“Yo.” Hector nodded at him as he passed his desk.
Rider murmured a response and then took his seat. He leaned over toward Paige, speaking too low for me to hear. I saw her shake her head. He put his hand on her arm. Surprise flickered through me when she jerked away. She slammed her textbook down on the desk, and I thought I heard him sigh.
He glanced over at me. “Hey, Mouse.”
“Hey,” I replied softly.
And that was the extent of what I said to him the entire class, which probably didn’t bode well. I was suddenly so incredibly nervous as we packed up our stuff at the end of the class and Rider waited for me.
“We heading straight over?” he asked.
I nodded, noticing that Paige had already exited the classroom. He arched a brow and said nothing as we filed out of the room, waving goodbye to Hector and Keira. It was a good thing that I was driving, because I could focus on that instead of the internal freak-out that was occurring.
We were heading to the library that was about a twenty-minute drive from the school, and I was white-knuckling it the moment we pulled out of the parking lot.
Rider noticed. Of course. “You doing okay over there?” he asked.
I nodded and then cleared my throat. I wanted to ask him about Paige, but the plug was filling up my throat. So stupid. I never had that problem with him, but I was just too stuck in my head. I needed to get my mouth to work.
“Is...is everything okay with...you and Paige?” It was painful but I managed to get the words out.
A moment passed. “Not really.”
“Do...you want to talk about it?” I asked.
“No.”
“Okay,” I breathed.
“I want to talk about anything other than that right now,” he added. “Okay?”
I tightened my grip on the steering wheel as I glanced up at the red stoplight. I could do that even though I was more than curious about the whole Paige situation now. But there was so much I wanted to know about him.
“How...did you...?” I glanced up at the red stoplight, mentally stringing together a litany of curse words until my tongue untied. I was so nervous it was like it was two years ago. “How did you start working at...the garage?”
He didn’t answer immediately, because I probably caught him off guard with the pure randomness of my question.
I flushed and squeezed down on the steering wheel. “I... I was just wondering about it. So I thought I’d ask. Sorry.”
“No. No, it’s cool.” When I peeked at him, he was staring out the windshield. “Razorback Garage is about a block or so from where I live. So I saw the owner—Drew—often. We talked whenever we crossed paths, you know? Sometimes I would hang out at the garage, because they had this detailer who did amazing work. Anyway, about a year ago or so, I got busted for tagging—unrelated to the school thing.”
“You get...caught a lot,” I said, turning right.
“Ha. Yeah. Apparently. Anyway. Drew ended up hearing about it. So when I saw him again, he asked me to show him some of my stuff. And I did. He liked it. Thought it was pretty cool. The rest is history.”
I slowed for another stoplight. “That’s really...amazing.”
“I’m lucky,” he replied, grinning then. “Drew pays me pretty good.”
“Because you’re really good at what you do,” I told him.
The dimple appeared. “I could, um, show you some of my work at the garage if you want? I mean, it’s not that exciting and you’d probably like to do something else, but—”
“I’d love to.” My heart was tripping over itself.
His dimple hung around for that.
“Do you...save the money from working?” I asked.
“Nah. I spend it all on liquor and girls.”
I shot him a look.
Rider chuckled. “Yeah, I save the money. I’m eighteen, going to graduate in May. Need to be looking toward the future. Got to get a place. The checks will stop coming in and even though I know Mrs. Luna wouldn’t kick me out, it isn’t right. She’ll have to bring in another kid.”
At the library, I pulled into the parking lot and searched for a space. “What about college?”
“Ah, I don’t see that in my future to-do list.”
“Why?” I didn’t understand. “You’re...really smart. College will probably be a breeze for you.”
He shifted in the seat. “I don’t know. That costs money, Mouse, and I’m not saving up that kind of money.”
“But there are scholarships and grants.” Finding a parking spot near the back, I eased in and turned off the car. I looked over at him. “What about that?”
A muscle flexed along his jaw. “Yeah, I know, but...I just don’t see it in my future. I mean, hell, people would probably fall over dead from shock if my ass ended up in college.”
I frowned. “I wouldn’t.”
He glanced over at me as he unlocked his seat belt and his grin tipped up a notch. “You’ve changed. A lot. But there are still things about you that are the same.”