Page 7 of A Fighting Chance

What book is this again? Fuck.

The words blur almost immediately and I’m unable to concentrate. I pinch the bridge of my nose and rub the hair along my jawline.

I can do this; I can focus. I can absolutelynotthink about Lyla—and apparently my lust for her. I cannot think about how I want to walk over to her room, knock on her door, and attempt to kiss her face off when she opens it.

No, Gentry. No.You can’t do that.

She may not appreciate me attempting to suck her face off. My lust for Lyla Whitney is very real and very deeply rooted in the fact that her body is something that belongs in a museum. A dirty, sexy museum for the blind so you can feel your way around. Because if there was ever a body built for touching, it’s hers. Just looking at it makes me think terribly delicious things. Most of which I’m pretty sure are legal in most states but I can’t be sure until I do the research.

When Nan had taken out one of her photo albums and flipped through Lyla’s section, I felt like trash. Actual trash. No, trash juice. Here Nan was—the sweetest, kindest old lady— showing me pictures of her lovely granddaughter, and I was staring down at eighteen-year-old Lyla in a sleek prom dress feeling like a dirty old man. Nan had flipped through senior pictures, of Lyla running during her cross-country meets, her college graduation, and then a vacation where she was in a bikini something like ninety percent of the time, and I felt like I was going to die. I finally had to make an excuse to stop looking at the photos. I was a dirty bird, the dirtiest of birds, in need of a cold ass shower.

So, naturally, when Harper announced Lyla’s impending arrival, my palms started sweating, my throat dried up, and all my clothes itched. I was excited—reallyexcited. My mouth had basically been dry all the way up until I saw her in person. And let me tell you, the photos didn’t do her justice.

Her big, hazel eyes impaled me. And her lips. Good god, her lips are the perfect shade of pink I’ve ever seen. I want to bite them—no, Ineedto bite them. I had half a mind to try right there in the bathroom after about forty-three seconds, but I resisted my urges for this thing called being a fucking gentleman and not a creep.

I set my book back down on the table because it’s clear I’m not getting anywhere with that tonight. Then I hear the bathroom door open and shut, followed by Lyla’s feet moving quietly across the floor before her door opens and closes. I resist the desire to leap from my bed and bound after her like an idiot.

What am I, some kind of lust-sick puppy?

Get ahold of yourself, man.

I’m glad I managed to keep my composure in the bathroom but there are only maybe two hundred and twenty-seven more possible interactions over the next few days with countless conversations and opportunities to be an idiot.

Awesome.

Lying down in my bed, I reach back and stack my pillows before turning my lamp off. Then it’s just me and the dark. I really hate these times. In time, I learned to push myself past tired before getting in bed so sleep would come quickly. But on nights like these, with too much on my mind, I stare up at my ceiling.

My thoughts drift from Lyla to Cassie and back to Lyla. What an odd mix of emotions.

I don’t have leftover romantic feelings for Cassie, but a loss is still a loss and the accompanying emotions still linger. Many nights, I find myself examining what Cassie and I had, what went wrong, and how it ended the way it did.

Now, it’s like a tennis match in my mind. Lust on one side and loss on the other. I let the ball volley back and forth a few times before planting it firmly on lust’s side, deciding it’s far less severe for bedtime thoughts.

I finally fall asleep, thoughts of Lyla arresting any others.

As I doze off, I wonder if it’s possible, if I have even the smallest chance to be with her. Sure, I know she isn’t here to stay. I know she has to go home eventually. But while she is here, while we can, why not? People can have fun, enjoy each other. And then people can shake hands at the end and go their separate ways and there is nothing wrong with that.

A man has to try, anyway.

Five

Lyla

I smell bacon.Eggs. Baked goods. But most importantly, I smell coffee—the nectar of the gods. I roll and stretch, forgetting for a moment too long where I am before I stretch right off my bed.

That’s right.

I lose my bearings, roll to my right, and fall off the bed. Because this is not my queen pillowtop in my Boston apartment. It is the full-size bed in my former bedroom in the backwoods of Kentucky. And I land with a gracelessthudon the cold hardwood floor, not even an area rug between us. If I wasn’t awake before, I am now. I still want coffee, but I don’t need it at this point.

I lie there on the floor for a few seconds and then hear the door to my room fly open somewhere behind my head. I look up, the door essentially upside down to me now, and see Harper and Gentry in the doorway.

Great. Just Great.

“What happened?” Harper asks, her eyes searching over my body, trying to make sense of why exactly I’m on the floor.

I cover my face with my hands. “I fell,” I say flatly.

“Off the bed?” she asks, her amusement beginning to crack through her concerned surface.