Sunflower (Clyde Logan x Reader)

Chapter 19

A/N: this whole chapter is from your / Y/N's POV. The next chapter will pick up with Clyde's POV.

You left home that day feeling like you were floating. Surely you were in a fantasy and Clyde was your dream man and you'd wake up and still be a doomed-to-be spinster in this sleepy town in West Virginia, destined to forever clean up after your brother's messes.

But this wasn't some hallucination from your sleep deprived, anxious brain. It was real and Clyde liked you. Really liked you is what he had said, actually, in case "like" and "like like" still held the same distinction they had since middle school. Really liked was serious.

You let the warm and fuzzy feelings of your encounter with Clyde entertain you all the way home, almost forgetting that you had promised your friends you'd meet for a girl's night. You let out a little huff as you opened up your apartment, dropping your bag and moving to go get ready.

A part of you wanted to stay as you were, wanted to immortalize the feeling of Clyde's hand on you, the way he had kissed your neck and made you unravel with just a few simple touches - but your friends were perceptive and you'd already been blowing them off for long enough, having felt antisocial lately. No, you had to look presentable, and more importantly, not smell like sex and sweat.

You hopped in the shower, letting them know that you would be ready by dinner at 6:30 pm, feeling (almost, pathetically) mournful about scrubbing and rinsing off the traces of Clyde as you washed yourself. What was wrong with you?

***

You made it to dinner with a few minutes to spare, finding your friends in a corner booth and sliding in. The usual greetings were exchanged, all of you ordering drinks before diving into catching up. You almost considered getting a sidecar or a mint julep with peach, the drinks Clyde had suggested to you weeks ago, but you wanted him to be the one to make them for you. It seemed like you would be ruining something if you tried them without him, so you ordered a cranberry vodka instead.

You looked around the table, happy to be hanging out with your friends again, having missed them in your period of just wanting to spend some moments by yourself, settling in and getting used to your new environment. Moving outside of the city had made it hard to get together, but it was about time that you all gathered and hung out again. Sometimes a good day with friends was just what was needed to relax and feel like yourself again - especially when your mind had been all scrambled by a Southern gentleman.

You listened to your friends detail their lives as you ate and drank, all but one apart from you in committed relationships. Your other single friend made a joke about at least still having another single lady to rely on, thankful to have a sympathetic ear when things were going badly in the dating world, as was often the case lately. You laughed along but she caught the hesitance in your reaction, suddenly grabbing your hand from across the table.

"You didn't! Are you seeing someone and haven't told us yet?" she squealed, eyes wide as she squeezed your wrist.

"No- no, I'm not," you answered, shaking your head. You tried to break free, look away from the accusatory eye contact and curious faces, but you should have known better, your flush and the buzz of being two drinks in after a long day giving you away.

"You totally are! Spill! Tell us everything!"

"Um... He's very private. And nothing is official yet, so don't get your hopes up," you started, conveniently forgetting to mention that he's in jail. Currently. As in, you're (maybe) dating an inmate and you fucked up.

"Come on, you've gotta have more to tell us than that!" your other friend chimed in, tapping her glass with her long nails before taking a sip. "Don't think we haven't noticed that you've been flaking on us lately. He must be good, in more ways than one. Is he... you know?" she added, holding her hands apart to indicate length.

Your flush only deepened as you groaned. "Oh my god, we are not talking about that. He's sweet and nice and funny and a gentleman and that's all you get right now. And the reason I've been flaking is because sometimes I'd rather just watch a movie and stay home after a long day," you answered, a note of finality coloring your tone.

Your friend narrowed her eyes but didn't press further, turning to the others at the table and pretending to whisper, "Either it's really big and she's holding out on all the juicy details or it's one of those microdicks. No inbetween."

You scowled, rolling your eyes as you refused to engage. God, your friends were insufferable sometimes, but you knew they were just excited for you, wanting to share in your happiness. It was just that this thing, whatever it was with Clyde, seemed special and new, fragile. As if, if you happened to speak about it, then the spell would be broken.

Only two more months until he was out of Monroe County. Then you could introduce him to all of your friends, go on real dates, sleepover at each other's houses, staying up late reading and watching movies together. That is, if the spell wasn't broken before then.

***

Thankfully, your friends knew when to stop pushing a subject and the rest of the dinner was more than enjoyable. You laughed until you cried, listened and added your own two cents every once in a while, reliving the ups and downs of your friends' adventures as you all shared.

As the night was coming to a close and you all ordered dessert, one of your friends mentioned the Hillbilly Heist, asking if you all had heard about the curious case of the money stolen from Charlotte Motor Speedway.

"Hillbilly Heist? No, I haven't heard... Is this recent?" you chimed in, spooning some chocolate cake into your mouth.

"Yeah, just this past weekend. Apparently there was an outage during the big race and then later on they discovered the place was robbed. The weirdest part, though? The money was returned. All of it. An anonymous caller led the cops to a gas station where an abandoned truck was parked with the bags of cash."

"What? That doesn't make any sense," you mused, scrunching your eyebrows together. "Why would you go through all of that and not keep any of it?"

"Dunno. Maybe they were afraid of getting caught - realized they took on more than they bargained for," your friend shrugged, wiping some of the chocolate sauce off of her lips.

You hummed in response and nodded, wondering what was up with the West Virginia air this weekend. A prison riot, a fire and a whole heist on the same day? Weird.

***

The next day, this odd coincidence of events continued to plague your thoughts as you walked into work. Maybe you missed it being a full moon or something, who knows?

You worked quietly and diligently until Clyde finally came for his shift, beaming up at him when you were finally alone. It was crazy how much this man could turn your day around, a smile always waiting for him when he arrived.

"Hi, sweetheart," he grinned back, tilting your chin up to plant a kiss on your lips once it was safe.

"Hi, Clyde," you answered, heart beating fast and cheeks going pink and warm just from that deep voice of his.

"What are we doing today, darlin'?"

"Got some books to ship out and there's a delivery coming in. The next stage of our project is presenting everything so people can vote, and then we get to figure out how to make it happen, so that's on hold until a decision comes back. Should take about a week," you rambled, feeling oddly nervous in Clyde's presence today after being teased by your friends yesterday.

Clyde nodded and moved over to the pile of books you had set out, starting to put them into boxes so they could be delivered to their next destination. Your heart was still racing and your throat felt dry as you worked, brain over thinking about you and Clyde, about whether this would last, could last. So you did what you did best, talked to fill the space so you didn't have time to over think.

"Have you heard about the Hillbilly Heist? The one from this past weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway?"