It's Not a Date

by Heather Blackmore

  Right before six p.m., Kade messaged Holly to come into her office. She needed to take action with respect to Jen, though she was fuzzy on what that meant exactly, with “action” and “Jen” being the only consistent themes floating through her brain. She thought Holly could help her flesh out details of some sort, even though asking Holly for assistance on this particular subject was sure to entail unending harassment.

  Kade fidgeted with her pen. “I need your help. And I’m not really sure where to start.”

  Holly handed her a piece of paper. Before Kade could ask what it was, Holly said, “Jen’s address. Also in your calendar. No, she’s not expecting you. Bring food.” She turned to leave but stopped at the sound of Kade’s voice.

  “Wait,” Kade said, not quite following.

  “You’ve been thinking about her all week.”

  Flustered, Kade couldn’t disagree. “I wanted to check on how things at the—”

  “You want to see her.”

  “Company are progressing.” Kade wasn’t sure who she was trying to fool.

  “I checked in with Jeremy Corbin. They’re running behind, but with all hands on deck, he thinks they’ll launch on Sunday instead of today. He sent Jen home.”

  “I really should do some work tonight,” Kade offered weakly, knowing she was seeking an excuse from doing any.

  “If you don’t go see her, do you think you’ll be any more productive tonight than you’ve been the past few days?”

  “And if I do go see her, I’ve learned nothing.”

  “You’re afraid you’ll hurt her.”

  Kade nodded.

  “That means you care.”

  “That means I’m selfish because I want to see her anyway, fully knowing the consequences.”

  Holly took a seat in one of Kade’s visitors’ chairs. “What’s the name of the man I’m going to marry?”

  “Wait. What? Who?” Kade’s head was spinning. Holly was getting married?

  “I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking. Since you can predict the future, I figured I’d cut to the chase.” Holly wiped her hands in the air. “No more bad dates.”

  “Be serious.”

  “No. Serious is exactly what neither of us should be right now. You like her. You’re checking in with her, not committing to share a sarcophagus throughout eternity.”

  “Wow. Romantic.”

  “So lighten up.” Holly stood. “I’m rejiggering a few things on your schedule this weekend, so be sure to check. Bring wine.”

  * * *

  Jen lived in a small ranch-style house on a quiet street. Kade used the old-fashioned knocker to signal her arrival. When no noise was forthcoming, she tried the doorbell. This tactic brought footsteps, which grew louder as someone approached. Kade saw Jen peer through the beveled glass at the top of the door, then her eyes widen. The door opened.

  Jen didn’t look anything like her usual sunny self. She looked tired. Defeated. Her eyes were red in the way of an all-nighter versus an illness or good cry. Her hair was sticking out of its loose ponytail and probably hadn’t been brushed today. She was in gray sweatpants and a well-worn yellow T-shirt with several holes in the stitching near the collar. Kade couldn’t help but notice she was bra-less, but it was a fact, not a turn-on. Her feet were in boot-type slippers. Even disheveled and glum, Jen was the most appealing woman Kade had ever seen.

  Kade held up the bag of Thai food and a bottle of wine. “I come bearing gifts.”

  Jen didn’t release her grip on the door. “We don’t have a meeting,” she said tentatively, squinting at Kade as if trying to visualize her calendar to confirm the veracity of her statement.

  “No, we don’t. May I come in?”

  “How do you know where I live?”

  “Resourceful assistant with too much time on her hands, apparently.”

  Jen didn’t move, and Kade questioned for the hundredth time why she had thought to come here.

  “I know it’s your personal space, Jen, and I’m not here to invade it. I brought these whether you want me to stay or not. Please. Take them.” She held out both items to Jen.

  “I’m a mess. My house is a mess. My company’s a mess.”

  Kade returned the objects to her side and smiled. “One of the things I advocate to entrepreneurs I work with is to try to break problems down into small, actionable pieces. Everything you mentioned is fixable, though I’m not sure I agree with your assessment. Can I help?”

  Jen frowned. “Probably,” she said dejectedly.

  Kade wasn’t sure why her help would be a bad thing and tried to shake off the mild sting Jen’s tone evoked. “I’d like to, if you’ll let me.”

  Jen moved aside and let Kade in. She took the lead down the hallway, past a dining room and into a kitchen. Jen was apparently using the kitchen table as an office. Handwritten notes, bullet points, arrows, and asterisks were strewn across printouts of PowerPoint slides. Her laptop was nearby, next to which a glass of water sat on a coaster. Jen started picking up and arranging the papers into some sort of order.

  “Hungry?” Kade asked as she set the bag and bottle on the counter.

  “Very.”

  “How about I dish out dinner while you do whatever it is you think will make you feel better about…” She waved a palm in Jen’s direction. “You. Though you look perfectly fine to me.”

  Jen scoffed. “I look like roadkill. Real roadkill. Not your kind.” She retreated down another hallway.

  As Kade prepared dinner and uncorked the wine, she took in her surroundings. The kitchen was small but bright and comfy, with buttery-yellow cabinets, white tile, pale-yellow walls, and lots of windows. It seemed the kind of place suited for a young family, where kids could do homework and parents could fix meals. Warm and open, like Jen.

  Kade was setting out napkins as Jen returned, looking more refreshed. She’d brushed her hair, retied her ponytail, swapped jeans for the sweatpants, and tossed a fleece pullover over her T-shirt. The slippers remained. “Better?” Kade asked.

  Jen’s nod was unconvincing.

  Kade sat and indicated the wineglass at Jen’s place setting. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted any, so no worries if you don’t.”

  Jen half-smiled and took a seat. For someone who claimed to be hungry, she picked at her food disinterestedly.

  Without knowing what to say, Kade ate in silence, reluctant to pressure Jen for information. Jen seemed to have a lot on her mind, and Kade figured she’d come around to speaking it. This might be the first uncomfortable silence to ever pass between them.

  “Kade,” Jen said, her eyes on her plate and her voice barely above a whisper. “I need you to do something for me.”

  Kade stilled her hands and fought the urge to drag her chair beside Jen and take her into her arms. “Name it.”

  “You once asked if what you said was off the record. I need that now. I need you here as my friend, not my board member. If you can’t do that…” Jen swallowed with difficulty, as if she were on the verge of crying. “I need you to please leave.”

  Kade was out of her chair in an instant, squatting next to Jen and taking her hands in hers. “Of course I’m here as your friend. I promise.”

  A dam broke. Jen tugged her hands free and covered her eyes, and she started to cry. Kade did drag her chair over then and, ignoring the awkward position, pulled Jen to her. She whispered soothing words, rubbed her back with one hand, and held her head with the other. She would leave it to Jen to decide what, if anything, she wished to share, and when.

  Jen apologized for getting Kade’s shirt wet, though Kade didn’t care. She poured Jen a glass of water and took it to her. After several sips, Jen stood and said, “Living room.” Kade followed.

  Jen sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to her, taking Kade’s hand as she joined her. “We’re behind schedule. The payment gateway isn’t integrated, the social-media platform is taking up five times more CPU than anticipated, and the dashboard is slow to load.
Oh, and a five-year-old with a coloring book would be more helpful than our current design contractor.”

  Kade eyed Jen with amusement.

  “I’ve spent countless hours on the fund-raising deck, and it’s shit. I wouldn’t invest. How can I convince someone else to?”

  Kade sensed the question was rhetorical, so she continued to let Jen say her piece. She had a number of thoughts on how to tackle the issues Jen was bringing up, but she’d promised to be a friend, and right now that meant listening.

  Jen sank lower into the cushion and smiled mirthlessly. “I have no idea what I’m doing, except failing spectacularly.” She took a deep breath. “That about covers it.”

  “May I make a suggestion?”

  “Please.”

  “Let’s finish eating. Then why don’t you walk me through the deck as it stands, no caveats by you or interruptions by me. I’ll jot down some notes along the way and then put together some thoughts while you get some sleep. We’ll tackle next steps afterward.”

  Jen shook her head. “You’re sweet to offer, but I don’t want to take advantage of you. I’m just unloading. I’ll be fine. I’ll figure it out.” She covered Kade’s hand. “But thank you.”

  “How about this then? Lie here.” Kade tugged Jen and arranged her until her head rested on a pillow in Kade’s lap.

  Jen stared up at Kade skeptically.

  Kade slid the elastic band from Jen’s hair and began a gentle scalp massage. “Come up with an alternative suggestion and tell me about it in twenty minutes.”

  Jen sighed. “I already know my plan. Read more guidance. Consult my advisors. Rework the deck.”

  “Great. Then you shouldn’t have any trouble repeating it in twenty minutes, assuming you haven’t come up with something better.”

  “It’s a waste of time,” Jen murmured as her eyes fluttered.

  “Planning is never wasted.”

  “Mmm.”

  * * *

  Jen woke languidly, emerging from a restful sleep she hadn’t remembered settling down to. As her eyes adjusted, she started at the realization she was on the couch in the living room. She quickly rose onto her elbows, working backward in her mind until landing on the recollection of resting her head in Kade’s lap. Kade wasn’t next to her, so Jen listened. Nothing. She swung her legs down and headed to the brightly lit kitchen. Kade was seated at what had been Jen’s makeshift workstation, Jen’s laptop displaying various text, and Kade studying a PowerPoint slide that seemed about midway through one of Jen’s printouts. The food and dishes had been put away, counter cleaned, wine corked.

  “Hi,” Jen said, blinking to adjust to the light and glancing at the clock above the sink. 1:28 a.m. “What are you doing here?” Jen was curious, not accusatory.

  Kade met Jen’s eyes and broke into a lovely smile that Jen was sure she’d never get her fill of. It was the kind of smile that somehow captured and projected one of life’s sweetest moments, like the instant a bride-to-be says “I do” or a father playfully tosses his giggling toddler into the air. She fleetingly wondered whether she was the impetus behind it, and in the seconds before she was awake enough to properly discard that thought, she reveled in the simple beauty of Kade’s delight.

  “How are you feeling?” Kade asked.

  “Not sure yet.”

  “There’s coffee if you’re interested. Half caff.”

  Needing extra time to make sense of the scene in her kitchen, Jen poured herself a cup before settling at the table across from Kade. She nodded to Kade’s pile to signal she awaited an answer to her first question.

  “I hope you don’t mind. I took a look through your slides to see if anything jumped out at me as something you might build on or take in a different direction.” She flipped the deck closed and pushed it aside. The wattage of her smile dimmed considerably. “Up to you whether you want to go over it.” She raised her hands as if in surrender to what she seemed to think was an impending upbraiding. “No pressure. I was here, that’s all.”

  Here, yes. Kade had certainly been here for her tonight. Jen needed Kade to understand. She stretched across the table for her hand, which was hesitantly supplied. “I don’t want you to think I don’t value your feedback, Kade. I do. Tremendously. I just don’t want you to get the idea that your experience and startup knowledge are all I value you for. I’d rather fumble around in the dark, trying to figure things out on my own, than have you believe that. Does that make sense?”

  Kade squinted slightly, as if trying on Jen’s words to see if they fit. “It’s all I know.”

  It saddened Jen to hear Kade boil herself down to such a small thing when Jen knew there was so much more to her. The very fact that Kade was here, that she’d come over to check on Jen in the first place, proved it. But Jen had no illusions of breaking through Kade’s well-cemented self-assessments tonight. She wanted Kade to see exactly how much she did appreciate her feedback. “Then let’s see whatcha got for me,” she said with a wink.

  Kade made Jen take her through her slide deck before giving any guidance, insisting the unprinted material and anecdotes Jen supplied with each page were equally as important, because they showed a potential investor how well-versed Jen was with the information. Investors wanted to see confidence in leaders and be confident those leaders had a solid handle as to what was going on in their company and industry. She made several more notes, crossed out some text, and typed a few things into the word-processor program on Jen’s laptop.

  Then she went through each slide, starting by asking Jen what her own thoughts were as to the strengths and weaknesses of the material, and ending by counseling her as to what she covered well and what could use a bit more work. They powwowed for over an hour before Kade slid Jen’s laptop toward her and covered several additional topics she thought would further strengthen Jen’s message.

  For Jen, it was a treasure trove. Kade didn’t bulldoze or condescend. She nudged directionally but required Jen to do the heavy lifting—the hard work that would bring it all together with the objective of landing additional funding for Creative Care.

  “Feeling better?” Kade asked after they were done.

  “Infinitely.”

  Kade sipped her coffee and held the mug in her lap. “You’re there, Jen. A few tweaks maybe, but you’ve got this.”

  “That means a lot, coming from you.”

  Kade nodded, too automatically, like she’d heard it all before.

  Jen needed to explain, though she hadn’t put her finger on exactly what she was trying to get across. This wasn’t just business to her. “I want to make you proud of me.”

  Kade yawned, no other reaction to what Jen said. “You’re doing everything you need to.”

  “I mean you, Kade. Not because you’re my colleague.”

  Surprise alighted in Kade’s eyes. “Why?”

  “I don’t know,” Jen said, skirting the truth. Kade was important to her. But Jen sensed Kade wasn’t ready to hear it and would flee as soon as she did.

  Kade smiled distantly before setting her beverage on the table. She patted Jen’s leg, the way a relative would. “I should get going,” she said as she stood.

  “Wait,” Jen said, grabbing Kade’s hand and entwining their fingers as she got up. “Stay.”

  Kade looked down to their joined hands and then up to Jen’s face. Confused. Searching.

  “It’s nearly three. Your shoes are already off. Come.” Jen tugged her reluctant guest down the hall to her bedroom and parked her in front of her dresser. She opened a drawer and removed an oversized T-shirt.

  “Jen, I—”

  Jen thrust the shirt against Kade’s chest and guided her into the bathroom, which barely held the two of them. She opened the cabinet behind the door and sorted through a few shelves before setting an unopened toothbrush, hand towel, and washcloth on the counter. She grabbed toothpaste from the medicine cabinet, spread it on her toothbrush, and shoved it into her mouth. It was the antithesis of sexy, but sh
e wanted to signal that she wasn’t making a play for Kade. At least not in this particular moment. As she started brushing, she backed out and closed the door behind her.

  From within the guest bathroom, Jen knew she was pressing her luck. She gave forty-to-sixty odds that Kade would take her up on her offer. Maybe thirty-seventy. She moved quickly in order to try to limit the amount of time Kade had to cycle through her objections.

  Having changed into a T-shirt, Jen was first to re-enter the bedroom—a good sign, as Kade hadn’t yet bolted. She left a bedside lamp on and crawled between the sheets on the side of the king-size bed farthest from the bathroom. Straddling the fence between turning her back to Kade and watching Kade enter her bedroom potentially wearing nothing but a T-shirt and underwear, Jen kept her eyes on the door. This was an opportunity she refused to miss. She pulled the top sheet and blanket on the empty side lower in invitation.

  Kade exited the bathroom hesitantly, wearing the T-shirt Jen had provided and carrying her folded clothes. She used the pile to point down the hallway. “Good night, Jen.” She swiftly headed out the door.

  Jen threw back the sheets and followed Kade, who had already set her clothes on the coffee table and was grabbing a throw from the back of the couch when Jen arrived.

  “I don’t want you to sleep on the couch,” Jen said.

  “Guest bedroom?”

  Jen snagged Kade’s hand and marched her back to her bedroom. “Not happening. My bed’s so big you could send up flares and I wouldn’t find you.” Pulling her to the edge of the bed, Jen gave Kade a gentle shove, landing her on her butt. Then she rounded the mattress and slipped under the covers facing Kade, giving her the final say as to whether to join her.

  Kade remained still for several moments and seemed to arrive at a decision. She crawled into bed and lay on her back as close to the edge as possible.