by Parker, Ali
“Actually, yeah.” I glanced up at her. “Holden invited me over. Says he’s going to cook for me. And hey, I’m not saying no to a free dinner, right?”
“Yeah, of course. That’s what this is about,” she teased. She took her seat opposite me. “How are things going with the two of you?”
“What do you mean?” I furrowed my brow at her.
“I mean, are you still friends, or is there something else going on?”
I thought back to the dream I’d had about him the week before and shifted in my seat.
“No, we’re just friends,” I replied. She reached over and patted my hand.
“Of course you are,” she mocked, and I shot her a hard look that let her know her spiel with this stuff was starting to grow a little damn tiring.
“I’m just saying.” She held her hands up. “The two of you are more or less dating at this point, aren’t you? I mean, you know his kid, he’s taken you out on his yacht, he’s having you over for dinner….”
“I mean, if you want to look at it like that, sure,” I sighed. “But nothing’s happened between us. Romantically, I mean. I feel like if he wanted to make a move on me, he would already have done it, you know what I mean?”
“Sure, but maybe he’s nervous. You said yourself he hasn’t dated anyone in a hell of a long time. Perhaps he’s not sure what making a move looks like in this day and age?”
“Okay, I think you’re being a little patronizing.” I raised my eyebrows at her. “He’s not stupid. He’s just out of the loop. No need to assume he’s too scared to hold my hand.”
“Fair enough.” She cocked her head at me again, and I could see there was something she wanted to ask me, something she was trying to come out with the best way to phrase so as not to piss me off.
“And you’re okay with things as they are?” she asked gently. She could talk a lot of shit, but at the end of the day, she wanted nothing more than for me to be happy. She wanted to make sure I wasn’t getting strung along, but I wasn’t. I was enjoying spending time with Hunter and Holden, but our lives were way too different to make a connection that would stick. At least, that’s what I kept telling myself.
“Yeah, I sure am,” I promised her. “I would have gone for it if I’d liked him that way. But I didn’t.”
“And now you’re setting him up on dates?”
“Yes. I actually have his first one lined up.” I grinned. “Casey, from the teacher training day, you remember?”
“Oh, shit, yeah, I know her.” Zoe tapped her finger on the desk to punctuate her words. “Yeah, she’s nice. I could see her being a good fit for a single dad.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” I agreed. If I was being honest, I was hoping that putting a whole person—a person I had chosen and liked and didn’t want to wind up hurt, no less—between Holden and me was going to be enough to scrub the last remnants of my attraction to him out of my brain once and for all. I knew it was a little shitty, setting him up to get him out of my head, but I had to work with what I had at the moment, and this was it.
“Well, I suppose you’re going to find out how he really feels about you based on how he reacts to the date,” she remarked.
“I know how he feels about me,” I reminded her, and she gave me a look.
“Well, then it’s going to be confirmed for you then,” she replied, grinning. She glanced at her watch. “Hey, I have to get going. The takeout place I like closes in an hour, and I want to have my Friday night pizza.”
“You get going.” I waved my hand at her. “Have a good night, all right?”
“You too,” she replied. “And let me know how it goes, okay?”
“Will do.” I smiled, and she headed out the door and left me sitting with my thoughts once more. What if he did go along with this date without a question? How would that make me feel? Did I want him to date Casey, or did I want to convince myself that I didn’t want to date him?
I went to grab my bag and put on a little makeup for the dinner this evening and didn’t let those thoughts stick with me. Whatever happened was going to happen, and I had to be all right with that. I could do this, come what may. It was just dinner, after all. Nothing I couldn’t handle.
I arrived outside his house and took a deep breath. I imagined Casey arriving out here, heading up to the door, checking the place out. Would she feel the same way I did about it? Would she think it was a little too much but also be quietly impressed that he had managed to provide this life for himself and his kid? Or would she swoon at his cash, at the promise of all that money?
I climbed out of the car and headed to the door. She would just be glad to have a date, I would bet. It was hard to find people to go out with in this business, given that it was so female-dominated, and she would be glad to find someone who shared her love of kids, her kindness, her compassion. The thought of them spending the night in here, talking about everything and laughing and sharing a bottle of wine, shifting ever closer on the couch—it should have made me happy for my friend. Instead, I felt a stab of jealousy. I pushed it down. No, not now. Not ever.
I knocked on the door, and Hunter opened it a second later, as though he had been waiting for me to turn up. He grinned widely when he saw me, and I smiled back at him. Damn, he was such a cute kid. I mean, I pretty much thought all kids were somewhat adorable, but Hunter was particularly endearing.
“Miss Becks!” he exclaimed happily, and I grinned. It was so weird being called that outside of school, but I didn’t mind too much. I certainly wasn’t going to encourage him to call me Autumn. I had to keep that line there between us. Just like the line I was trying to maintain when it came to his father.
“Autumn.” Holden emerged from the kitchen, wearing a dark gray shirt, jeans, and a dishcloth thrown over one shoulder. “How are you doing? Journey down here all right?”
“More than fine,” I told him, and I unhooked my bag and let it drop to the ground next to me. I smoothed out the dress I had put on for the occasion and wondered why I’d felt the urge to dress up like this. Dinner at a friend’s place, that was normally a jeans-and-your-baggiest-shirt affair, yet here I was, looking like I was dressed for a date.
“The lasagna’s almost ready.” Holden nodded to the kitchen. “Hunter, why don’t you finish setting the table?”
“Okay.” Hunter saluted him happily and vanished off to take care of his task. Holden waved me through to the kitchen, where he had a glass of wine sitting out on the counter ready for me.
“Oh, you have no idea how much I need this.” I took a sip of the wine and then inhaled the gorgeous smells filling the kitchen. “Hey, that smells great. Didn’t know you could cook.”
“I had to learn for Hunter.” He shrugged and then checked the food in the oven. “This is my specialty. I hope you like it.”
“I’m sure I will,” I promised him. “It’s nice not to have to cook dinner for myself for a change.”
“I can imagine,” he said, and I was so distinctly aware in that moment that the two of us were alone in this kitchen together, that I had wine in my hand, and this handsome guy cooking me dinner, and that it would have made every bit of sense if I had shifted myself that inch toward him, moved in close, stolen a little moment of intimacy….
“The table’s ready.” Hunter appeared at the door, mercifully barring those thoughts from my brain before they went any further.
“I’ll take my wine through,” I suggested, ducking out of the kitchen and trying to catch my breath. What in the hell was going on with me? It was that dream, that damn dream—but it wasn’t real. Nothing had happened between us, no matter how realistic it had felt in the moment. I had to forget it, to leave it all behind. I was here to set him up on a date, after all, and I couldn’t very well do that while all those thoughts were running through my mind.
Holden emerged from the kitchen a few minutes later with the lasagna, and he served us all up a generous portion, and we began to eat. The food was good—great, even—a
nd I tucked in happily, glad to have something to distract myself with.
“So, Hunter, I saw that you were in the arts and crafts club earlier this week,” I said to him, and he nodded gamely. “Did you like it?”
He shrugged. “It was okay. I don’t know if I would want to go again.”
Holden furrowed his brow, and I could see that the statement had put him out. I dived in with a counteroffer.
“Hey, so, there’s a gaming club that just started at the school,” I told him. “I’m helping out with it. Do you think that would suit you more?”
Hunter raised his eyebrows, and his eyes sparkled with interest.
“That sounds good.” He glanced at his dad. “Is that okay, Dad? Can I go to it?”
“Sure you can,” he promised his son.
“And you’ll be there, right?” Hunter asked me.
“For sure.” I smiled at him, and he seemed excited by the thought. It was a victory, even a little one, to get a kid like him who had been struggling to find his place in the social scene of the school to come to a club. I knew it wasn’t going to be well-populated at first, but maybe that would suit him better, not having a bunch of people around that he felt like he had to live up to.
“Thanks,” Holden mouthed at me, and I flashed him a brief smile in return. The way he was looking at me, pure gratefulness in his eyes, it made my stomach twist up. I put down my fork, not hungry anymore, or at least, hungry for something else.
The three of us finished dinner, and Hunter helped me wash up while his dad set up a game of cards for us. I was no good, but they guided me through, so I didn’t make too big a fool of myself. I found myself relaxing and enjoying myself, reminded of how much I enjoyed their company. The three of us together, it just made sense.
Soon enough, Hunter was yawning, and it was clearly time for him to go to bed and my cue to get out of there already. I wanted to stay longer, to split a couple of glasses of wine with Holden and catch up adult-to-adult, but that was risking things more than they needed to be risked. Holden set Hunter off to get ready for bed, and I helped him tidy up the cards that were now scattered over his living room table.
“So,” I took a deep breath and began to speak, “I think I have a date for you.”
“Oh, really?” He glanced at me, eyebrows raised. “Who is she?”
“She’s a friend of mine from a teacher training conference,” I told him. “Casey Styles. She’s really nice, and I think you’ll like her. Quiet, sweet, smart.”
“Sounds awesome.” He nodded after a pause. I felt my stomach drop and realized I’d been hoping, somehow, that he was going to turn down the notion of this date. Which was crazy. This was what I’d wanted for him in the first place, and now that he was agreeing to meet someone new, I was disappointed?
“So I think she’s hoping to make it this weekend,” I continued. “Maybe tomorrow night, if you can find a sitter for Hunter?”
“Yeah, I think I can,” he said. “I’ll let you know either way, and we can take it from there.”
“Sounds good,” I replied, and our hands brushed briefly as I went to grab a card from the spot next to him. I froze for a moment, the connection enough to land me right back in the middle of my dream. I pushed it down. I felt as though I had spent all evening doing that.
“Cool.” I pulled back from him and turned away. “I should get going. Thanks for tonight. It was fun.”
“Yeah, it was,” he agreed. “You’re welcome around here anytime. And thanks for letting Hunter know about that club. It sounds perfect for him.”
“No problem,” I mumbled, going to get my jacket and doing my best not to look him in the eye.
“I’ll text you about that date, right?” he followed me to the door. “I’m looking forward to it. Sounds fun.”
“I’m sure it will be,” I agreed, and suddenly the world felt as though it was tilting to the side, a seasickness taking control of me for a moment. Ironic that I had been out on the water with him for all that time and been fine, but on dry land, I couldn’t seem to keep it together.
“Well, see you,” I exclaimed, my voice higher than it needed to be, and I headed out the door without so much as a hug goodbye. Because if I touched him right now, I wouldn’t be able to keep down those feelings that were no good for me. I closed the door behind me and inhaled a deep lungful of the cool evening air, hoping it would bring me back to earth, to shore. But it didn’t, and I was left with the lingering question over whether I had just set up the man I was meant to be with on a date with someone else.
23
Holden
“I don’t know what to do,” I admitted to my best friend as Raymond sat opposite me and watched me pace back and forth in front of him.
“I thought you wanted her to set you up on a date?” he asked, sounding confused. “That’s what you told me the last time we saw each other.”
“Yeah, and I guess I did think that’s what I wanted.” I rubbed my hand over my face. “But now that it’s actually here….”
I trailed off and tried to make sense of the mess inside my head. Last night, when we had been tidying the place up after our evening together, I had known. I had known that this was the day I needed to make a move. I wasn’t sure what had switched inside of me—maybe the kindness she had shown Hunter or maybe how good it was to have her spend the evening with us—but I wanted Autumn. I didn’t want some girl she was setting me up on a date with. I wanted her and only her, and anything else would have been a lie.
But then she had told me that she had someone interested, someone who sounded sweet and good and like a solid match for me, and I felt like the ground had dropped out from underneath me. I wished I’d had the nerve to tell her this wasn’t what I wanted, that it would have been silly for me to go out with this woman given what I felt for her, but that wouldn’t have gone down well. She had gone to all this effort to find someone for me, right at the moment when I had decided I had already found the person I wanted to date.
“So what are you going to do?” Raymond asked, and I shook my head and shrugged.
“I honestly have no fucking idea,” I admitted. “I don’t think I can back out of this date now, not when it’s all set up for me. I should have turned her down when she brought it up. I don’t think I’m ready yet—”
“Dude, I know you probably don’t want to hear this, but it sounds as though you have feelings for Autumn,” Raymond cut across me. I clenched my fists at my sides. I knew he was right and had been right all along, but I wasn’t ready to admit that to myself yet.
“I guess you could be right,” I conceded. “But I can’t tell her that now, can I? After everything I’ve done and said in the last few weeks. She’s going to think I’m crazy.”
“I don’t think she is,” he assured me gently. “Look, you guys have been pretty much dating all this time, haven’t you? All you need to do is tell her you’re starting to get feelings for her. Just tell her the truth. I don’t think that’s so crazy.”
“Yeah, but she just set me up with someone else,” I pointed out to him. “Those aren’t exactly the actions of someone who’s into me, are they?”
“I mean, I guess not, on the surface,” he conceded. “But maybe it’s that she does have feelings for you and isn’t sure you feel the same way. This is what you asked for, after all. She’s just going along with that. But things have changed now, and you can only try to tell her the truth, right?”
“I don’t think I can.” I shook my head. “I think I left it too long. I think I’ve fucked things up between us.”
“I think you’re catastrophizing because you haven’t done this in a while.” He cut me off once more, which was the right decision because it felt as though my brain was going to melt and start leaking out the back of my head at any given moment.
“I think I’m going to go out on this date with this woman,” I sighed. “I don’t want her to think I’m not grateful for it.”
“Are you just provin
g a point?” Raymond furrowed his brow. “Because I’m sure she would rather you tell her the truth than play these silly games.”
“I’m not playing games,” I replied stubbornly and realized I sounded a little too much like Hunter when he wasn’t getting something he wanted. I took a deep breath, raised my hands, and exhaled.
“She’s set me up on a date,” I told him. “She’s gone to all this effort to find me someone. I’m not going to shoot that down, not now. This is what I told her I wanted all along, and it’s that simple. I’m going to do it.”
“And you’re not doing this to spite her?” Raymond pressed. I shook my head.
“I’m doing this because she’s trying for me,” I replied, and I felt my entire body tense at the thought of what was meant to be happening tonight. Autumn had texted me the address, the place I was to pick this woman up, and I knew I should go there with my game face on and make the most of it. But I could barely even imagine heading out to this woman’s place, not when Autumn was spending the night alone.
“Right.” Raymond nodded, but he didn’t seem convinced. “I’ll pick up Hunter, then, and bring him around here.”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll drop him off.”
“I think it’s important you take some time to think,” he replied firmly. “Figure out what you really want, no?”
“I guess so,” I sighed. “Thanks, man. I appreciate it.”
“It’s cool.” He waved his hand. “You just make the right choice tonight, okay?”
“Any input on what that is?” I grinned at him ruefully. He shook his head.
“I’m keeping out of this one,” he replied firmly. “You have to make this call for yourself.”
“Guess so,” I conceded. With that, I headed back down to my place to start getting ready for my date that evening.
It wasn’t that I didn’t like the thought of seeing this woman at all. In fact, in a lot of ways, she sounded pretty great, and I trusted that anyone who was friends with Autumn had to have at least something going for them. I should have been excited at the thought of getting back out there with someone new, even if my last blind date hadn’t exactly gone the way I had expected it to. Yet, as I made Hunter some lunch and told him he’d be visiting Raymond later that afternoon, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was wrong.