The Catching Kind

by Caitie Quinn

  “It’s just not…I don’t know. What’s wrong with it?” He asked looking at the chair as if it had purposefully offended him.

  “Nothing. It’s very comfortable.” And expensive.

  “I think it’s too small. It’s like it’s built for short people.” He eyed my feet comfortably resting on the floor. “See? Short people chair.”

  “Um, no. I’m not tiny.” I rested my head back enjoying the supreme comfort while he paced around the chair. “My feet managed to reach the ground in every chair.”

  “I know!” He stopped and checked the chair out once more. “What if I buy you this chair and I take the one at your house?”

  “You want my chair? Again, um, no.” That was my chair and I earned it by putting up with an overbearing, pain in the rear ex.

  “Yes, but you’d get this chair.” He smiled, and I realized that not too long from now he’d also be an overbearing, pain in the rear ex.

  But, still, no.

  “You can’t have my chair. It’s already broken in and I like it. But,” I said, watching him go from disappointed to hopeful. “I’ll bring you to somewhere that you can get a chair you like.”

  And won’t cost several thousand dollars.

  “Really?” He sounded oddly intrigued.

  Without even asking where we were going, he called for another cab, thanked the sales woman, and dragged me out to the sidewalk to wait.

  Apparently this was a chair emergency.

  We drove out to Jordan’s, a lovely, huge showroom of a furniture palace where normal people bought perfectly comfortable chairs every day.

  Two hours, forty-three autographs, and six different chairs later, Connor had a flawlessly comfortable leather chair. There was no viewing, just a whole lot of sitting. Like normal people.

  SEVENTEEN

  I loved game night. Not so much because I was a huge game person, although Jenna was winning me over, but because the guys were insane.

  In. Sane.

  I’d been afraid when Ben had headed off to London that Jenna would stop having us over. I wouldn’t have blamed her. Kasey and I were already working on ways to make more Girl Time happen. But, instead, she’d doubled down, inviting John and Sarah to join us—leaving The Brew to the indelicate closing rituals of Abby.

  But, John was trying to give Abby more responsibilities and being only three blocks away meant he could get there if she lit the building on fire or assaulted anyone. So far, she’d done a great job. Or at least hadn’t done anything that got her and the café on the news. Of course, Jenna had asked John what night they had the fewest customers and shifted game night accordingly. So, Wednesday night it was. Weirdest night to play games, but whatever.

  Our guy-to-girl ratio was off so I’d been afraid she’d suggest bringing Connor.

  I should have known better.

  “So, since we’re down a player tonight, we’re going to do something new,” Jenna announced to everyone assembled in her living room. “Dane, you’re disappointing me. I thought you’d bring one of the Danettes and I’d have Hailey to myself. But, since you didn’t, we’re going to do something a little different tonight. I’ve arranged—”

  “Wait,” Dane interrupted. “You’re upset with me for not bringing a girl who you would mock for her low IQ and lack of pop culture knowledge?”

  John glanced at Sarah, obviously worried that his inability to name anything culturally current might get him mocked.

  “Don’t worry.” Sarah patted John’s arm. “I have boy bands covered.”

  “Really?” He glanced at her as if he’d never seen her before. As if boy bands were such a unique knowledge base for a museum curator that she was way outside her intellectual comfort zone.

  But, enough of that.

  “Don’t worry about the mocking,” I said to John and Sarah, trying to put them at ease. “She means we mock them for sleeping with Dane, not for anything else.”

  “Hey!” Dane crossed his arms as if he had made a brilliant comeback.

  “What? You pick them up, hang out with them for a week, and then move on.”

  Dane had rules.

  “Right.” He nodded. “But they know this going in.”

  “Where’s Jayne?” I asked. “I’ll take Jayne and you can have him.” I nodded my head at Dane knowing that would annoy him.

  “Him is sitting right here. Why would you want Jayne when you could have me?” He seemed genuinely confused.

  “Maybe because all of your answers will be sexist when you think they’re funny?”

  “Hailey, sweetheart, I wasn’t—”

  “And, that,” Jenna cut in, “is where I’ll be stopping this argument. Jayne can’t come. She had a gig working at a gallery tonight. So, yes. You get Dane.”

  “Fine, but—” My phone rang in the other room, cutting me off since basically everyone who might call me on a random Wednesday night was sitting in the room. I glanced toward the kitchen where MMMBop blared from, wondering who it could be.

  “As I was saying,” Jenna continued. “I have created a game that includes parts of all our favorites. I will moderate the play and referee any disagreements. The winner gets to pick the game next time. With three teams of two, we’ll roll to see who goes first.”

  “I call Kasey!” I stuck my hand in the air, like someone might acknowledge me more quickly and hoping that my second attempt would make me Dane-free.

  “What?” Max and Dane said at the same time.

  “I get Kasey.”

  I was not being brought down by Dane again. We always lost. Not because he was stupid, but because he was easily distracted and his favorite part of game night was ticking off Ben and Max by picking the most absurd answers and fighting his stance to death.

  “Um. No.” Max shook his head before wrapping an arm around Kasey. “I’ve been stuck with Dane for a decade. I’ve upgraded.”

  “Also, you’re prettier, and I always go with prettier.” Dane gave me the look that had girls crossing clubs to climb into his lap before they even introduced themselves.

  “But—”

  “As the referee,” Jenna interrupted, “I call the teams. Kasey and Max. Hailey and Dane.”

  “Challenge!” I shouted, jumping to my feet.

  Sarah gave John a look that clearly asked what they’d gotten themselves into. I don’t think I’d ever seen either so quiet.

  “Challenge? You can’t challenge this. It’s not a right or wrong answer.” Jenna gave me The Look. “It’s an official call.”

  She was tiny, but stern. I was stuck with Dane. Again.

  “Fine, but I get a handicap for idiocy.” I glanced at Dane, waiting for him to be insulted.

  He shrugged. “I’m okay with that.”

  Geez.

  My phone rang again as Jenna started laying out some very complicated rules. I couldn’t figure out who would be calling me two times in a row and started to worry something was wrong at home. I headed to the kitchen to grab my phone, surprised to see Connor’s name on the screen.

  My stomach dropped. Someone had outed us and my career was crashing into the mountains of authors past. I was already making a list of everyone I’d have to call.

  Crud, I was going to have to fire my agent. There’s no way I could play this off without that. And, if I was no longer a viable brand, she deserved to be fired because this was all her fault.

  I prepared myself for the worst and hit answer.

  “Hey, Connor.” Listen to how even my voice sounded. “What’s up?”

  “I was just calling to see what your schedule was for the rest of the week. I thought maybe you’d like to get dinner tomorrow night.”

  I gushed out a breath of relief, then sucked in one of panic. The call sounded way too much like a date.

  Of course it was a date. We were dating. Just not for real. Or like sane people. But, the way he asked made it sound like a date-date.

  I really needed to stop over thinking everything. I took the phone away
from my ear and started paging through my calendar. The color-coding Kasey had set up for events and launches helping me figure out my day at a glance.

  “Um, yeah. I could do tomorrow night,” I answered, blocking off seven to nine. “But I have an AMA at six.”

  “What’s an AMA?” Connor sounded like he was completely laid back and in no rush to get off the phone.

  “Ask Me Anything. We do one before every launch. The readers get to ask anything they want and, as long as it doesn’t spoil the book, I’ll tell them.”

  “That sounds like my worst nightmare.” I could almost hear the tremble in his voice.

  “Yeah, well I’m not out sleeping with supermodels, getting caught in elevators with co-worker’s girls, or doing anything else to get me on the cover of any magazine I’d never buy. So, you know, I should be safe.”

  “Ha, ha.” Obviously he thought that joke was too soon. “I’m going to create a fake account and ask you things like who you lost your virginity to.” Connor laughed at his own joke as if teenage girls didn’t want to know this stuff anyway.

  It was often a careful balancing act to not give advice or become too personal.

  “Who said I’d lost it?” I asked and smothered my own laughter when Connor went silent on the other end of the line.

  “Hailey, that’s not even funny.”

  “It’s not like it matters to you any way you look at it.”

  “It would just be such a…” Connor struggled to find the right word and I shook my head confused about what my sexual activities had to do with him. “A waste. It would be a waste if a girl like you was—”

  “Hailey!” Dane stomped into the kitchen looking annoyed. “We’re already down three points. John must be the smartest person on the planet. What are you doing in here? And, don’t give me that look, sweetheart. I’m not a complete moron. I can see you’re on the phone.”

  “Who’s that?” Connor asked—no. Demanded.

  “It’s just Dane.” I shoved at Dane, pointing back to the living room.

  Instead of moving, Dane crossed his arms and leaned against the counter settling in for the rest of my phone conversation.

  “Dane? That…guy who had his hands all over you at The Brew?” Connor of the faulty memory apparently.

  “Um, no. No one had their hands all over me. Dane was sitting next to me. For a moment.”

  “Right. In my seat.” It was like he was verbally pouting.

  I didn’t even know what to say to that.

  “Anyway,” I glared at Dane more, thinking of all the ways I was going to torture him for being such a pain in the butt. “I have to go. It’s apparently our turn.”

  “Your turn for what?”

  “It’s game night.” Maybe Connor and I needed to do a calendar sync and plan out everything for the next few weeks.

  “And Adonis is your teammate?” Connor asked it like Dane was leading me down the path of seduction and debauchery.

  “Yup. He’s always my teammate.” I pointed Dane toward the living room again, hoping he’d take off instead of staying there staring me down. “Lucky me.”

  “That’s right,” Dane nearly shouted in my ear. “Partners. That’s us.”

  I rolled my eyes. Apparently with Ben absent, Dane would settle for annoying some random guy on the phone.

  “I have to go. Everyone’s waiting for us.” I pushed at Dane again, watching him smirk before finally heading back to the living room. “I’m up for dinner tomorrow. I’ll call you in the morning.”

  “Right. Okay.”

  I waited, wondering if there was more, but apparently that was it.

  “Okay. Night!” I hung up before the weirdness could multiply.

  Back in the living room, Dane was sitting on our loveseat looking smug. “How is Mr. Baseball?”

  “He’s fine.” I settled in and elbowed Dane when he slung his arm over my shoulder. “Dude, you’re such a pain in the butt.”

  “Right, but when the ass looks like yours, I’m fine with that.”

  Lord save me from egotistical womanizing men.

  ~*~

  I rinsed another plate and handed it to Jenna, glad to be down to just the two of us. If John and Sarah ever came back, we’d know they were either saints or just as crazy as the rest of us. I was leaning toward crazy.

  “What the heck was up with Dane tonight?” I asked, more annoyed at him for the phone antics than the stupidity of our big loss.

  Seriously, who says green when asked about van Gogh’s famous colored phase? I swear he loses on purpose. The boy’s IQ is off the charts.

  Jenna laughed and I expected her to launch into a replay of Dane Highlights. But instead she looked at me like I was nuts.

  “Are you kidding me?” she asked, as she squeezed another glass into the back of the dishwasher’s rack.

  “Um, no. He was worse than normal.” And that had to have been a challenge.

  “Yeah. Of course he was.” There was way too much meaning behind those words.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Jenna shut the dishwasher and grabbed the last of her wine before boosting herself up on one of the kitchen stools.

  “He’s in a panic. You’re throwing off his plan.”

  “Dane has a plan?” A plan I could throw off? That was news. I wonder if it involved sleeping his way through Europe, because that seemed like something he’d put on the calendar.

  “Of course he does.” Jenna took a sip, eyeing me over the rim of her glass and I wondered if I should have kept my wine fresh too. “He’s actually very organized. Deadlines and stuff. He was ahead of schedule when he sold that website at twenty-four and I think it threw him off a bit.”

  “Okay. But, what does that have to do with me?”

  “You’re serious? You haven’t figured it out?” She set the glass down and leaned in, looking as amused as she was surprised. “You’re the girl he’s going to marry after he’s done screwing around.”

  “What?”

  Jenna laughed and I was glad one of us thought that was funny. Maybe I’d think it was funny later.

  No. Probably not.

  “You’re kidding, right?” Because, leave it to Jenna to think that was serious and funny.

  “Nope.” She smirked. She actually smirked. “I’m not even kidding a little.”

  “Did Ben tell you this?” Actual validation would be good. Or bad. Bad, it would be bad.

  “Nope.”

  “Dude,” I tried to stay calm, but this wasn’t the type of news a girlfriend should just throw at you. “You’re kind of driving me nuts right now.”

  “Hailey, anyone can see how much he cares for you. You’re the girl. Smart, funny, cute. You know him, all of him, and still care about him. He’s more than fond of you. You’re the total package.”

  I snorted because, hey. It was so insane it deserved a snort. “That’s ridiculous.”

  “You’ve met Dane, right? He’s not always in step with the norm.”

  “So, he just thinks that when he’s done sleeping around and figuring out what he wants to be when he grows up, I’ll meet him at the front of a church and tie myself to his brand of insanity for the rest of my life.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably pretty much how he thinks.” She refreshed her glass and pulled a new one out from where they hung under the counter, splashing the rest of the bottle into it and sliding it over to me. “Now he’s got competition and he’s worried.”

  “Where are you getting all this?”

  “Watching. Then talking to Ben about it. Then convincing Ben and watching more.”

  “So, Ben thinks you’re right?” Crud.

  Jenna nodded.

  “But, I’m not going to marry Dane. And it’s not because of Connor.” Wait. “Why is Connor competition? What about all my other boyfriends?”

  As if I was going to marry Connor. Ha.

  “None of those guys were going to last.” She took a sip of wine, a little smile playi
ng around her lips. “They didn’t get what we do. The crazy writer thing. All of us knew none of them would make it past a book cycle. Maybe two if they were really patient.”

  “So?”

  “So, Connor also has a job that isn’t nine-to-five. He gets year cycles and having to be unavailable for stretches because of work.” She made a little motion with her hand as if none of that really mattered. “He’s also incredibly good looking, successful, rich, and famous. All the things Dane excels at, Connor does too.”

  “Yes. Because I’m looking for an idiot of my very own.”

  “Plus, Connor is looking to settle down.”

  “No, he isn’t. That’s the last thing he wants to do.” Ever. And hadn’t that been made incredibly clear?

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Trust me. Dane will be a grandfather before Connor settles down.” And that was a thought to avoid pondering.

  “So, you’d be interested in Dane then?”

  “Jenna.” I set down my glass. “I feel like we’re having a conversation where you forgot that I wasn’t insane.”

  Jenna smiled a super, sticky sweet smile. The one she gave us when she knew something…or was up to something.

  It was time to sleep with one eye open.

  EIGHTEEN

  The only thing Conner said about our “date” tonight was to dress casually.

  After consulting Becca’s binder, that still left me with too many options. Which meant, girlfriend consultation.

  “Hailey, this is nuts. You’re not really dating.” Kasey’s frustration threshold was a lot lower than Jenna’s. “Just put on a pair of jeans and a nice top.”

  “I’m not dressing for him. I’m dressing for the pictures. I know that I’m going to get ambushed again by crazy people with cameras. I need to look the right type of casual.”

  Oddly, the pictures were easier than I’d expected. I hadn’t had to pose for one yet. And still, there were pictures of us everywhere. It was a lot easier emotionally having pictures taken covertly. Social media was, for once, my friend. Kasey said we even had a hashtag.