Chapter 34: Ryan’s Turnaround
Ryan was pacing the length of his parents’ backyard, kicking at stray pebbles and occasionally glaring at the grill like it had personally wronged him. To the casual observer, he might have looked like a man deep in thought, but in reality, he was running a mental marathon of self-doubt, frustration, and, annoyingly, Ava Lee.
"Stop pacing," his mom called from the porch, where she was arranging plates on the picnic table. "You’re wearing a trench into the lawn."
"I’m not pacing," Ryan shot back, though he very much was. "I’m... thinking."
"Thinking about Ava?" his dad chimed in, strolling over with a pair of tongs in one hand and a bottle of BBQ sauce in the other.
Ryan froze mid-step. "What? No. Why would you say that?"
His dad raised an eyebrow. "Son, you’re muttering to yourself and just kicked a pebble into the potato salad. Pretty sure that’s a sign."
Ryan groaned and scrubbed a hand down his face. "Can we not do this right now? I didn’t come here to talk about Ava."
"Then why," his mom said sweetly, not even looking up from the plates, "did you ask if we invited her to the BBQ?"
Ryan opened his mouth to argue, but the words caught somewhere between his brain and his tongue. His parents were infuriatingly perceptive, a trait that had never worked in his favor.
"I just... I didn’t want things to be awkward if she showed up," he finally mumbled.
His mom chuckled softly. "Sure. Let’s go with that."