Finally, Forever(30)

“You’re the only person I’ve ever met who enjoys being investigated,” Officer Bryan tells me. “Usually people clam up and want to get out of here as fast as they can.” I glance over at Gray and he shakes his head. He only talks when someone addresses him.

Officer Bryan looks over my camera, which ends up being our best witness, since it documents everywhere we’ve been for the last twenty-four hours. They called Sue Anne and Chris to back up our statements. Once we’re cleared from the case, Officer Bryan starts commenting on my photography which turns into a lengthy discussion about tornadoes. He smiles and tells me I should come out storm chasing with him some time.

I look over at Gray and he’s reading a magazine. Most of the anger in his eyes has vanished. He looks bored more than anything.

“You each can make a phone call if you want,” Officer Bryan tells us. “You won’t get your cell phones back for a while, but you can use an office phone.”

Gray nods for me to go first. I stand up and follow Officer Bryan into a side office. He introduces me to Debra, the administrative assistant. I sit across from her desk and she picks up the receiver and asks for a number.

I should call my parents, but they’re worried enough about Serena. I don’t want to give my mom a nervous breakdown. I ask Debra to dial Nick’s number and she hands me the receiver. Nick answers before it even rings.

“Hey! How’s the sex?” he asks.

I groan into the receiver. “Nick, we haven’t had sex. Not even close.”

I glance at Debra and she raises her eyebrows, but she keeps her eyes on her desk.

“What? Well that is your problem, Dylan. Any other trifling matter you’re calling me about is not important.”

I look at the legal file that Debra is studying, opened up to a mug shot.

“Okay,” I say.

“Have sex with him. Tonight. Make a sex kabob out of that boy, Dylan. Eat him up. Got it?”

“Nick—”

“That’s all that matters. And don’t you dare call me back until you have something interesting to say. I want some steamy details. Not cable TV Hallmark fluff, I want skin-a-max dirty shit. Bye.”

I hear his phone cut off. “Nick. Nick?!”

I hand Debra the receiver and she sets it back on the phone base. There’s a wry grin on her face. I start to smile. Sex kabob. I like the sound of that.





Gray





When Dylan walks back in the room, Officer Best Friend Bryan offers to give her a tour of the police station and the jail in the back. Dylan asks me to come, but I decline the sight-seeing experience. I watch them leave and I swear the man is hitting on her. I saw him checking her out when she stood up to use the phone. He even agreed to order a couple of pizzas to the station for dinner. But how often do these guys get tall girls with cut-off shorts in here? They’ve been treating Dylan like a celebrity guest, not a robbery suspect. Men are so simple. Show them a little skin and they become floor mats.

A few hours ago I probably wouldn’t have cared, but a new piece of information is making me care.

Dylan is single.

I look at the cop sitting across from me.

“Can I make a phone call?” I ask. He nods without looking up from his paperwork. I walk in the side office and a name plate on the edge of the desk reads Debra. She looks up and smiles at me. I sit down across from her and give her the number for Lenny, my best friend in New Mexico. We’re each other’s emergency contacts in college, so I memorized her phone number. Debra hands me the receiver when it starts to ring.

Lenny picks up.

“Hey, Lenny,” I say.

“Gray? Hey stranger.”

“Stranger?” I mock. “Says the girl who never returned a single one of my texts this summer.”

“You know I hate texting.”

“You hate anything that’s popular,” I remind her.

“That’s because anything adopted by the masses is usually annoying, since the vast majority of people are annoying. I don’t even like recycling.”

I smile into the phone, despite my situation. I’ve missed Lenny’s eternal pessimism.

“Lenny, I’m in trouble.”

“What is it?” she almost sounds like she cares. “Muscle sprain?” Lenny makes it a priority to give me crap on a daily basis for being a college athlete. She thinks sports are as necessary and helpful to society as fad diets.

“I ran into Dylan a few days ago,” I say. I expect to hear a sympathetic gasp on the other end.

“Really? That’s great,” she says.

I frown.

“No, it’s not. She’s my terminator. It’s like she has some mission programmed in her brain to search out and destroy me. She is what I need to run from, right?”