“I mean,” Becca smirked coyly, avoiding Austin’s direct gaze, “we all kinda thought you guys were cute, the way she put her stickers all over your motorcycle. We were jealous when you started giving her rides to school.”
As thrilled as Austin was to know that she had even noticed him back in high school, he was still a little nervous when she brought up Jynx. All anyone at school seemed to know about him was that he and Jynx were an item, and that went a long way toward explaining why nobody ever showed an interest in dating back in high school. Stunned at the revelation, and unsure of how to change the subject, all he could manage was a muttered response. “She wasn’t my girlfriend.”
Becca poked at the chocolate shaving sprinkled whipped topping, plucking individual cocoa curls with her paper straw probe and daintily licking each from the tip absentmindedly. “Really? You guys were like, always together?”
Austin shrugged. “I guess we just are. Or we were. I dunno.” If he had been slightly uncomfortable before, the fact that his phone had just started drilling out a nearly silent humming for an incoming call wasn’t exactly helping. “She’s just my neighbor,” he said, but he felt bad right after he said it.
“But you guys were never...?”
He shook his head, tucking his buzzing phone into his pocket.
She seemed to consider this new piece of information for a few moments before nodding appreciatively. “Just friends, huh?” She leaned forward, growing a little more comfortable with her questions. Unbeknownst to Austin, he and Jynx had maintained a sort of untouchable aura of mystery in small-town adolescent gossip and now she found herself close to the chewy, chocolatey center of it all. “So why do people call her Jynx anyway?”
Austin shifted uneasily in his seat. Of all the topics she could choose to talk about, Jynx wasn't his favorite. If he was trying to impress her with some sort of grease monkey line, like Jeremiah thought, telling her all about his little space cadet shadow wasn’t part of the plan. She had her spaceship. At least he should have just one date with Becca. “She just started signing all of her papers like that when she started school.” He shrugged and poked at the crumbs on the plate. “I guess her mom called her that when she was really little, and she remembered it.” He inspected the few grounds at the bottom of the mug, swilling around with the last few gulps of fancy backwash coffee.
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“Oh, that's so mean!”
“What?”
“Well, like, she's some little hex or something.”
Austin took a moment to consider the other meaning of the word before he realized what it must look like. “Oh, not like that.” He chuckled a little and shrugged. “I mean, I guess nobody much liked her dad anyway, so who knows why he left, but it’s pretty obvious he doesn’t get the Asperger’s thing because he’s still sending her dolls and coloring books and crap and he has no idea that she’s killing it in honors classes.”
“But to call her kid that?”
He laughed again. “It's not like that.” He pushed his crumb plate away again, amused. “When she first learned to talk, she did this weird thing where she sorta finished people's words with them, somehow.”
“Like repeating them?”
He shook his head and tossed back the last crunchy splash of coffee. “She doesn't do it anymore, because it freaks people out, but she used to mouth people's words as they spoke. It was super creepy.”
Becca nodded her head, sipping at her mocha, manicuring the edges of the slowly melting whipped topping. “Well, that's cool!”
Never having given it much thought, Austin agreed. “Yeah, so, she got into a big fight with her first-grade teacher and refused to be called Amber.” He poked at the remaining pastry, knocking chunks off like miniature boulders from the looming hills behind them. “Her teacher changed it in the books officially and they’ve called her that ever since.”
Becca’s phone vibrated on the wrought iron cafe table, rattling Austin’s mug and a spoon that had been lying there. Startled by the resulting clatter, Becca tapped the screen to check the incoming caller ID. She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “It’s Kourtney. I told her to check in.” She tapped the ignore button and slid the phone up the table slightly. “So does anyone call her Amber?”
Austin shrugged, ignoring the vibration of his phone. “Only her mom...” Increasingly annoyed by the buzzing, he admitted, “...and me, when she’s really annoying.”
Becca seemed elated by the news and picked up the phone after the final message alert buzz. “Oh my god, this whole time she’s like your little sister and nobody even knew it!” Becca leaned back in her chair, momentarily so excited that she had to text her friend Kourtney back really quickly to let her know that everything was fine. “Do you mind if I tell her about this?” She asked.
Austin shrugged, “I guess not.”
“She gave herself that name. How awesome is that?”
Austin didn’t find that awesome at all. Austin now understood that Jynx had been cockblocking him through high school, and even if she didn’t mean to do it, she was kind of back at it again now, tagging along on his first date with Rebecca DeWeiss.