Becca by Dean Krystek Read Free Book Online Page B

a Bert act?”
    “You’re really getting on my nerves.” She sipped her coffee.
    “Well,” Bert said, “you
don’t have to worry about that anymore. This is it for us.” He sat back against
the booth and sipped his Coke. The girl stared into her coffee.
    “She saw you,” the girl
said. “That friend of mine. She was here with her boyfriend. She saw us come
in.”
    “And?”
    She shrugged. “Nothing. I
mean, she’s cool. Liberal. You’re laughing?”
    “No, I was chuckling. There’s
a difference. I laugh at something funny. I chuckle when someone tells me that
their liberal friend thinks it’s okay for that someone to sit with me.”
    She sighed. “She wanted
to know who you were, what your name was, and all that.”
    “Which name did you give
her?”
    She let a smile tug at
the corners of her mouth. “I said you were Bert.”
    “Can you trust her?”
    “Of course I can. You
don’t understand.”
    “Yeah, I do .”
    “No—you do not.”
    Bert said, “I’m sorry. Explain.”
    “It’s my father.”
    “Ah yes. That’s right. I’ve
met him.”
    “You don’t…know what he’s
like.”
    “No, I don’t.”
    Her green eyes seemed to
shine more and Bert realized they were tearing over. She leaned back in seat,
brushed hair out of her eyes, and looked out the window.
    “You were wrong before,
Alexander,” she said, not looking at him.
    “Ah, so now I’m Alexander
again. Okay, how was I wrong before?”
    “ You are important
to somebody else.”
    “My mom, you’re right.”
He watched her stared into her coffee again. “So…what’s wrong? You’re a little
down. Fight with the boyfriend?”
    “Yes. No. Well, sort of. Not
a fight…just…well I finally saw the light.”
    “Break up?”
    She shrugged. “I don’t
know.”
    “Well, if you do,
there’ll be another one to come along soon.”
    “What? Like a bus?”
    “No. I mean I can’t see
you alone.”
    She smirked. “You don’t
know me, Alexander.”
    “That’s true, and here’s
something else I don’t know.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Your name. I don’t know
your name.”
    “You’re kidding.”
    “Cross my heart.”
    “I never told you my name?”
    “Nope.”
    “Oh my God,” she laughed,
and she covered her mouth with one of her hands. “Oh my God, isn’t that weird?”
    “Well,” Bert said, “not
if you weren’t ever going to see me again.”
    She pulled a dollar bill
from her purse and dropped in on the table. Bert protested but she would not
hear of it and stood up, brushing past him before he had a chance to hand her
back the money.
    In the parking lot, he
caught up with her. “You’re done with me now? You’re taking me home?”
    “Yeah. I think we talked
enough, and I can’t think of anything else to do with you.”
    “Thanks for the Coke,”
Bert said as the Mustang’s engine roared to life.
    “You’re welcome.”
    They were back across the
bridge before she spoke. “Well, if you must know, the reason why I
wanted to talk to you tonight was to tell you that I came to the conclusion
that you were right about Greg and me.”
    “In what regard?”
    “That we are not like
salt and pepper or apple pie and ice cream. We’re just not compatible.”
    “Sorry.”
    She shrugged. “Not as
sorry as I am. I have to explain this to my father. He won’t let me date
anybody else but Greg.”
    “How old are you?”
    “Nineteen.”
    “Nineteen, so why do you
need your father’s permission to date anyone?”
    “It’s a long story.”
    “Shorten it.”
    She glanced at him. “No,
I can’t.”
    “Oh, make a left at this
light.”
    They turned left and started
up a steep hill that had numerous stop signs. “You walk this in fifteen
minutes?”
    “If I walk fast.”
    “If you don’t walk fast.”
    “Twenty or twenty-five
minutes.”
    “Thanks again for lying
for me,” the girl said suddenly. “You know…my father.”
    “He was pissed off, and I
got the impression he wanted to confront me,