Read Online Even the Moon Has Scars by Steph Campbell - Free Book Online Page A

study the way he walks back and forth, with a little swagger. I like the way he talks with his hands, I don’t know if he’s upset or not, but he’s definitely animated. The button-up plaid shirt he threw on as we were leaving his grandmother’s house is wrinkled under his coat, like he probably just grabbed it from a pile of clothes he has stashed in a room that isn’t really his. His jeans fit him perfectly and fall to his ankles against expensive looking boots.
    Gabe isn’t bad to look at all.
    I glance down at the ground and there’s a small white piece of paper stuck to my boot. I bend down and peel it off the rubber sole.
    “Told you she’s always watching,” he laughs.
    I startle a little, not having realized he was back, and for a stupid fleeting second wonder if he could hear what I was thinking while I spied on him.
    I look down at the paper, flip it over, and see that the second side of it is striped in red, white, and blue. It’s a re-election flyer for his mother.
    “Yep. Guess you were right.” I force a smile. “Was that about the car part?”
    I know it wasn’t. I could see the way he was working his jaw back and forth while on that call from where I sat on the bench.
    Gabe shakes his head slowly. “No, that was...something else.”
    “Listen,” I say. “If you need to go, we can—”
    “No, no, no,” he says. The collar of his shirt is flipped up. I want to tuck it back down, but don’t know if I should. “That was—I’m sorry. I’ve been trying to avoid that call and—”
    “It’s really alright. If you have somewhere you need to be I’m happy to take the train back—”
    “Lena,” Gabe says with a small chuckle. He reaches a hand out to help me off of the bench. “Why do I have the feeling you’ve never taken the train by yourself?”
    I fight the urge to pull in my bottom lip like I do when I feel embarrassed, and instead, I  raise my chin defiantly.
    “I’m not an imbecile. I can take the train by myself.”
    Gabe steps out of the way, like he expects me to storm off. “Do you even know where the T is from here?”
    “It’s that way,” I say, giving a noncommittal motion in the general South/West/North direction.
    “So close,” he says with an infuriating smirk. “It’s actually just over there.”
    East. Naturally.
    “Right, well, I would’ve found it. Eventually. Anyway, your phone has been ringing like crazy, you obviously have somewhere else to be.” Someone to be with .
    “I’ve got nothing going on but this coffee that has obviously been sitting on that warmer for a while,” he says, choking around a sip. “And hanging out with you.”
    “Why are you doing this?” I ask.
    “Doing what?”
    “Why did you bring me along? Why didn’t you just leave me at home with your grandmother?”
    “You really want to hang with Babci? I mean, my grandmother is a hip lady, but have you ever endured a Murder, She Wrote marathon? Or is it that you prefer the main course of your dinner to be a handful of those hard, strawberry candies that miraculously appear in every household once the owner reaches retirement age? If so, I can certainly bring you back—”
    “I’m being serious. This is weird, right? Us being here, when we don’t even know each other.”
    “And how exactly do you usually get to know people, Lena? I don’t know about you, but when I want to get to know someone,” he raises a condescending eyebrow and it makes me want to punch him in the throat, “I usually spend time with them.”
    Wait. “You want to get to know me ?”
    “No. I wanted to drag you all the way to the city so you could maybe freeze to death, be hit on by some asshole, share some really stale coffee, and then I wanted to bail on you. Or maybe I wanted some company, and your smile said you might not be a bad pick.”
    “Okay,” is all I say.
    Okay?” Gabe asks.
    “I do have a nice smile,” I joke.
    I finally reach over and flip Gabe’s collar back down. He keeps