Lorelei

“Serena Williams!”

“Why Serena?”

“Because she’s…good.”

“Emory, is that the only tennis player you know?”

Emory Dawson knows a lot of things, but sports is not one of them.

“No,” he says, rapping his knuckles on the table, “she has a sister too.”

Ruby peers over at me and I discreetly shake my head. She drags a line through his answer with a pop of her lips.

It’s the final round at Trivia Night, and we are neck and neck with our rival team. Though we’d be winning by a landslide if anyone in our team knew anything about tennis.

“Oh!” Bennett snaps his fingers. “What about that Joker guy?”

Ruby giggles. “We’re talking about sports; not Batman.”

“No, no,” he says, swatting at her with a grin. “His name is like Djokovic or something…”

“Why don’t we just put down a Quidditch player and call it a day?” Quinn asks, tracing a bored line down the condensation of her beer. “We’d lose the points either way.”

I laugh. “Because tennis is a real sport and Quidditch is not.”

“Well, I could tell you at least three famous Quidditch players and not a single tennis star.”

“Let’s go with Serena,” Ruby says, scribbling down on the answer sheet.

We bet three points for Serena Williams.

We lost those points.

Quinn splays her hand out on the table and looks pointedly at Emory. “Okay, you were supposed to increase our chances of winning when we let you date Lorelei.”

Emory’s eyebrows rise. “You let me?”

She grins. “I don’t see my fists in your face, do you?”

Emory’s lips twitch up in a half smile. He’s getting better about recognizing when Quinn actually wants to punch him and when she’s just joking. In his defense, it’s a fine line.

“Such biting words from Queen Bee,” he snarks back.

She shrugs. “I’m off duty.”

They clink water glass to beer pint in mutual respect.

It’s funny how fast she and Emory have fallen into a rhythm. I think they found a bond in being the two bitter cynics of the group.

Emory’s rare but beautiful smile whips across his face when he catches me watching them. My eyes stick like glue on his. It’s hard to look away from someone when they stare at you the way Emory does—with a sense of possession yet pride. It’s alluring.

“Okay,” Ruby says from down the table. Her tiny yellow pencil engraved with the trivia company’s name is poised over the score sheet. “Even with that horrific attempt at a tennis answer—”

Bennett laughs out a small, “Hey, we tried!” and she gives him a grinning side eye.

“Even with that answer of disastrous proportions,” Ruby continues, “We’re actually tied for first place right now.”

“Oh, get out, no way!” Theo says, leaning her forearms on the table, eyes wide.

If our math is correct—and Ruby’s math is always correct—the last question puts us at the same point value as our rival team, the over-60 Cedar Cliff crowd.

It is a close game. Too close. The closest we’ve had in months.

Regardless of Quinn’s jokes, the addition of Emory to our team has been a boon to our overall score. We’ve gotten closer to winning first place than ever before, but never with zero points between us.

It’s anyone’s game at this point.

Frank, the rival team’s trivia prodigy, points two fingers to his eyes then turns them on us as if to say, I see you.

I gesture back. He chuckles. I don’t return the laugh. It’s serious business this time.

Emory shakes his head at me with a chuckle.

“What?” I ask.

“I think I’ve made you more competitive,” he says, squeezing my thigh underneath the table.

My heart pounds in my chest at that simple movement, like his palm is the defibrillator to my nerves.

I stick out my tongue. He inhales sharply, leaning in toward my ear, whispering with his minty breath warm against me, rustling the wisps of hair that hang down from my ponytail.

“If you want,” he says, his low voice bouncing through my body like a ping pong ball, “I can put that tongue to good use later.”

I curl my bottom lip in, chewing on it and raising an eyebrow.

He raises one thick eyebrow back.

It’s been one month since we went public with our relationship. Or, at least since Jaymee forced us to go public. We passively confirmed it by skipping through Honeywood together hand-in-hand. Metaphorically. I’m not sure Emory’s grump self is capable of skipping.

But even after four weeks, my heart is still beating in tandem with his. I could dance to the tempo of his pulse beating from his palm down to my knee.

“Tell me what you want me to do with this tongue,” I whisper back.

Apparently, my whispers aren’t as low and deliciously secretive as Emory’s.

There is a chorus of loud groans from our four friends—including a crumpled napkin thrown by Theo. Bennett’s “boooo!” carries across down the table.

“Stop being weird, Lore,” Quinn says. “We need Emory’s big old brain undistracted.”

Emory pulls back from my ear, clearing his throat. But once everyone looks away, he winks. My stomach may as well topple to the floor with how much it affects me. I place my hand over his, tracing a line down his wrist.

Sure, we’re still in the honeymoon phase of our relationship but something tells me this is just what love is with Emory. Delightful and easy.

The Honeycomb’s televisions flicker to the next slide and our trivia host, Bill, croons into the microphone, “We’re onto our final question!”

I look across the bar toward our rival team with their travel t-shirts, assortment of bucket hats and baseball caps, and general air of retirement bliss. Their palms clutch the edge of the table. Mrs. Stanley, their note-taker, has her hand poised to write on the answer sheet, readying for a race.

Fun fact: It doesn’t matter who turns in the answer first.

They’re just old show-offs.

The question pops on the screen and I watch their faces fall. Mrs. Stanley’s pencil clatter to the table.

Instead, all eyes in the bar dart to our table.

I look at the televisions at the same time Bill’s voice echoes through the speakers: “A now defunct ride, what is the roller coaster inversion that received its namesake from the ride itself?”

I look at Emory, patting his hand feverishly.

“Oh my god,” I say. “This is you. You know this.”

We’ve won. There’s no competition here. None at all.

Except while all stares are still settled on a not-writing Emory, his brown eyes instead stare into mine.

“Emory, if you know it, just write it down!” I whine with a laugh.

His lips tip up into a half smile. It’s a lazy one—far too relaxed and adorable for this tense moment where he is not writing the answer down on this very important question.

His hand slides from my knee up to my thigh and my body lights on fire.

“You write it,” he says. “You know it too.”

I do.

“The Drachen Fire Dive Drop,” I whisper.

The joke he told in our very first blue sky meeting. The one I didn’t get but now is just between us. Our own little slice of roller coaster trivia.

“Shh, shh,” he says with a chuckle. “Write it down.”

I gesture gimme hands to the answer sheet on the opposite side of the table. Ruby slides it down the wood, and I scribble the ride’s name on the sheet—hoping it’s a little better than chicken scratch—and betting the max amount.

“Woah, we’re full sending this?” Quinn asks.

I grin. “Trust me.”

Ruby leans across the table, waving her hand as if trying to waft the answer sheet toward her. I extend my arm out and she reads it. Our fellow coaster enthusiast nods back, confirming our answer.

I push my chair back, the feet squeaking on the floor. I practically run to our trivia host, holding out the sheet. Nobody else has come up yet.

He reads our answer, and his eyebrows raise.

“How’d you know that?”

“Bill,” I say, rolling my eyes with a smile. “Please.”

He takes the sheet and types on his laptop. I lean forward on the podium.

“Did we win?” I whisper.

A subtle smile and a twinkle in his blue eyes signal possibly yes so I fist bump the air and run back to our table.

I ignore my own seat, instead immediately landing into Emory’s lap. He grunts at the impact but then laughs, stroking his hand down my arm to wrap around my waist, tugging me closer against him.

Every touch from him is wonderful. Every graze of his skin against mine still lights me on fire. A warm bear hug even better than Buzzy the Bear’s.

It’s no competition.

We win trivia that night.

Our whole team is whooping, jumping, and collecting our Honeycomb gift card from Bill. Ruby pulls out her phone to take a group picture while Theo waves the gift card in the air. Quinn and Bennett order another round for the table. And amongst all the excitement, Emory kisses me.

Kissing in public is normal now, but it still feels sweet as honey. I sink into him. His arms loop around me, pressing into my lower back, pushing a fever through me that warms my soul.

I am the Drachen Fire Dive Drop. My whole body is ablaze and diving deep just for him.

My own personal thrill.