The One That Got Away by Bethany Chase

He called me, the day after I told him I got the job, and proceeded to read me the entire contents of Eamon’s Wikipedia entry. “Ree-Ree, did you know he won
five
medals last year? After breaking
thirteen
bones in a car crash? It says the only silver medal he got was when some other guy took too long on his leg of the relay!”
    Oh, yes. I knew.
    John is sporting a curly-brimmed brown felt Stetson when I catch up to him. With his creased, weather-scuffed skin and bristly white stubble, he looks every inch the rugged cowboy.
    “Very nice,” I tell him.
    He turns his head to the side, scowls at himself in the mirror. “You think?” He cocks his jaw like a tough guy.
    “I do. Oh, Eamon’s going to stop by,” I add. “I hope you don’t mind. I mentioned we were here and he sort of invited himself over. He lives around the corner.”
    “Why would I mind? That’s great!” He picks up a straw hat with a silver concha buckle on the front. “Hey, try this one on.”
    Shaking my head, I oblige him. He vetoes it and insists I try another, then another. Consequently I am kitted out like a rodeo contestant when Eamon walks into the store.
    “Howdy, cowgirl,” he says, giving me an amused once-over.
    I tip my hat at him. “Howdy, yourself.”
    “Hi there! John Kurzweil,” booms my stepdad, holding out his hand.
    “Eamon Roy. I’m pleased to meet you, sir—that’s a fine girl you raised there.”
    John beams. The fastest way to his heart is to compliment me. “All the credit goes to her mama. But it’s a fine boy your folks raised, too, I hear.”
    My face burns as Eamon’s eyebrows skip upward; he’s going to think I’ve been singing his praises to my stepdad like a lovesick little girl.
    “John’s addicted to Google,” I interject, and Eamon taps his temple in understanding.
    “Ah. Well, thank you, that’s kind of you. So what have you guys been finding? Anything good?”
    John proudly points out our selections.
    “Nice,” Eamon says. “I love this place. I always wanted a pair of black lizard-skin boots, but I didn’t feel badass enough to pull it off.”
    “We saw a pair like that, didn’t we, Ree-Ree?” says John.
    Eamon gives a delighted, boyish smile. “Really? Where?”
    A minute later, he is kicking out of his gray suede Pumas so he can try on the boots. Balancing with one hand on the shelf, he wiggles one foot, then the other, into the boots and pulls his jeans down over them.
    He shoots us a grin. “Well? What’s the verdict?”
    “Badass,” says John.
    I give him a carefully unenthusiastic thumbs-up. They look great on him. Everything looks great on him.
    “Mahler, you are a terrible influence on me,” he says as we line up at the cash register. “Every time I’m around you, you’re making me spend money.”
    “Those were your explicit instructions,” I remind him.
    When we step out of the store into the sunlight, the heat hits like someone has opened the door to an oven.
    “Damn, kid, I don’t know how you do it,” says John, wiping his forehead with his ratty bandanna. “It’s hotter than a billy goat in a pepper patch out here.” I’ve got to talk him out of visiting at the height of summer next year. I crank the A/C in the Honda, but it’s barely begun to cool down by the time we pull into the driveway at the job site; I can feel sweat beading between my breasts and on my lower back.
    Esteban, Joe’s foreman, is just locking up the house when we arrive. He looks at me inquiringly.
    “Hey, Esteban,” I say to him in Spanish. “Don’t worry about staying, we’re just going to take a walk through.”
    “Who’s that guy?” he asks, nodding at John. “Inspector?”
    “My stepfather,” I explain. “Don’t tell Joe, okay?”
    He winks. “You got it.”
    Once, not long after Noah and I had started dating, I was complaining about receiving only blank, confused stares when I tried to communicate with the Spanish-speaking construction workers. “It would be