The answering machine flashed an angry red when I stepped into my apartment. I hit Play wearing the same grin I’d worn all night, the same grin I’d worn on the drive home beside Matt. He hadn’t been able to stay out late since he’d promised to help out at his dad’s farm the next morning, and it was just as well. Roxanna and Lexie had blown up my phone with text messages all night, asking for every detail. I’d ignored most of their requests for information, but snuck in a few messages. I’d spent most of the two hours with Matt unable to take my eyes off of him, shivering at every brush of the hand, holding my breath every time he leaned in to whisper something to me. For a woman who’d sworn off dating a few hours ago to my sisters, I was very, very interested.
And he’d kissed me good night. Not the hot, passionate kind of kiss we’d shared the first night we met, but a simple, soft kiss on the lips coupled with an “
I’ll see you soon
,” leaving me to wonder when “soon” would be. Like tomorrow soon? Or two days soon?
You are pathetic
, I thought with a big idiotic grin on my lips. The damn smile wouldn’t go away.
“You have three new messages. Message one,” the machine said, and brought me back from obsessing over Matt’s dimpled smile.
“Hey, Gen, you weren’t answering your cell so I looked up your home number on the internet,” Richard’s voice said. “I thought maybe you might want to catch a movie tomorrow night? The Sunday matinee starts at five. Call me when you get in.”
“What the hell?” I wondered out loud. He’d been the one to tell me we weren’t right for each other, a point I agreed with wholeheartedly. And now he had my unlisted home phone number. Obviously, there were ways around that. Maybe Dad and Tony were right: the internet would be the downfall of all humanity.
“So much for privacy,” I muttered and grabbed a glass from the cabinet beside the sink.
“Message two.”
“Hi Gen, this is Matt. Uh, your mom called me at work today. She invited me over for dinner…I’m not sure if you wanted me to come? She seems to think we’re, uh, dating. I hope you don’t mind, I asked her for your phone number. If you get this before dinner tonight, you should call me.” My heart accelerated at the sound of his voice. I waited breathlessly during the pause before he said, “I’ll show up in case you don’t get this message in time. In case you lost my card, here’s my number.”
My fingers went up to her lips while he read out his phone number. The scent of his cologne still lingered on my skin.
“Message three.”
“Hey, Gen, it’s Richard again. You must not be home. It’s…nine forty-five. I was really hoping we’d get a chance to talk tonight. Maybe you’ll still get this in time to catch the matinee tomorrow. Hope you had fun wherever you were.”
I frowned at the sad hint to his voice. Like a lost-puppy-dog kind of sad. I had a sinking feeling he liked me more than he’d let on, which confused me since he’d been the one who’d orchestrated the whole dump-n-dash in Mario’s Italy.
Taking a drink of water, I leaned against the counter, deep in thought.
The phone rang and on reflex I picked it up without checking the caller ID first. “Hello?”
“Oh good, you’re home now. Did you get my message?” Richard asked eagerly, breathing heavily into the phone. He was clearly excited to have reached a warm body on the other end of the line. I shuddered—and not in ecstasy.
I looked at the clock on the microwave: it was ten p.m., only fifteen minutes since his last message.
“Yes, I got both of them.” I stuffed the phone between my ear and shoulder and began pacing, gesturing with my hands. “Richard, I’m…Listen, I realize something must have changed on your end since you, you know, dumped me, but you had it right. We’re just not compatible. Like you said. Remember?”
I nodded vigorously, hoping he could somehow sense just how much I believed we weren’t any good together. There wasn’t a future with us—especially not with my mind so focused on Matt’s dimples.
“About that, I was thinking maybe I was wrong. You know? You’re pretty awesome.”
Hmm
. How could I argue? He was making this very difficult.
“Thank you. That’s a very nice compliment coming from someone…as awesome as you.” I squeezed my eyes shut and mouthed
shit, shit, shit
. Then I said, “But the problem is that I’m just not ready for commitment.”
Yeah
. I smiled, satisfied I had finally delivered a fact he wouldn’t be able to argue with. I stopped pacing, feeling pretty damn good about the conversation now.
Until he said, “I think we should give it another shot. I only dumped you because the guys thought I should play hard to get.”
I smacked my forehead with my palm. Of course his friends would think humiliating a girl in public was a great way to play hard to get. Probably, none of them had ever had a real girlfriend in their lives. And cyber girlfriends didn’t count. What my generation lacked was a little human interaction; something my dad mentioned every chance he got.
I shook my head. “Richard, really, I—”
“And they all think you’re hot,” he added. “Even the guys I play Minecraft with online think you’re hot.”
I had no clue what Minecraft was. What I did understand, though, was the people he spoke of didn’t work at Bradshaw Insurance. “Oh, they do, huh? How would your Minecraft friends know if I’m hot or not?”
He’d probably snapped some pictures of me at work. I pictured him and his IT friends hiding behind trashcans and vending machines with their camera phones. My eye started to twitch. I took his silence as an admission of guilt. “Richard?”
“I, um, well, uh, I just described you to them. Yeah. They think you sound super hot.”
I didn’t buy it. “You must be really good at appearance descriptors.”
“Oh yeah, I really am.” He was far too quick to agree, and sounded relieved. “After talking with the guys, I think we could really have something. I think you should come over and game with me. If Xbox isn’t your thing you could bring your laptop and I can set you up with a Minecraft account.”
I flinched. “Richard, I don’t even know what Minecraft is. But that’s not the problem. I’m just not into that kind of thing. You know?”
“Oh, you’d like it. You can even try on my War Zombies 4 helmet. It has a switch on the side so you can see in the dark.”
From the excitement in his voice, I assumed I wasn’t supposed to be horrified by the offer. I knocked over the glass of water and swallowed a few swear words. How the hell was I supposed respond to the helmet offer? The conversation had just gotten weird in a bad way.
When I didn’t answer, he said, “You could come over tonight if you want. It’s kind of late, but my mom doesn’t care when I have people over.”
“Richard, you aren’t listening to me.” I grimaced at the thought of getting mean. I needed to get the point across without sounding like a major bitch. He seemed like a nice guy, despite everything. “Here’s the thing; you aren’t my type. At all. I don’t date guys like you, never have. You’re…too smart and have too many…electronic gadgets. Bikers. I’m into bikers.”
“Bikers?”
“Yeah. Bikers,” I said with a firm nod. “You should just move on, you know? There are plenty of nice girls out there who are into your games…into gaming…gamers. Whatever it’s called. I mean, what about a relationship with a nice girl online? Maybe you could go to some kind of video game hang out and find a girl there.”
“I didn’t know you liked bikers,” he said, sounding much too interested for someone who’d been told to take a hike. “I guess I’ll see you around, then.”
“Right,” I agreed and nodded at the wall. “Of course, yeah. I’ll see you around, Richard.”
I set the phone in its cradle on the counter.
“Well, that was strange,” I said to the empty room.
Chapter Twelve
“Here’s the deal. My best friend has been talking about you all week,” Roxanna said to Matt and I stepped on her toe under the table.
Yeah, I had been talking about Matt all week, but it was none of his business. He didn’t need to know that I’d spent four and a half days—not that I was counting—thinking of an excuse, any excuse, to call him. Roxanna suggested I bring him along to what had become our Thursday night ritual of ladies night and crooning, but I’d been hesitant. I’d only agreed after Roxanna promised to be on her best behavior. Lexie was out of town with Jeremy, so it was just me, Roxanna and Matt in a corner booth at the karaoke bar, and had no more than sat down and ordered our drinks before Roxanna was already up to her nosy ways.
“Ouch,” Roxanna said and scooted her foot from under mine. She ignored my warning glare, and said to Matt, “I feel like I already know you, what with Gen gushing about you on and on ever since she put her face in your crotch.”
My cheeks flamed. I gave Matt an apologetic half grimace, half smile. “Ignore her. I try not to take her out in public much.”
“I don’t mind,” Matt said, his eyes smiling. He did his dimple number on Roxanna and she was toast.
“Do you have any brothers?” Roxanna asked, batting her eyes, and Matt laughed.
“Just one, but he’s engaged.”
“That’s a shame.” Roxanna said. “Well, despite that disappointing revelation, you’re on your way to earning my approval.”
“Roxanna is a tough cookie to win over,” I told Matt, but he just flashed another gorgeous smile.
“I’ll work hard for the approval.”
“And a pleaser,” Roxanna said. “You’ve already scored another point.”
“There are no points,” I said and fished through my purse for the lip gloss I’d just purchased. “Matt and I are friends. Neither one of us are looking for a relationship.”
That was more for his benefit, not mine, because he’d said he wasn’t interested in serious dating. Now that I couldn’t get him out of my head, I’d decided to throw my whole dating sabbatical out the window. I hoped the new lip gloss would change his mind, too. Maybe I should have asked him exactly what his hang up on serious dating was, but truthfully I’d been too scared. I didn’t want this to be one of those times where I didn’t like the answer, because I really liked him.
“Friends…right,” Roxanna said and winked at me. If I didn’t love her so much, I might have shaken her silly. “So what are we drinking?”
The waitress was already on her way back from the bar, a tray with an ice cold pitcher on it and three frosty mugs.
“Beer is good,” I said, and leaned a little away from the table so the waitress could set our mugs down. When she left, I poured beer into an ice cold mug then slid it toward Matt.
“Nonsense; it’s Thursday night,” Roxanna said, and accepted the mug of beer I’d just poured her. “Karaoke is better heard on lush ears. And we’re all single and hot—we need shots.”
“You’ll get used to Roxanna.” I nudged my shoulder against Matt’s arm. “She grows on you. Like a fungus.”
Roxanna grinned. “The good kind of fungus.”
“Like mushrooms,” Matt suggested, winning him another point from Roxanna, probably.
“I would have given anything to see Gen’s face when you walked into her parents’ dining room.” Roxanna laughed. “I miss one Saturday dinner at the Gorecki household and it turns out to be the most exciting one of the year.” She glanced over at me. “When are you going to tell them all you made it up?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.” I glanced at Matt. “But I promise soon.”
“I didn’t really think about the consequences of me showing up,” Matt admitted. “I’m sorry if I made things worse.”
“No, it’s not your fault. I’m the one with the big fat liar mouth,” I said, only half joking. Mom had been talking about Matt all week long, dropping his name in every conversation I had with her and Dad. Lexie had warned me about this, and every day I didn’t admit the truth only made the matter worse.
“Marilyn’s probably already planning a wedding,” Roxanna said. Matt cleared his throat and took a drink of beer. She pierced him with a best friend glare. “Commitment phobia?”
“Not particularly.” Matt grinned. “Only on the first fake date with a fake girlfriend at her parents’ house.”
“Point taken,” Roxanna conceded. “What do you do for fun, Matt?”
“I like to fish, take long walks on the beach and cuddle,” Matt said, and my insides warmed. After this night, Roxanna would have to like him. He was easy going and quick to smile and, right now, that was exactly what I needed. I didn’t want to over-think things. I’d been doing that too much in the last few months. Live in the moment; that’s what I would do.
The waitress reappeared to ask if we needed anything, and Matt held out a twenty-dollar bill. “The lady here would like to order shots.” He gestured with a nod to Roxanna. “And I have a feeling I’ll need a few.”
Roxanna held up her beer when the waitress left, and we raised ours in toast. “It’s a best friend’s duty not to go easy on a guy for at least thirty minutes after meeting them. There’s rules about this kind of thing.” With a wicked grin, Roxanna said, “Here’s to crotch-sniffing.”
I stepped on her toe under the table and laughed. “You are such a jerk.”