“You were in it a couple of times this morning.”
I was mid-swallow when she said that, making me realize what she’d meant by her “car,” and I started to cough. Not only because she made a sexual reference in front of her family—granted, none of them would’ve gotten it—but I’d mentally called her car a clunker, and I couldn’t stop thinking what would’ve happened had I actually said that out loud when I thought it.
She didn’t even give me a chance to regain my composure before throwing a wink at me and walking away. Matt seemed a little confused, but he didn’t question anything. I wasn’t sure how I’d respond if he did. However, that didn’t stop anyone else from taunting me.
Steve was the first to mention my dating life—or lack thereof. He thought it was hilarious how Janelle managed to kill my game. I laughed along with him, but not at his joke. I laughed because he thought I had a game to begin with. Janelle didn’t “cock-block” me like Shane had insinuated, but I wasn’t about to admit anything. If they wanted to believe I was a player who entertained women all the time, then who was I to tell them differently? Matt knew I wasn’t, though. Thankfully, he didn’t speak up. Instead, he sat there and laughed with us, everyone having fun at my expense.
Finally having enough of their mocking, I got up and walked away. They hadn’t pissed me off, and honestly, I found much of their statements comical, but I was tired of hearing them essentially put Janelle down. It wasn’t on purpose or done with malice, considering they all loved her, but it irritated me all the same. But the breaking point was when Tony referenced us playing house. As soon as he said I had it made because I had a woman in the kitchen who had her own room and her own bank account, I couldn’t take any more. I told them I needed a beer and excused myself.
They had a large cooler by the pool, where the women were. Christine and Janelle sat on the edge with their feet in the water, talking to Nikki, who floated in the shallow end. Stacey and her mom were off to the side, applying lotion to Stacey’s two kids, Alex and Kinsley, while Rachel fed her daughter on a lounge chair.
“Holden, come here.” Nikki waved me over. “We need a man’s opinion on something.”
I decided this was my golden opportunity to really get under Janelle’s skin, so rather than just go over there, I took off my T-shirt and stepped into the water. Janelle groaned beneath her breath, but I ignored it. “Hello, ladies. What would you like my opinion on?”
“A woman’s appearance.” Nikki smiled and wagged her brows while Janelle groaned and covered her face. “Imagine there are two women standing side by side, one has on jeans and a T-shirt, and the other has on a skirt and blouse, think executive style. The one with jeans has her hair in a ponytail and the other has hers styled. Which one would you look at? As in…which one would you be interested in?”
“I’m going to need far more information than that. Such as…the woman in jeans, are they tight and fitted, or loose and baggy? And this T-shirt you speak of…is it one of those that cuts low and shows off cleavage, fitted so it hugs the waist and hips? Or is it something she grabbed from the men’s rack in Wal-Mart?”
Nikki snickered and shook her head in disbelief. “Should’ve known not to expect a simple answer from you, but fine. Tight and fitted to all the above. And before you ask, the other girl’s clothes are just as tight. So now…which one would you choose?”
I pretended to think some more before asking, “Are they nice or bitchy? I mean, which one seems more approachable? And more importantly, what are they doing? Are they talking to each other, like would I be interrupting a conversation, or are they strangers?”
“You’re impossible,” Janelle said with a laugh. “I told you he wouldn’t give you a real answer.”
“Oh, I will. I just need all the facts first. You can’t give me two vague options and expect me to pick one. For instance, what if the girl in jeans has a disgusted look on her face? That would be enough to make me not approach her. Is the woman in the skirt standing flirtatiously, just waiting to pull the next victim into her web? If so, I probably wouldn’t come within ten feet of her.”
Nikki paused for a moment, appearing to process my words. “Explain.”
It took everything in me to not look at Janelle when I spoke, because if I did, I’d give myself away. “If I approach someone, it wouldn’t be for a random hookup. I have no interest in that anymore. So if I stopped what I was doing to go speak to a woman, it would have to be someone I would want to become acquainted with. If she doesn’t look like she could have fun lounging around on the couch with me on a lazy Saturday afternoon, then I wouldn’t give two shits what she wore. It’d be a waste of my time. My ideal woman is someone who can joke and even laugh at herself when the occasion calls for it. If someone isn’t comfortable in their own skin, then I have no interest in her.”
“But how would you know all that by simply looking at her?”
“Easy.” I chanced a glance at Janelle and almost became sidetracked by the shadow of a grin dancing at the corners of her mouth. “It’s in the expressions. It’s easy to tell if a smile is genuine or not. And you can’t fake an effortless laugh. Even without hearing the sound, you can tell by the way her head tilts back and how much she closes her eyes if it’s the kind that’s capable of breathing life back into you. Because that’s the kind of laughter everyone needs around them. We all have crappy days, but the one thing that can make them better is when you come home to that sound.”
“You are thinking far too much into this,” Nikki said with a giggle, bringing me back to the present. “And you’re clearly the wrong person to ask. I told Janelle she needs to update her wardrobe if she ever expects to grab a man’s attention, and she said if a guy isn’t okay with her clothes then she doesn’t want him.”
“I’m sorry, Nik…but I have to agree with your sister on this one.” I stared at Janelle, waiting for her to say something else, but she didn’t. Instead, she narrowed her gaze at me, twisted her lips to the side like I’d seen her do dozens of times, and then nodded to herself, as if having an entire one-sided conversation in her head.
However, nothing shocked me more than the perceptive grin on Christine’s lips.
“What did I just walk into?” Stacey asked while stepping into the pool. “Everyone got so quiet.”
We all chimed in with “oh, nothing” at the same time, which only served to make us seem like we were hiding something. I was about to get out and leave them, unable to handle the stares and silent suspicions, when Janelle turned to Stacey and said, “I’m glad to see you’re not hovering on death’s doorstep.”
“What do you mean?” Stacey showed genuine confusion, as well as the rest of us.