The Things We Do for Love by Margot Early Page B

David and Paul and climbed into David Cureux’s truck.
    Mary Anne said, “So sorry. None of the local restaurants have seats big enough for my butt.”
    “Then, you’ll have to come to my house. I have a couch.”
    Graham noticed that behind Mary Anne, near the Dumpsters, Paul Cureux and the man in the hard hat were both shaking their heads and giving him a thumbs-down. The couch. Ah, well.
    “For your information, I am a size eight and considered extremely slim for someone my height.” She was,in fact, much closer to a ten on those few days before her period began, but she felt no remorse in giving Graham the size of her skinny jeans. There were usually a couple of days a month when they fit.
    Graham said, “Mary Anne, I apologize for ever casting aspersions on that fine chassis of yours.”
    Two thumbs-down from Paul and the garbageman. David Cureux shoved two phone books at his son’s shoulder blades.
    Mary Anne drew her eyebrows together. “Does this ever work?”
    “What?”
    “This particular method of…courtship?”
    “It’s not courtship, ” Graham told her. “I just thought you’d like to have dinner.”
    His audience at the Dumpster—except for David Cureux, who seemed entirely disinterested—winced.
    Mary Anne smiled. Great teeth. “It happens you’re right. Lucille probably has it on the table by now. See you later, Graham.” She spun away, whipping her hair with skill, and opened the driver door of her car.
    This wouldn’t do.
    He followed her, though Paul Cureux and the garbageman waved their arms and shook their heads in a way that spelled, No! No! Cut your losses, dude!
    She was in the car, but before she could close the door he caught it with one hand.
    He asked softly, “Do you have the Holy Hand Grenade?” It was a Monty Python reference.
    Her baffled expression answered the question he hadn’t asked. She was clueless about the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog.
    She said, “Maybe you should talk to someone, Graham. Really,” and shut her car door.
     
    H E KNOWS ! M ARY A NNE thought in horror. Graham had somehow guessed that she’d given him Flossy. Or why that reference, which must have come from Monty Python? Her boyfriend had been as excited about the Holy Hand Grenade as about the little bunny with fangs.
    Graham had asked her out.
    Graham didn’t think she had a big butt? Deciphering the car-related remark, she decided it had been a vulgar compliment. Though he had made that crack about the couch. Which could be read a few ways. She needed to call Cameron, to make sure Cameron was all right.
    These things did happen in life.
    And it wasn’t as if the guys usually went for Mary Anne. Nine men out of ten flirted first with Cameron.
    Would it be better to wait until Cameron called her? We don’t even have to discuss it, because I’m not going out with Graham Corbett.
    But it was looking plain to Mary Anne that Graham was not going to fall for her cousin.
    As Mary Anne walked into her grandmother’s living room ten minutes later and joined Nanna near her grandmother’s chair, Lucille said, “You got a phone call, Miss Mary Anne.”
    Mary Anne blinked. Her friends used her cell phone. Where was it, anyhow? In her purse. She looked at it and saw that she’d missed two calls. She’d turned off the ringer and put it on vibrate, then left it in her purse.
    Mary Anne asked, “Who from?”
    “Man named Jonathan.”
    Mary Anne’s heart gave a hard pound, but she quieted her hopes. He was probably calling to set up a double date so that she could become bosom buddies with his betrothed. Mary Anne did not ask any more about the call from Jonathan. This wasn’t because she wasn’t curious. It was because she was in her grandmother’s house, and her grandmother would find such curiosity unseemly. In fact, Nanna looked entirely uncurious about the fact that a man had called her granddaughter.
    Mary Anne absently answered her grandmother’s questions about how her essay had gone.