Taste of Love

by David Horne

  Then Harry started smiling.

  Scrubbing his hands over his face, Alex took a deep breath.

  “Want a bagel?” Bella yelled.

  Alex yelled back an affirmative, smiling as he remembered Harry’s appreciation of a New York breakfast. A cream cheese bagel wasn’t the pinnacle, but it would do in a pinch.

  Kicking off his shoes and making sure he didn’t look like a complete disaster, he left the bedroom to the sound of Bella banging around in his kitchen. Quiet was good, he reasoned, but it was nice to have someone else around.

  “So,” Bella started as Alex slid onto one of the stools in the kitchen. She rested her hip against the cabinets and crossed her arms over her chest. It was her I’m going to get you to talk to me pose, and Alex groaned inwardly. “So, that cute guy.”

  “Was a cute guy,” Alex said, tapping a finger against the counter. At the ensuing silence, he rolled his eyes. “Is me talking to someone attractive a difficult thing to imagine?”

  Bella’s gaze was assessing, as she waited for the bagels to finish toasting. Though she was younger, she had made it her personal mission to make sure that Alex didn’t get through his life alone. “You should have given him your number.”

  “Yeah right.” Alex gave her an unimpressed look. “Since when have you known me to ask anyone for their number, let alone a potential date?”

  “So, you’re admitting he’s a potential date,” Bella grinned, pointing at him with a butter knife. Alex made a mental note to discuss her disregard for potentially harmful kitchen utensils.

  Alex shoved away from the counter and busied himself with finding the cream cheese. If Jason had been in his apartment recently, there was a good bet he’d eaten and replaced Alex’s supply. “I’m not admitting to anything. There was a guy on the plane, we talked, that’s it.”

  When he shut the door with his hip, he caught the look Bella leveled at him, eyes narrowed and judgmental.

  “Listen to me, Alexander Wheeler,” she started, back to jabbing at him with the butter knife. He took a step backwards on impulse. “You don’t talk to anyone cute. Period. What makes him so special?”

  Alex’s friend circle was startlingly small. On the one hand, there’s Sara, his best friend and his brother’s wife. On the other, there’s the aforementioned brother and Bella. There are drinking buddies and some guys from work who he’ll hang out with at a push, but generally, he trusted very few people. He blamed that as the reason he blurted out, “He was scared of flying and I held his hand.”

  Bella stared at him, mouth open, eyes wide. It was her guppy face, which was a little unfair to a guppy because they didn’t actually look like that. Well, Alex’s didn’t at least. Bella thankfully put the knife down on the breadboard before leaping forward, gripping Alex’s upper arms. “Are you serious?”

  “Deadly,” Alex said, deadpan.

  “Shut up,” Bella snapped immediately and then shook Alex gently. “You held his hand?”

  “Arm,” Alex corrected gently, but Bella’s enthusiasm was catching, and he found himself grinning. “I felt like an idiot.”

  Bella waved him off, staring up at him with a pleased smile. “I never thought I’d see the day you’d take the initiative.”

  Alex snorted, tossing the cream cheese on the side. Thankfully Bella stepped back before he could nudge her away. The bagels popped up in the toaster, startling them both, but Alex couldn’t shift the smile from his face. “He tripped over my legs.”

  The words came tumbling out as Bella passed him a bagel. He told her about meeting Harry and making sure he was comfortable on the flight, right up to the departure at baggage claims.

  “It’s like a movie,” Bella said, amused. She licked a strip of cream cheese from her thumb and dropped the butter knife into the sink. “Why didn’t you get his number?”

  “Because I remembered that I can’t actually talk to a cute guy when I’m thinking about things going further than just, ‘Hi, I’m Alex, nice to meet you’?” Alex glared down at his bagel as if it was single-handedly responsible for everything wrong in his life.

  Bella nudged him with her toe, and picked up her plate, heading back into the living room. “Why you always gotta sabotage yourself?”

  “A question I ask every day,” Alex said, wearily. He followed her back to the couch, and dropped into it with a sigh, tipping his head back. His plate was resting precariously against his knee, and he tapped it with a finger. “When will a cute guy make the first move for me?”

  Tucking her toes under Alex’s thigh, Bella peered at him over the top of the plate balanced on her knees. “A question for the ages.”

  Alex laughed around a bite of bagel and felt his phone vibrate in his pocket.

  “It’s probably just Jason,” Bella pointed out, wriggling her toes.

  Nevertheless, Alex maneuvered himself—and his plate—enough to be able to dig his phone out of his pocket. It was an Instagram notification, and Alex rolled his eyes, intending to shove the phone back in his pocket when the name of the new follower caught his eye.

  “Oh shit,” he said, dropping both his plate and his bagel onto the carpet as he startled. “Damn.”

  “What?” Bella was still chewing on her bagel, but she eyed the mess on the carpet with an expression that told Alex he was cleaning it up himself. It was his apartment, so obviously, but he waved the phone at her, feeling slightly sick.

  “He followed me.”

  “What?!” This time Bella shrieked the word, and she moved her plate over to the coffee table. Rubbing her hands down her shorts, she grabbed Alex’s phone. “Oh my God, Alex.”

  Alex buried his face in his hands, trying to get his breathing under control. Everything was fine, he didn’t have to panic. This was what he wanted, right? A cute boy to contact him first. Oh God, he was going to be sick.

  “Don’t be dramatic,” Bella chastised, shifting on the couch so that she sat next to him. “Wow, he’s even cuter on Insta.”

  Unable to keep from peering over, Alex stared down at his phone in her hands, watching the images of Harry’s face scroll past. There was a couple of his dog, Flora, and yeah, she was even cuter than he had imagined. More of bread, cakes, and baked goods. Hadn’t he said his parents owned a bakery?

  Alex snatched his phone back, scrolling back up to the top so that he could see Harry’s profile information. “Why would he do this?”

  “Because he met a cute boy at the airport and wanted to talk to him?” Bella looked unimpressed, and she snatched up her bagel, taking a huge bite out of it.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Alex said, knowing she was right and refusing to admit it. “What do I do?”

  Bella laughed outright, squeezing his thigh. “You really are a disaster, Alex. Follow him back, duh, and initiate a dialogue.”

  Alex gave her a look. “‘Initiate a dialogue’? You sound like Mom.”

  “Whatever works,” Bella said, with a false smile. She hated it when someone compared her to their mother, but whatever, Alex was back to staring at Harry and his many pictures. Bella shuffled closer, watching. “He really is cute.”

  “He was funny too,” Alex said quietly, thinking back to the plane. Usually, two hours would take forever, but it had gone by so quickly. Harry had blabbed about parents and their bakery and about his dog. Alex had mostly talked about work and archery. “Oh God, I talked about archery.”

  Bella shook her head, amused. “Of course you did. You’d talk to a homeless guy about archery.”

  It was true. Alex’s finger hovered over the follow button, and it was ridiculous, wasn’t it, to be scared of something so simple? Harry could have just followed him because he was the kind of guy that followed everyone he met. Except his follower count didn’t lend credence to that. Maybe he just felt sorry for Alex.

  “Maybe he just wants to know if you’ve had breakfast yet,” Bella said, laughing. She slid back down the couch, head resting against the arm.

  It was that, of all thing
s, that made Alex follow Harry back. As soon as the confirmation came through, he sent a message before he could convince himself that it was a bad idea.

  Not exactly a full New York experience but I did have a bagel this morning!

  He turned off his phone and threw it on the coffee table before he could change his mind or turn into some lovesick teenager who refreshed their phone every five minutes to see whether their crush had texted them back.

  “I’ve regressed a decade,” he moaned, sighing as he picked his bagel up off the floor. The cream cheese was stuck to the carpet and he cursed under his breath. He climbed to his feet, headed for the trash bin.

  Bella shuffled back, head tipped back so that she could watch him upside down. “You’re in your early twenties, I think it’s allowed when you’re falling in love for the first time.”

  “It’s not love,” Alex said immediately and tossed his bagel in the bin. “And it’s not the first time!”

  Laughing loudly as she righted herself, Bella twisted on the couch, sitting cross-legged on the cushions. “Alex, you haven’t been on a date since high school.”

  Alex bristled, ready to correct her, and stopped short. There had been a couple of guys in college, but nothing that particularly stood out as memorable. There was a girl in high school, but the less said about that the better. “We can’t all marry young.”

  “Jason’s a moron,” Bella pointed out. “Sara’s the best he’s going to get and he knows it.”

  “What about you?” Alex groused. “You haven’t got your shit together.”

  “Milo’s fun,” Bella said, shrugging. “We might even make it official one of these days.”

  Alex hoped not. He knew better than to say it aloud, of course, but Milo wasn’t the greatest influence, nor the nicest of guys. He was better than most of the people Bella had dated, however, and so he just sighed. “He just followed me on Instagram,” he said instead. “Let’s not organize a wedding too soon.”

  The idea of having a wedding was daunting and terrifying when Alex couldn’t even handle a guy potentially messaging him on Instagram. His life was a mess.

  “Relax,” Bella chastised. “He’s gonna message you back and it will be a beautiful friendship.”

  “Sure,” Alex agreed affably. Mind running in circles, he decided his best defense was to ignore it. Running the water into the sink, he gestured at the plates. “Give me those and get out of my apartment. I have a TiVo to clear.”

  Bella wrinkled her nose and jumped up off the couch. Grabbing both plates, she gave him a cheeky smile. “Better watch ‘em before Jason clears your queue.”

  Alex flipped her off as she shoved her feet into her flip-flops and waved one-handed.

  “Thanks for the bagel,” she said, blowing him a kiss as he dropped the plates into the soapy water. She ducked out of the door. “Call me if he texts back!”

  She slammed the door before he could reply.

  His sister was exhausting but had managed to alleviate the apprehension and fear. He would have to turn his phone on eventually to check in with his mom, but for now, he could put his feet up, watch a couple of his favorite shows, and pretend that the outside world didn’t exist.

  Chapter Three

  “So, what did he say?”

  Alex used his shoulder to keep the phone steady as he tossed his overnight bag in the trunk and shut the door, taking one last look at his apartment and going over his mental checklist. It was guaranteed he would have forgotten something, but the fish were fed, and his door was locked. “You couldn’t wait for me to arrive?”

  “It takes you ages to get here,” Bella whined. Alex could hear the indicator going in her car and he sighed.

  “Did you really call me while you’re driving?”

  “You’re on speaker,” Bella protested. “It’s not illegal.”

  Rolling his eyes, Alex switched his own phone to speaker as he slid into the driver seat. “I’ll talk to you later, Bella.”

  “No, Alex, wait—”

  Alex hung up on her with a grin and shut his door. It wouldn’t kill her to wait a little longer. Rubbing the palms of his hands against his eyes, he sighed. One Sunday every month was always spent at the Wheeler house in Manhattan and Alex hated the journey. It was a two-hour drive from Plainview if he was lucky, but it wasn’t worth the hassle to decline the invitation. Besides, it was usually the only time he would see Jason for more than five minutes at a time.

  Forcing Bella to wait that long was cruel, but Alex didn’t care.

  As if on cue, Alex’s phone vibrated once, then again. The first was a text from Bella—I’m going to kill you!!!!—and the second was from Harry.

  Alex blew out a breath, aware that he was grinning like an idiot, but he opened the message anyway. When Alex had turned his phone on two days prior, Harry had been all too willing to strike up a conversation, thanking Alex again for his help, and moaning that his dog had, in fact, done something worse than just pee in his shoes.

  It had been comfortable and fun, no weight to it at all, and though part of Alex wanted there to be weight—he wanted to ask Harry out on a date—he appreciated the lack of pressure.

  Still, he couldn’t help the way his heart skipped as he read Harry’s newest message.

  I’m just going to say this because I’ve been agonizing for days. Do you want to grab a drink sometime?

  Alex’s hands were shaking as he typed in a reply and his face hurt from how hard he was smiling.

  Yes! Too enthusiastic, perhaps, but Alex didn’t care. He was done being slow and thanked Harry under his breath for being brave enough to say something. Sorry. Yes, I would. I’ve been trying to ask you since the airport.

  It was a lot easier to tell the truth over text, Alex reasoned, even if part of him wished he had the courage to do this face to face. Still, a date was a date, and he breathed out a sigh of relief and then hit the steering wheel, laughing. Maybe he wasn’t so bad at getting a date after all.

  Sliding his phone into the magnetic holder on his dash, he started the car, ready to make the (awful) journey to Manhattan. He scrolled through his phone, trying to find an upbeat playlist and came up short.

  I need a new playlist. I didn’t realize how much of my music was depressing.

  It wasn’t until he was pulling out of the parking space that he realized how that must have sounded. Maybe he wasn’t so bad at dates, but he was still pathetic and embarrassing. If he came out of this with any lasting relationship, he thought snidely, it would be a miracle.

  Settling on the radio as an intermediary, he wondered how soon was too soon to talk about playlists. Isn’t that what teenagers did? Made mixtapes? God, he was so clearly a nineties child.

  One thing for technology, Alex thought, as he pulled onto the 495, was the fact that he could text and talk without touching his phone. A blessing when ten minutes later his phone chimed.

  Mixtapes, Alexander? How so very high school.

  Alex huffed out a self-deprecating laugh and if he hadn’t been occupied with the steering wheel, probably would have facepalmed. He was so out of his depth that he was actually considering going online and getting help in dating someone. Which was, when he thought about it, the epitome of desperation.

  “You have things about you people like,” Alex muttered to himself, refusing to give into this self-defeating attitude. He wasn’t unattractive—according to both Sara and maybe Harry?—and he liked stuff that people found cool. Not necessarily the archery, which was a personal preference and not something Alex would give up, even if his partner of choice didn’t like it. Everyone liked reading, right? He’d also started teaching himself to cook. Living on takeout was not a viable life choice, or so his parents were always telling him, and cooking for someone held a lot of appeal. Alex put off messaging Harry back until he’d made it to Manhattan. It would give him time to figure out just what he was going to say to this mixtape business. He wanted song recommendations, all right, not outright mixtapes. Tho
ugh everyone liked getting mixtapes, right?

  Traffic was less horrifying than it usually was, and Alex entered Manhattan with enough time to socialize with his family for a change. Exciting, he thought wryly.

  The Wheeler driveway was already packed, but Sara was obviously driving because there was enough room for Alex to pull in behind the garage. If his parents needed to leave, they could just use his car.

  “Alex!”

  Alex should have expected Bella to be waiting for him, and as she jogged down from the house, barefoot and munching on a cracker, she was grinning like an idiot. As she approached the car, he shoved open his door. “You’ll ruin your appetite.”

  “Yes, Dad,” Bella mocked. She leaned against his open door and wiggled her eyebrows. She looked ridiculous. “So?”

  Before leaving the car, Alex grabbed his phone, ignoring Bella poking at his hip. “So, what?”

  Bella let out a frustrated sound and kicked his shin. Alex instinctively slapped her arm and darted out of the way of a punch. Hands on her hips and refusing to move out of the way of the door, she looked up at him, unimpressed. “Did he message you back?”

  It would be so easy to say yes; he could tell her about their exchange, and about his ridiculous statement with the mixtapes, but there was another part of him that wanted to keep this thing with Harry a secret, even if just for a little while. What if it didn’t go anywhere? Bella was irritating a lot of the time, but she cared about him, and Alex didn’t want her sympathy or pity if—when—things inevitably went wrong.

  “If there was something to tell you,” he said, just to keep her from going on, “you would be the first to know.”

  It wasn’t a lie. Technically, she would be the first person he told. Thankfully she let it go, giving him a satisfied nod and moving aside so that he could lock his car up.