𝙸 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚘𝚟𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝙸 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚝𝚘.

𝙸 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚗 𝚊𝚠𝚊𝚢.

𝙸 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚜𝚎𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝙸 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚖𝚘𝚟𝚎.

𝙸 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚘𝚘𝚔 𝚊𝚠𝚊𝚢.

𝙸 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚘𝚟𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝙸 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚝𝚘.

𝙸 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚗 𝚊𝚠𝚊𝚢.

𝙸 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚜𝚎𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝙸 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚖𝚘𝚟𝚎.

𝙸 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚕𝚘𝚘𝚔 𝚊𝚠𝚊𝚢.

𝙰𝚗𝚍 𝙸 𝚍𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠

𝙷𝚘𝚠 𝚝𝚘 𝚋𝚎 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚎 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝙸'𝚖 𝚗𝚘𝚝.

'𝙲𝚊𝚞𝚜𝚎 𝙸 𝚍𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠

𝙷𝚘𝚠 𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚊𝚔𝚎 𝚊 𝚏𝚎𝚎𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚙.

"Welcome to Clifford's Cafe. How can I help you?"

"Dorothy, darling!" Eddie exclaimed into the microphone which was matched by the lady on the other end as if they'd known each other for years.

Lennon's smile widened when he propped his elbow up onto the unrolled window of his door.

"Hello, baby. How you doing?"

"I'm great, Dorothy. You and Clifford doing alright?" he responded cheerily.

"Oh, we're doing just fine, baby. The cold's got my arthritis and Cliff's sciatica's in a pinch but we're doing lovely."

"I keep telling you guys. You need to get down to fucking Florida or something during the winter."

"Eddie, you know we don't have anybody to keep the shop running for that long," she countered matter-of-factly.

"Hire me! I'll work for you..." Eddie giggled, fiddling with his rings and blushing at the interaction.

"Now you know I love you, Eddie, but there ain't no way we're hiring you, baby."

Eddie burst out laughing and hid his face behind his hand as he ran it over his forehead all the way down to his chin.

"With the way you sleep 'til noon and curse, we might as well hire the sailor out by the bay."

Lennon didn't realize she was smiling at Eddie and this woman's conversation until he started ordering food.

"Well listen, since I'm not permitted in your kitchen, is there any way I can get a warm Portabella meal, darling?"

"We've got you, Eddie."

Eddie chuckled warmly and turned to Lennon in question. "What do you want?" he asked softly, making sure the microphone couldn't pick up his voice.

"I don't have any money on me," she responded with a smile to hide her weariness.

"I've got you. What do you want?" he pondered in a whisper.

"Well, I'm not hungry," she lied, shooting him a sideways smile in hopes that he would be convinced.

"Anything else for you, baby?" Dorothy asked over the speaker.

Eddie made a noise with his tongue and turned back towards the open window. "Can I also get something high in protein? Maybe something a little healthier?" Eddie pondered as he scanned the menu to consider what Lennon might like.

Dorothy chuckled on the other side of the intercom and put in the order on her register. "Boy, I know you're not looking to lose weight with your lanky bones..."

"No, Dorothy. I've got a..." he looked over his shoulder and smiled with a look of mischief in his eyes. "I'm with a girl who I think I'm on a date with but I'm not really sure because instead of fucking me she likes to fuck with me..."

"Eddie!" she grit her teeth and hit him on the arm with a considerable amount of force.

He started snickering before his hand went to his shoulder and held it in pain.

"A girl?! Is she nice?" Dorothy laughed on the other end of the speaker.

"She's got a heavy right hook... shit," Eddie rubbed at his arm and turned back to the window. "She's usually nice but I don't know... She's hangry right now."

Lennon hid her burning cheeks in her hands. She was far too embarrassed now. She was anxious about eating and now she was embarrassed to face whoever she might face at the window when Eddie collected the food.

"I've got just the thing, baby," Dorothy replied charmingly.

"And can we get two large helpings of your famous hot chocolate, please?" Eddie asked in a childish, hopeful tone of voice before he and the woman said their temporary goodbyes, and Eddie was pulling up to the window.

"You are a dick!" she cursed, hiding her face in shame as Eddie, who had the biggest, brightest smile plastered to his face, drove up to the window. There, he met the woman who he spoke to through the intercom and Lennon had nowhere else to go to avoid making a fool of herself.

"Oh, Eddie. You only gone and done embarrassed the poor girl!" Dorothy chuckled. "Hi baby!"

"Hi..." Lennon called out shyly.

"I wouldn't worry about him. He's just mad he has to actually work for some good company."

When Lennon turned towards the woman in the window, she found an older lady with a strange, almost southern accent clinging to her words. Her eyes were squinted and heavily wrinkled in comparison to the rest of her radiant face which made Lennon think she had spent several years smiling and having the best time of her life. Her hair was beautiful and bouncy. The black kinks were shiny and the marbled grey hairs coming from her head made her look even more elegant.

"I'm..." she giggled. "I'm learning to expect it at this point," she pressed her lips together and tried not to show either of them how much she secretly enjoyed Eddie's teasing.

"Oh baby," Dorothy smiled tenderly. "You are too cute. What in the hell are you doing with a troublemaker like him?" he asked tenderly.

"Are you sayin' I'm not cute?" Eddie pressed his hand to his chest and widened his mouth sarcastically at the woman in the window.

"I know you lyin'," she said tersely, turning over her shoulder to grab the white paper bag full of food. "Take your food. I ain't finna play with you," she said with pursed lips, causing Eddie to bring his knuckles to his mouth as if to hide his amusement.

The woman's eyes ran past Eddie's and found Lennon's again as she was waiting for Lennon to answer her previous question.

Lennon shook her head slowly and frowned. "I have no idea what I'm doing with him," she waved her hands in the air to show how hysterically innocent her intentions were with him. "I've been asking myself that question since the day I met him."

She had followed him everywhere and she still felt safer with him than she felt with anyone else. It didn't matter that they were in the middle of a low-grade snow storm or that they had just gotten over different levels of different hangovers. She trusted him with her life. She trusted this idiot and she didn't know why.

How was she meant to explain that to a woman she just met?

Dorothy burst out laughing. She had a very addicting and contagious laugh. The woman bellowed with her whole body and her cheeks were rosy either from amusement or the cold and Lennon couldn't help but mirror her.

"You young things never fail to humble an old lady," she chuckled, moving back over her shoulder with a bright smile to grab the drinks. "Oh, to be young and in love again..." she sighed, handing Eddie the two decent-sized cups of cocoa through the window.

"You aren't old yet, Dorothy," Eddie drew out lovingly as he set the two cups in the cupholders between him and Lennon. "You still got a few decades of terrible fashion to judge," he chuckled, causing Dorothy to smile.

"Yeah, well, enjoy it while you're still young and pretty. And if you'd quit pumping your veins with them drugs then maybe you can reach the ripe ole age of seventy so you can tell me I'm wrong," Dorothy ridiculed Eddie for his poor judgment but she still loved him, that much was obvious.

Eddie shoved his hand into his back pocket and unfolded his wallet to reveal some cash he had hidden in the sleeve.

"I don't want your drug money, boy," she cringed.

"But if you let me pay you for food then I won't have anything left to buy drugs with," he informed her cheekily.

He knew she was looking out for him but he also knew she wasn't the richest person in the world and no matter how motherly Dorothy was to him, he couldn't let her lose income because of him.

"Child," she whined, swiping up the money with a look of disgrace as she shook her head in disbelief. "He's a damn hustler," she mumbled under her breath. "You be good to this girl," she pointed at Lennon who was watching it all unfold in silence.

"You should be telling her to be good to me. Shit... I'm being beat today..." Eddie shifted his gaze slyly over to Lennon who was looking back at him cynically.

"And you probably deserved it," Dorothy shot back before pulling a few coins out from the tray in front of her and handing Eddie his change.

"That's fair," Eddie giggled, taking the coins and dropping them into the small glass jar that sat beside the window of the building. "You take care, Dorothy."

"You two be safe out there," she smiled kindly and waved them goodbye.

"We will. It was lovely meeting you," Lennon called out before Eddie shifted the gear into drive.

"You too, baby. Take care."

Eddie rolled up the window and drove out into the road again.

"How does a sweet old lady like that know you?" Lennon giggled, chewing absent-mindedly on her thumbnail.

"Who? Dorothy?" Eddie chuckled, shoving his hand into the white paper bag and pulling a burger and a wrap out while he drove. "I come here all the time. She and her husband, Clifford, opened the cafe the year I was born," he informed her warmly, extending his hand to her so she could eat.

She eyed the sandwich and the wrap and felt discouraged at the sight. She didn't think she would be one of those girls in high school who feared the sight of oil and wanted to throw up at the thought of drinking her calories. She never thought she'd end up like this. But then again, she never thought her family would be ripped apart or that she would end up spending her days with the local drug dealer either.

Eddie noticed how she didn't take the wrap and dropped it in her lap instead so he could focus on driving. "Their son," Eddie continued as he unwrapped his meal. "He and his wife work the kitchen and Dorothy has this killer hot chocolate recipe... Oh, my God, you have to try it," Eddie raved, taking a large bite of his sandwich and taking a backroad toward a deserted park Lennon didn't even know existed down the road.

"Do you want me to burn my tongue?" she smiled and motioned toward the steaming hot cups of cocoa sitting between them.

"No... We wouldn't want that," Eddie chewed on his mouthful of food and stopped for a moment to smirk.

Lennon peered up from the wrap sitting in her lap and found Eddie staring back at her mischievously. She saw something strange lingering in his stare. There wasn't just playful insinuation in his eyes but she couldn't decipher what it was when he turned away.

He hid his examination when his eyes went back to the snow-covered concrete to park the car. He found a place underneath the brush of large pine trees behind the playground and pulled the van into park.

He didn't want her to play off his adoration. He knew how to flirt but he wasn't sure what to do if she saw just how much he liked her. He knew how to flirt and he knew how to fuck but he didn't know how to love.

It was funny like that.

He wanted to call her his. He wanted that label. It was stupid and if he ever said it out loud he would immediately regret it for sounding so possessive. But he did. He wanted that stupid title.

That was the one thing she couldn't give him. That was the one thing she couldn't promise him.

But as much as he wanted what he couldn't have, he didn't know what to do with it. It scared him. Caring. Being cared for. That was one thing Brontë got right. Everyone who seemed to love Eddie got hurt and the idea of Lennon following in their footsteps scared him. It scared the shit out of him. He wanted her, but he was terrified to have her.

Maybe that was why it was so easy for him to want to be friends with her. Because he didn't think she would actually say 'yes'.

He didn't think she would actually want to be with him; in any form.