"And speak of the Devil," Wendy says. I feel her grab my sleeve. What would my twin sister want with me right now?
"Hey!" I say. "What?"
"Nothing. I was just telling the new girl about my awesome brother and now here you are." Wendy smiles at the new girl. I slightly roll my eyes while Wendy isn't looking. Whatever she was talking about, it certainly wasn't about how awesome I was.
"Behold, Tucker Avery," Wendy says.
I turned to face the new girl. She's the girl who almost ran into me this morning!
"This is Clara," Wendy says.
"You're the one with the Prius who almost rear-ended my truck this morning."
"Oh, sorry about that," she says.
I look at her. Wow, I think, she's beautiful! Somehow, "beautiful" didn't begin to describe her. She was tall and thin and had startling eyes that were bluish-gray. She was pale, with delicate hands, her pink lips were smooth. But she had weird hair, carrot orange. Hmm... Carrots would make a decent nickname... Even with weird hair, she was a real sight to behold. She blushed. That has probably got to be the cutest thing I've ever seen. But that doesn't change the fact that she almost ran into Blue Bell.
"From California, right?" I asked. I really hope she wasn't, those Californians got on my nerves, but her driving was really terrible...
"Tucker," Wendy says, with a hint of warning. I ignore her.
"Well, I doubt that I would have done any damage to your truck if I'd hit you," she said. "It looks like the back end is about to rust off."
I felt Wendy go a little rigid. She knows that I don't let anybody talk about Blue Bell that way. But for some reason, I wasn't very hurt by her comments about my truck. I found them charming. But just to put on a show...
"That rusty truck will probably be towing you out of a snowbank next time there's a storm," I say.
"Tucker!" says Wendy. "Don't you have a rodeo team meeting or something?" She's making me leave? Maybe that last comment went too far... Nah! But I really didn't want to go.
"You're the one who wanted to chat," I say to Wendy.
"I didn't know you were going to act like a pig," she shoots back. Oooh, ouch.
"Fine." I say. I smirk at the new girl playfully, wanting to make her blush again.
"Nice to meet you, Carrots," I say. The nickname was brilliant! You're such a genius Tuck! "Oh, I mean Clara."
As I turn, I glance at her and see that she's blushing again. It brings a smile to my face.
"Same to you, Rusty," she says back. By that time I'm already a few feet away, heading for my rodeo buddies. I hear her laugh and had the urge to turn around and joke with her some more, just to hear her do it again. I think of her name. Clara. It was beautiful like she was. I thought of the way I said her name just a few moments ago. I liked the way it felt to have her name escape my lips. Clara. I spent the rest of the day thinking about her. Her image engraved in my memory. Man, I was really falling for her hard. I didn't have a problem with that. In fact, it made me smile more.