Obsessed With You by Jennifer Ransom Read Free Book Online Page A

said.
    “ You should bring Lindy over
and we’ll fish. I’ll even make us a picnic lunch,” Cathy said.
She didn’t know why she was feeling so friendly all of a sudden.
Maybe she was going to be all right after all.
    “ Okay,” he said. “I’ll
bring the beer.”
    “ How about this Saturday? I
heard the weather’s supposed to be good.”
    “ Let me call Lindy and make
sure she hasn’t made other plans for us. You know how that is.”
He pulled his phone out of his pocket. Cathy went further down the
pier to give him privacy while he talked to Lindy.
    “ She says that sounds fun,”
Neil shouted a moment later from the end of the pier. “She can’t
wait to see you.”

    *************************

    Neil and Lindy arrived at eleven
on Saturday lugging a cooler.
    “ It’s so good to see you,”
Lindy said giving Cathy a hug.
    She looked around the living room
and dining room, which Cathy had already painted.
    “ It looks good in here,”
Lindy said. “Let’s see the kitchen. Neil told me all about it.”
    Good old Lindy. She was as blonde
and petite, and as perky and cute as she used to be. Guess that’s
why she was a cheerleader in high school.
    Lindy went into the kitchen ahead
of Neil and Cathy and made a beeline for the vintage stove.
    “ Babe, you didn’t tell me
about the stove!” Lindy said excitedly.
    “ Lindy runs a vintage shop in
town,” Neil said by way of explanation for his girlfriend’s
excitement at a stove.
    “ Yeah,” Lindy said. “Lindy’s
Vintage. We’ve got some stoves in there, but none as nice as this
one.”
    Lindy walked around the kitchen
touching every surface, from the countertops to the vintage kitchen
table. She even opened the Hoosier cabinet doors and admired the
Fiesta ware on the shelves.
    “ Please excuse her for
snooping,” Neil said with a laugh. “She can’t help herself.”
    Cathy laughed. “It’s okay.
It’s nice to have someone appreciate this old stuff.”
    Cathy grabbed her cooler of
smoked turkey sandwiches and potato salad. Neil went to his truck and
brought in three fishing rods.
    “ I didn’t know if you had one
anymore so I brought an extra,” he said. “I also got the shrimp
heads.”
    “ Yum,” Cathy said.
    Everyone who grew up on the bay
knew how to fish. They all threaded their hooks with shrimp heads and
threw their lines out, but not very far. They reeled their lines in
slowly, coming up empty time after time.
    “ Got one,” Lindy said. She
wound her taut line in slowly, pulling up a nice-sized trout. She
held it out to Neil. “You do it,” she said. “I hate that part.”
    They laughed and joked through
the afternoon, stopping to eat at one point, drinking beer from the
cooler all day long. Neil caught two fish and Lindy and Cathy each
caught three.
    “ The women win!” Lindy said
doing a little dance on the pier.
    “ Winners get to clean the
fish,” Neil said laughing.
    Lindy frowned prettily.
    “ Just kidding!” Neil said
grabbing her into a bear hug. Cathy couldn’t help but be envious of
their easy relationship. She missed being in a relationship and all
of its perks—someone to talk to, someone to eat with, someone to
sleep with, and especially someone to have sex with. She realized she
was lonely and admitted to herself that she missed Aaron. Even if he
was a cheater, she missed him and the life they were planning
together.
    “ Cathy, can we cook the fish at
your house tonight?” Lindy said. “Or are you sick of us already.”
    “ I’m not sick of you! Let’s
get going.”
    Neil cleaned the fish behind the
house while Cathy and Lindy prepared the pan for frying the fish and
another for hushpuppies.
    “ Neil said you had a broken
engagement,” Lindy said as she stirred the batter for the
hushpuppies.
    Cathy was a little taken aback at
Lindy’s directness, but she shook it off.
    “ I’m sorry, I don’t mean to
pry,” Lindy said. “I just thought you might want to talk about
it. I wouldn’t tell a