The Hardest Cut by Jamie Bennett (book club recommendations .TXT) 📕

Nope.  I shook my head at the phone, that was how opposed I was.  No way!

I drove slowly through the empty lot toward the stadium exit and I glanced over again at the dark screen.  Maybe I would just quickly look and see how long the message was.  That wouldn’t make any difference, just to check that.  I reached over and picked up the phone.

It was one minute and forty-nine seconds long.  I stared at the screen, shocked.  What could he have been saying for one minute and forty-nine seconds?  I realized that I was squeezing the phone hard in my hand, so hard that it made a creaking sound, so I put it down on the passenger seat and gripped the steering wheel instead.  I continued onto the stadium drive, definitely not listening to the message, however long it had been.  It didn’t mean anything to me.

But actually, I realized, it wouldn’t hurt anything to hear it.  I, of course, wouldn’t believe any more of his lies and I wouldn’t fall for any of his excuses or apologies.  But I could listen to one, simple message, because it wouldn’t affect me at all.  Of course wouldn’t affect me, since I was so totally over him.  I could listen and hear if maybe it was something like that he was sick—which I certainly wouldn’t care about, but I would want to know, anyway.

Or maybe he had something of mine, like my hot pink, hibiscus flower earrings that my dad had brought back from Hawaii for me one winter when it was so cold.  They had always reminded me to be hopeful, that warm weather and flowers would come again.  I loved those earrings and I thought that I hadn’t seen them in a while.  Maybe he had them, and he was calling to tell me because he knew how much they meant to me…

If he had my earrings, then I wanted them back, and I needed to listen to the message to find out if he had them.  I reached over for the phone but by mistake, I knocked it onto the floor.

“Gravy!”  I stretched, brushing the sparkly case with my fingertips, but it slid away again, closer to the passenger door.  I stretched further, glancing down to see if I was close to getting it.  Almost, I could almost reach—I stretched a little more.

I grabbed the phone and sat up straight, just in time to see the truck stopped ahead of me.  And I hit it.

Chapter 2

“Oh, gravy.  Oh, no.”

I sat in the car, shaking, and watched the driver’s door of the truck open and a big man descend from the cab.  What had I just done?

I opened my car door too, and got out.  The entire front of my little green convertible was squished, smashed like when my older brother had shoved his palm against my face when we’d been kids to give me a pig nose and make me ugly.  “Oh, no,” I said again.  I more or less groaned it.

“You ok?”

My head snapped up, because for the second time in that long day, I recognized his voice.  Benjamin Matthews.  Ben.  Coach.  “Yes, I’m fine,” I said, and heard my voice shaking, too.  “I’m so sorry I hit your car.  It was totally my fault because I was trying to get my phone.”

To my utter shock, he smiled a little, a reaction that seemed to surprise him, too.  “Well, that’s honest,” he told me.  “I guess it’s good to be an honest person, even when you rear end someone.”

I stepped away.  Honest, right.

He had strolled to peer at the back of his truck, which seemed relatively untouched.  “Looks like I’m good.  My trailer hitch did most of the damage,” he said, staring at my crumpled hood.  “What is this thing made of?”

“It’s made of…car,” I said blankly.  Oh, that sounded so stupid.  He was already looking at me like I was an idiot.  “I’m not that familiar with this model,” I explained.  “My brother let me borrow it.”  Borrow, as in, I would have to give it back.  And speaking of people who thought I was stupid, my brother Anthony was never, ever going to forget this.  I covered my eyes, so ashamed of myself.  “I’m really, really sorry,” I said.  “I’ll pay for any damage I did and I hope you’re not hurt or anything because I couldn’t forgive myself.”

“I’m fine, my truck is fine.  You should save that apology for your brother, for when he sees…this.”  Ben Matthews frowned at the green car.  It had been kind of cute, kind of sporty.  Now it looked like it had been in a juicer.

I dropped my hand from my face and nodded.  “Yes.  I will.  I’ll apologize a lot and have to make amends to him.”  I had been trying to fix stuff all winter and now Anthony would go on the list of people I needed to make things up to.  I would never really be done.

Coach Ben tilted his head and looked at me for a moment like he was going to say something, but then he only nodded and stepped back toward his car.

“Do you want my insurance information?  Or, if you don’t mind, I’d rather just pay for any repairs myself,” I said.  “I can give you my number.”

“No, I don’t need your number,” he said.  He took his phone out of his pocket and frowned at the screen.  “The truck’s fine.  If you’re ok, I have to get home.”

I nodded back, and pushed up the sleeves of my cropped sweatshirt like I was going to do some repairs or something.  “Yeah, I’m ok.  Thanks for being so nice about me hitting you.  I really didn’t deserve it.”

He tilted his head again, and for the second time, I had the sense that he was going to speak, but he just got into his huge truck and drove off.

I watched him leave and then re-examined the hood of