Between the Stacks

Chapter 25

Wesley, as it turned out, was a very safe driver.

He kept his hands at the nine o'clock and three o'clock position on the wheel. He checked his mirrors. He used his turn signals. "You've seen a turn signal before, right?" he asked, when he caught me looking.

"Aren't they optional?" I asked, doing my best to blink coquettishly. I'm sure I looked like I had something in my eye.

"The thing is, I don't know if you're joking," he said, and checked his mirrors again.

He gracefully pulled onto the 401, merging effortlessly into a lane packed with other drivers. I'd only driven on the 401 once before, during my driver's test, and I had internally screamed the entire time. I wasn't a fan of the highway at all. ("Driver needs to relax a little," the evaluator had noted in his comments.)

We settled into an uncomfortable silence with only the hum of the road beneath us. Wesley must have noted the same thing, since he turned on the radio. ABBA started blaring.

He changed stations immediately.

"Go back!" I said, because I was a sucker for punishment. I fiddled with the radio until I found the song again. It wasn't Mamma Mia - it was Super Trouper, still a banger - but it was enough to remind us both of the karaoke night. 

Wesley was blushing. Yes, he definitely remembered.

"It wasn't me, you know," he murmured.

"Sorry?"

"I tried to get in touch with you. I think you were ignoring me." He seemed to be concentrating very hard on the road, judging from the way he wouldn't look at me. "It wasn't me who booked Mr. Oodles of Noodles for Riverside."

I blinked. "What?" I thought back to the email that I had indeed ignored from him.

"Jack was such an idiot. I know you can't really judge a guy on meeting him one time - but at the same time, he's a total jerk. But he's a jerk who can draw a crowd, and Scott went ahead and booked him."

Scott, the librarian with braces who had checked out books to me when I was doing reconnaissance at Riverside. Scott, who had also been there during board game night.

"You mean Biscotti?" I asked, remembering Scott's nickname. I was going for a joke, considering that this revelation was a lot to handle. "That's such a Stale Biscotti move."

Wesley laughed. "Yes, it was. I reamed him out for it. He said, and I quote, 'All is fair in love and libraries.' Which was a bit dramatic of him."

I realized it was my turn to say something. I was stuck looking out the window and brooding. For the past few weeks I had assumed it was Wesley who had sold out. The possibility of it being Scott never even registered in my dumb brain.

"I'm sorry," I said. "For ignoring you."

"No worries." Again, he still wasn't looking at me. He cleared his throat, and then pointed at a McDonald's we passed. "A," he said. "McDonald's."

"I'm sorry?" I wasn't following this segue.

"It's the alphabet game." He said this in such a matter-of-fact way that it seemed like a sin for me not to understand.

"I'm not following," I said, trying not to sound like I was five years old.

He pointed at the car ahead of us. "B," he said. "In the license plate."

"Ah," I said, picking up the game. We had to find letters and call out where we saw them. "C," I said, when we passed a Kentucky Fried Chicken on the side of the highway.