anything stronger than mildly pleased. “Let’s earn us some dessert.”
Hollis flips the camera on his phone to face us. I take the opportunity to rest my head on his shoulder. To get more of the restaurant’s decor into the frame.Notbecause he smells like the human embodiment of the perfect way to spend a day.
“Smile!”
I grin and watch the screen, waiting for him to join me. But he still looks like a kid who got coal for Christmas.
“No,” I say through my teeth like a terrible ventriloquist. “You need to smile or it looks like I’m holding you hostage.”
“You kind of are, though, aren’t you?”
“Ha ha, very funny. Blame your conscience for not letting you leave me at the airport.”
“You would’ve been perfectly happy winding up on a missing-persons list, yeah, I know.”
Another photo attempt. Another former TV star smile from me and nothing at all from him. “Hollis. Come on. Smile. Or I’m going to have to tickle you.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Don’t be so certain,” I say. “You really don’t know me very well.”
Oh god, there’s that awful grimace-smilethingagain. It’s like in medieval times when people tried to draw lions without ever having seen one and created all sorts of un-lionlike abominations. Except Hollis is managing to do it with his lips and teeth. How can such a handsome face morph into something so horrifying so quickly?
“Ah! No. That’s even worse. Jesus. Gimme that.” I take the phone from his hand, hold it in front of us. “Okay,” I say. “Spitfire dad jokes. Here we go. What do you call a pig who does karate? A pork chop.” The Hollis on the phone’s screen only looks grumpier. “Why do seagulls fly over the sea? Because if they flew over the bay, they’d be bagels.” Nothing. Not even the tiniest lift of the corner of his mouth, even though that joke ishilarious. “Man, you’re a tough crowd. Time to pull out the big guns. Where did Napoleon keep his armies? In his sleevies.” There it is! A response, a slight one, but it’s good enough. I take the picture in the split second before he wipes all evidence of amusement from his face. “There we go,” I say, handing him back his phone. “Now was that so hard, Grumps McGrumperson?”
Hollis ignores me and focuses on typing a caption. “What do you think?” he asks, holding it up for me to see.
Superb dinner with my favorite redheaded time traveler. #JoseNapoleonis
Hisfavorite. The word is like a surprise hug—warm and welcome, but briefly disorienting. Except that’s an extremely specific category... “Oh, I’m your favorite redheaded time traveler, but not your favorite time traveler in general?”
“Well, I mean. There’s Scott Bakula. The entire cast ofHot Tub Time Machine. And the guy in that short-lived show where he gets with Paul Revere’s daughter...”
“Yeah, yeah,” I say. “I get the message. So this is fine, but...” I take his phone again and add#PenelopetothePast,#MillicentWattsCohen,#roadtrip, and a row of heart-eye emojis. “Now it’s perfect.”
“You really don’t need to play it up like that. We’ll get the dessert with the one hashtag, and I’m sure you don’t want the extra attention your name will bring to the post.”
“Usually I wouldn’t, but... I think today I do. It’ll give José some extra exposure, and I really like this place. Plus, do you know how jealous Josh is going to be when he sees this? It will absolutely kill him that I’m using my fame to help you. And he knows I love heart-eye emojis, so he’ll probably realize I had a hand in writing the post. What he stole from me, I’m giving his competition freely.”
Hollis’s eyes trail over my body, their difference in color stark again now that we’re sitting close together. “I do believe there’s a bit of a storm brewin’ under all that sunshine,” he says. And for a split second there’s a different cadence to his voice, a drawl that wasn’t there before. Or maybe I’m imagining it. I don’t know. I’m too distracted by the fact that I’ve got him smiling for real again.
•••
As we leave, I give the taxidermy bear and its yawning mouth a longing look.
“It’s not exactly consistent with the rest of the decor,” Hollis says, following my gaze.
“I want to know what its mouth feels like.”
