“Were you eavesdropping?” I ask, trying to see myself through his eyes. With my kilt and ruthlessly orange hair. The color rivals that of a perfectly baked autumn leaf. But since redheads make up less than 2 percent of the entire world population, I don’t have it in me to dye it.
He raises his arm, gesturing to a little pack in his hand. “I came to buy this.”
“Lip pencil?” I cock an eyebrow. “To go with your fake lashes?”
There’s a dark edge behind his smile, and it calls to me to come closer, peer in.
“Fine.” He shrugs. “I came in to give your friend a piece of my mind but stayed for the entertainment. Sue me.”
“Sorry about that.” I chuckle. “Pippa’s cool, you know. In a sometimes-I-want-to-duct-tape-your-mouth-but-I’ll-always-love-you kind of way.”
“If you say.”
“I do say. Of course I say. I’ll say it again and again. She is my best friend.”
Somewhere in the back of my head I recognize that I’m displaying extremely odd behavior here. But I want to keep the conversation going.
“You two are different.”
“Why? Because she’s Miss Popular and I’m goth?”
“Yeah,” he says flatly.
This guy is a real rebel. An OG. Not like me and my aesthetically cute septum piercing.
Then he says, “Mainstream people aren’t revolutionary. Nothing good ever comes out of them. Average equals comfort.”
“Is there a compliment hidden somewhere in this sentence?” I squint.
His lips hitch up slightly. I feel light all of a sudden. As if I could drift like a balloon if he continues giving me his drugging attention. “Do you want there to be?”
I think, despite his blank tone, that he is not as nonchalant as he wants me to believe he is. My heart roundhouse kicks my rib cage. But since hope is a great recipe for crashing and burning, I try to examine it from all angles. Maybe he is here for my glamorous, eccentric friend, and I’ll soon be left with one of his wingmen while he woos her. I’ve spent countless nights in awkward conversation with random guys while Pippa was flirting up a storm. It doesn’t normally faze me, but this time, I know it’s going to sting if he wants her.
“What are you listening to?” He changes the subject, jerking his chin toward the earphones slung over my shoulders, just when I ask, “So, are you here on vacation, or . . . ?”
We both laugh. I answer first. “The best song to ever be recorded in the entire world.”
“‘Never Gonna Give You Up,’ by Rick Astley?” His eyes widen comically.
More laughter. “No, but you’re in the right decade.”
“Challenge accepted.” He rubs his palms together. I can tell his interest is piqued. “Let’s see.” He gives me a slow once-over, taking me in, like the answer is written across my shirt. “I’m going with ‘Where Is My Mind?’ by the Pixies.”
“You would be wrong, my friend.” I turn my phone around to show him the iTunes app still dancing on my screen. “‘Save a Prayer,’ by Duran Duran.”
“Shit. That’s a really good song.”
“My mom’s favorite.” My smile feels like it’s about to split my face.
“Your turn.” He raises his phone in the air, then scrolls and picks a song. “What’s on my iTunes right now?”
“Give me a decade.”
“Nineties.”
“That barely narrows it down.” I lean against a row of lubricants. “I want to give you the credit for listening to something that’s not ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit.’”
“Why, thank you for indulging me. Think British.” He grins.
I frown, thinking. “‘Don’t Look Back in Anger,’ by Oasis.”
“Final answer?”
Hesitantly, I nod. “Yes.”
He turns his phone around, and I see that I was right. Whoa. Holy crap. Have I just met the male version of myself?
“How’d you do that?” he says, looking at me differently. Like I’ve passed some sort of test.
“By the power of deduction. In the war between Blur and Oasis, you are definitely for the working-class band. And also that guitar solo.”
“I just think it’s funny to find a fellow American Anglophile . . . in Spain.”
“My mom’s English. What’s your excuse?”
“Don’t have one.” He shrugs. “Sometimes you’re just born in the wrong place. And decade. And era.”
“Too true,” I hear myself say. “Now your turn to answer my question.”
His face fascinates me. It’s like I’ve never seen a human before. This is not normal Everlynne behavior. Typically, when I meet another person, I count back the minutes until I can say goodbye to them. It’s not that I hate people. I even like some of them. But I prefer to spend my time with my carefully curated books, music, and pets. Those three have rarely let me down.
“I—” Smoker Dude starts, but Pippa barges into our conversation, waving two plastic bags in her hands.
“Here. I bought a crapload of chocolate. I’m PMS-ing. Are you PMS-ing? Ever since our cycles started to sync, I feel like I—” She stops when she notices Smoker Dude (what’s his name, anyway?). I’m yet again mortified that now he not only knows my entire sexual history but also all about my menstruation cycle.
“. . . Hi?” She cocks her head in confusion.
He reaches into her plastic bag, grabs a chocolate bar, tears the wrapper, and eats it in one clean bite. “Hello, cigarette snatcher.”
Pippa’s mouth is agape. “What else do you eat like that?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“I would, actually.” She throws him a sultry smile.
He gives her a bored bad-boy stare of the type that convinces teenyboppers to buy posters.
I look between them, nervous that I’m witnessing an epic falling-in-love moment.
I suddenly realize that I really, really don’t want to hear from her how he kisses. I don’t want to aww and ahh and pretend that I’m happy for her after the inevitable happens and they sleep together. The more they stare at each other, the more cold sweat forms over my skin. Until it becomes unbearable. The silence. The prospect of Pippa and Smoker Dude locking lips in a dim corner of a Barcelonese nightclub to a slow Arctic Monkeys song while I engage in mindless conversation with one of his buddies.
Whatever happened to Mainstream people aren’t revolutionary?
Pippa opens her mouth, no doubt to flirt with him. Something seizes me. I grab her by the wrist and pull her away. She is stumbling behind me, trying to yank herself free. But I’m propelled by fear and motivation.
“What are you doing?” she demands. “Ugh, he gave me big-dick energy! Let’s go back.”
“Nope.” The air-conditioned pharmacy spits us out to the tree-lined avenue. “I’m not going to let you fall in lust and disrupt our entire girls’ trip by planning your schedule around some guy.”
Apparently, this is the reason for our early departure. I pulled it out of my ass, but now that it’s here, it’s my hill to die on.
“Oh my God, you nutcase. Is that why you did this?” She stops when we’re on the corner of the street, then slaps my hand away. “You thought I was about to hit on him?”