Perfect Match (11 page)

“I'm sorry, ma'am,” a store clerk said from behind me. “We're closing. Did you want to take that
Mommy's Favorite Valentine
book?”

I looked down at the cartoon illustration on the
cover of the picture book I'd accidentally picked up while talking to Bennett. Not exactly the gift I had in mind.

“Uh, no thanks,” I said, as she ushered me out the door to the dark street.

I guessed I'd have to put off my Alex shopping one more day. At least I'd gotten a little shopping done on Morgan's behalf. Now I all I had to do was convince her that this latest fix-up would be worth her while.

It was unseasonably warm the next day, so the girls and I decided to skip out from under the fluorescent cafeteria lights, grab some sushi from Haru, and park ourselves on the front steps of the Met during lunch.

Maybe it was the sunny weather, maybe it was just that it was Friday, or maybe it was the fact that I had very impressively arranged a slew of blind dates for my friends for tonight, but we were all having too much fun to think about going back to class.

Morgan had brought her inflatable speakers and was playing the Vampire Weekend CD I'd given her last week. Amory was making shadow puppets out of her sashimi. Harper was reading everyone's horoscopes off her BlackBerry, noting that all of our Romance Factor numbers for the day were abnormally off the charts. And Camille and I were
participating in one of our favorite Met steps pastimes: selecting three guys off the street and playing Kiss, Diss, or Marry.

“Ooh, kiss,” she said about a businessman crossing the street with an alligator Hermès briefcase.

“
What
? Diss—Camille, he's like forty.”

“Forty and fiiine. Look at that luscious bottom lip.” She pursed her own lips and made a smooching sound.

I pushed her playfully off the step and grinned. “I've missed this.”

“What, me drooling over silver foxes?”

“You know what I mean,” I said. “You being, well, you. I've been worried about you for a few days.”

“It's still hard,” she said. “Xander e-mailed the other day to see how I was doing, but I'm just not ready to talk yet. I'm trying to keep my mind off of it, you know?” I nodded. “Now remind me who this guy is that you're fixing me up with tonight?” she said.

“Camille,” I said, incredulously, “it's Saxton. Alex's outrageously hot friend who you met at Bowlmor the other day? Don't you remember talking his ear off about your breakup?”

“Ugh.” she shook her head. “Hazily. I guess I was still in a self-pity coma. Wait—I talked his ear off about Xander and he still agreed to go out with me?”

“He thought you were hot. Guys are able to overlook small flaws like emotional baggage to get a date with a gorgeous girl.” I shrugged. “You're meeting at eight at Mary's Fish Camp. Wear that green leather skirt from Takashimaya, and just, uh … maybe try to focus on a new topic of conversation tonight?”

Camille nodded. “Got it. Okay, what about you, Harper? Who's our little yenta fixed you up with?”

Harper's cheeks flushed lightly. Even her embarrassment was ladylike. “A painter,” she drawled.

I'd managed to get Trevor's number from Patch, who confirmed that he was in New York and single. I wasn't sure Trevor would remember me, but when I called him last night, he actually sounded really excited. He said he'd had some bad experiences with blind dates before, so I'd agreed to show up with Harper for the first half hour to moderate their introductions. It actually worked out perfectly, since Harper was a little wary of the whole blind fix-up thing as well. I knew once Trevor saw what a babe Harper was, and once she saw how cool and talented he was, they'd have no problem with me skipping out.

“I've never dated an artsy guy before,” Harper was saying as she touched up her French manicure. “It feels so rebellious!”

“Just make sure you tell your parents that he also
graduated first in his class at Xavier so they'll let you out of the house,” I coached. “You and I are going to meet at Grey Dog's at seven, and we'll have coffee with Trevor before I send you off on your own.”

“What should I wear?” Harper asked.

I thought back to the image Trevor had captured in his painting. “Pearls,” I said, glad that this request wouldn't be much of a challenge for Harper. “Pearls with something classy and black.”

I turned to Amory, but before I could instruct her on the details for her date to see
The Adding Machine
with Phil, I spotted a familiar green beret dashing up the steps toward us.

Uh-oh. I'd been able to tone down SBB/Simone at the dance committee meeting yesterday, but I wasn't so sure I could maintain her cover in front of my friends. What was she doing here?

“Flan—here you are! I've been looking all over for you.” SBB/Simone sank down on the steps. Today she looked like a schoolgirl from the fifties in an argyle cardigan, pleated gray skirt, and oxford shoes. Her hands were full of poster boards, Magic Markers, protractors, and a big Ziploc bag full of erasers. She looked like she'd just robbed a Staples store. And she clearly still hadn't figured out how to use her locker. In fact, she was so bogged down with school
supplies, she didn't even notice the rest of my friends.

“After that committee meeting last night,” she said hurriedly, “I decided that I need to join more clubs. That's the only way to round out this experience. So I signed up for the choir, the science fair, and the 4-H club. Did you even know Thoney had a 4-H club? Well, there's only one other member, but apparently that's all it takes to make a club so—”

Harper cleared her throat. SBB stopped talking and looked around, taking in my crew. For a second, I was sure her cover was blown. How were we going to explain this to my friends? I looked at Camille, who'd be the most likely of any of them to un-incognito SBB, but, amazingly, she seemed oblivious to the starlet in our midst.

Maybe it was because of how confident SBB was in her acting abilities. She just shifted her posture slightly, put on the Midwestern accent again, and stuck out her hand.

“I must have left my manners back in Chicah-go,” she said. “I'm Simone, your new classmate at Thoney. You must be Flan's posse. She's told me absolutely everything about you.”

I could tell my friends were a little thrown by a stranger knowing absolutely everything about them,
especially when I'd never even mentioned having made a new friend. Still, they were polite enough to introduce themselves and act normal.

Which was more than I could say for SBB/Simone. After she pretended to learn everyone's names, she fixated back on me.

“So anyway, now I'm just stressing that I've signed up for
too
much. I feel put out, stretched thin, you know? I'm giving myself wrinkles and my face is insured. But then I remembered: overcommitments are my Flannie's specialty. So you can help me, right?”

“Um, actually,” I said, looking around at my very confused friends, “I'm already a little overcommitted right now. I've fixed everyone up with dates tonight and I need to go over the details.” I explained this last part slowly, to help jog SBB's memory that this whole matchmaking venture had been her idea—and that it was important to me, and my Valentine's Dance future, that everything go smoothly. Hint, hint. “Maybe we can meet up later?” I suggested.

“Oooh,” she said, finally getting it. “I'll just wait here quietly until you're done.”

Groan. Somehow I doubted that SBB was capable of waiting quietly for anything. I looked at my watch. We only had ten more minutes of lunch and I had a lot of dating ground to cover.

“Okay,” I said. “Back to Amory. Your case is the easiest one, since you've already sparked with Phil.”

“Oooh! Love those initial sparks,” SBB cooed. I shot her a look to shut up.

“But what if Phil remembers me differently and doesn't like me this time around?” Amory used the last piece of her sushi shadow puppet to mime terror.

“Impossible,” I said, shaking my head. “Just meet him outside the Provincetown Playhouse near NYU at seven-thirty, be your crazy self, and you'll be golden.”

“Wear perfume,” SBB chimed in again. “Actor boys love perfume.”

“
Simone
!” I hissed.

“S
ah
-rry,” she said sheepishly. “Shutting up now.”

Luckily, after that, SBB stuck to her word, and I was able to get through the details of the final fix-up without interruptions.

“Morg, since you and Bennett are both crazy about Middle Eastern food, you're meeting him at eight-thirty at Moustache. You'll recognize him because he'll probably be wearing a Weezer T-shirt and, when he's waiting for someone, he always stands slightly slouched over, with his hands in his pockets.”

“Oh, okay,” Morgan said, sounding hesitant. “Remind me how you know so much about this guy?”

I'd conveniently decided to leave out the fact that Bennett was my ex. Morgan was already on the fence about being set up again, and I didn't want to do anything to tip the scales.

“Oh, you know, the usual,” I said. “We had a couple classes together and a lot of the same friends at Stuy. He's great,” I added. “You'll totally hit it off. But he likes really natural-looking girls, so don't wear too much makeup. And make sure to show up on time. He hates when people are late.” I was trying to sound casual, but I could also sense the scrutinizing eye of SBB, who knew all about my history with Bennett.

Luckily, she came through for me and changed the subject. “So Flan, now that you've fixed up all your friends, do you get to spend some quality time with a special someone of your own tonight?”

“Actually, no,” I said, almost wishing that I was the kind of person who could kick back with Alex tonight and not worry about how everyone's dates were going. But who were we kidding—this was me. And I'd put a lot of work into making sure everything went just right tonight.

I turned to my friends and shrugged. “I wanted to be around to check in on you guys. Did anyone notice how I conveniently arranged all your dates in the same neighborhood at half-hour intervals? Not that
you'll need my help,” I joked, then waited for my silent friends to reassure me.

“Of course not,” Amory finally said, nodding as if to convince the other girls. “We'll be fine. Right, girls?”

“Right,” Morgan said, looking nervous.

“We'll all bring our A-games,” Camille said.

Under normal circumstances, I might have joked that hopefully Camille's dating A-game was better than her field hockey A-game, but she was biting her lip in this weird, nervous way, and avoiding my eyes by pretending to be very absorbed by the pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk below.

Why did my friends look so helpless and desperate? Gulp. I crossed my fingers that everything would go smoothly that night—and that I hadn't just made four big mistakes.

At seven o'clock on the dot that night, Harper and I walked into Grey Dog's café on Carmine Street in the West Village.

“He's late,” Harper whispered, looking around frantically.

“You don't even know what he looks like,” I said, scanning the restaurant myself. “How can you tell he's not here?”

“I just have a feeling,” she said. “If he were here, he'd have an eye out for us.”

“So he's fashionably late,” I finally admitted. “He's an artist—he doesn't live according to the clock in the same way other people do. It's better this way—we'll sit down first so there won't be that awkward shuffle at the door. Relax. I'll order you a soy latte.”

As Harper worriedly picked out a seat, I headed
over to the coffee bar. I'd picked Grey Dog's because it was a total artist hangout, funky yet casual (which seemed to fit Trevor's personality) and because the giant chalkboard menu hanging behind the counter touted a huge selection of vegan-friendly sandwiches and salads (perfect for the nutritionally conscious Harper). True, she stuck out a little in her pearls and black Ralph Lauren sheath dress, but I knew that wouldn't matter once lucky couple number one hit it off … assuming he ever showed up.

“Flan,” a guy's voice said behind me. Phew—it was Trevor. Oh, and he was hugging me. “Wow,
you're
all grown up. You look great!”

“Thanks,” I said, paying for the lattes. “My friend Harper got us a table over there. Come on, I'll introduce you.”

“Oh,” he said, looking a little disappointed. “She's here already? Did I misunderstand? I thought the two of us would have a chance to catch up and your friend would show up later.”

Yikes, thank goodness Harper was out of earshot. She would've been out the door quicker than you could say
gauche
. I glanced at her sitting over in the corner. She'd just spotted me talking to Trevor and gave a tiny wave.

“See?” I gestured at her to Trevor. She was a
knockout, even when she looked as nervous as she did now. “Now, don't you want to meet her?”

For half a latte, I hung around Camille and Trevor's cramped table to help make sure the matchmaking ball got rolling. Trevor seemed polite, if a little bit reserved. Harper was charming, but kind of stiff.

“So what are you painting these days, Trevor,” I asked, when their conversation lulled for a moment.

“I've been doing some animal portraits,” he said. “In fact, do you still have Noodles? I always had this vision of painting the two of you together.”

I don't know why that comment took me by surprise, but I found myself stammering, “You know who loves Noodles? Harper! In fact, she loves all animals. So much that she volunteers at the SPCA on weekends. Isn't that right, Harper?”