by Alana Terry
He had tried to contact Carly all week, but her inbox at Soulmates was full. The last note Mom received said how excited she was to meet him at Olive Garden and that she’d be there wearing a teal turtleneck sweater.
He would never admit it to anybody, but he had to Google teal to make sure he knew what color to look for.
An hour and a half drive just to dump somebody. And there weren’t even any good oldies stations once he got out of Orchard Grove County.
Every once in a while he wondered what might happen if he went ahead with the date as planned, but he knew that wouldn’t be fair to Carly. He had already rehearsed what he was going to say, how he was going to apologize for the way his mom had interfered, ask her to forgive them both for wasting her time, and wish her luck on finding the love of her life.
It was possible — just slightly possible — that even after he confessed everything, she would go ahead and agree to have dinner with him anyway, but part of Ricky hoped she’d storm off angrily so he could go home and prove to his mom what a tremendous mess she’d made of things.
He wondered what Carly looked like. Her account profile was one of those cartoon faces only, and all he knew from her personal page were some very basic statistics. Strawberry blonde hair. Fair skin and freckles.
Ricky glanced again at the time. Twenty or thirty minutes left at most. Half an hour before he could find this girl with the strawberry blonde hair wearing the teal turtleneck sweater and let her know that this entire date had been one huge, embarrassing mistake.
CHAPTER 21
BEFORE HE GOT OUT OF his car, Ricky did one more Google search to make sure he remembered what color teal was, then he did another search for turtleneck sweaters just to be safe.
He stepped outside the car and glanced at the restaurant’s exterior, wondering if Olive Garden would be any good. His mother hated to eat anywhere besides the Main Street Hotel, where she knew the owners and was convinced they weren’t going to sneeze on her food or poison her drinks. He’d never been to Olive Garden before, but he’d seen commercials and had heard people raving about the breadsticks. His stomach rumbled, and he paused to wonder for just a moment if it would be ethical to wait until after their appetizers to tell Carly the full truth.
No, definitely not. Which was a pity since Ricky hadn’t thought about how hungry he’d be on the drive back home from Wenatchee.
He stepped inside the door, surprised at how dim the whole place was. How could people read their menus or see the food in front of them?
“Welcome to Olive Garden. Do you have reservations?”
Ricky fumbled in his pocket to pull out a cellphone, which he dropped to the floor. On his way up from retrieving it, he banged his shoulder into the little podium where the young woman stood staring down at him.
“Reservations?” she asked again.
He thought through all his messages from Soulmates. Had Carly said anything about reservations?
“I didn’t know I needed them. I’m here waiting for someone. I’m not sure either of us thought to call ahead.”
The woman stared at him quizzically and then shrugged. “It will be about a twenty-minute wait. What should I put you down for?”
His mouth had grown unbelievably dry. “For now just breadsticks. Breadsticks and water. Or better make that two sodas.”
“No, I just want to know what name to write down.”
Ricky’s face heated up. “Oh.” He wiped his sweaty palms on his pants. “Oh,” he repeated. “Sorry about that. I’ve never eaten here before.”
“So what name?”
“Oh yeah. Carly.”
She stared at him again, shrugged, and scribbled something down on her tablet. “All right, Mr. Carly. Just have a seat, and we’ll call you when there’s a table free.”
So that’s why she wanted a name. Why did they have to make things so complicated here?
He glanced at the time. It was still only 4:45. He wondered how long he’d have to wait. Every time the door opened, he glanced up to see if it was a girl in a teal turtleneck sweater, but everything was so dimly lit here he realized it would be next to impossible to tell one color from another.
He decided to pass the time people-watching since there wasn’t anything better for him to do. He was surprised at how many older couples there were, men and women his mom and dad’s age or older. His own parents had never once gone out together in all of Ricky’s working memory, and he wondered if perhaps his mom and dad were an abnormality.
He made himself a mental note to take his wife out to dinner at least once a year no matter how long they’d been married. Of course, he’d have to find a wife first for that little romantic tip to serve any practical use.
“Excuse me.” Something familiar in the voice startled him, and he turned to see a young woman talking to the greeter behind her podium. “I was in the restroom and think I might have missed getting seated.”
Ricky couldn’t believe it. How much more awkward and embarrassing could this night get?
“Jillian?” He stood up and walked toward her. She was still wearing the windbreaker, so he couldn’t see what color she was wearing underneath, but it was definitely her.
She looked just as surprised as he was. “What in the world are you doing here?”
CHAPTER 22
RICKY WAS CONVINCED. It was like a nightmare come true.
“You’re Carly?” He could barely squeak the question out. How could a terrible mix-up like this have happened?
She stared at him angrily. “What are you talking about?”
“Carly,” he repeated. “With the tan sweater. I mean teal one.”
She crossed her arms. “Have you been drinking?”
“No, it’s just that ... So you’re saying you’re not Carly?”
“Do I look like a Carly to you?”
“Maybe not, but I was going to meet someone here, and ...”
“Ricky?” He turned around at the sound of his name.
“Sorry,” he started to explain. “I’m waiting for someone and ...” He stopped and squinted at her. Yup, that was definitely a turtleneck sweater.
But was it teal?
“Are you Ricky?” she asked again. He could hear the nervousness in her voice.
“Yeah. So you’re Carly? I think there’s been a mistake.”
She laughed a little nervously. “No, I’m Carly. And if you’re Ricky, then I think we’re both at the right place. Soulmates, right?”
Ricky glanced back to where Jillian had been, but she was gone. Just as well. He was flustered enough already.
“Listen,” he began, “there’s something I should tell you.”
“Okay. But should we get our seats first maybe?”
“Maybe. I mean, probably not. It’s just that ...” He glanced around one more time, trying to figure out where Jillian had gone. He hadn’t been trying to be rude.
He took in a deep breath. He could do this. “All right, there’s something I need to tell you. Before we get a table.”
She frowned. “Are you okay?” Fingering her hair, she asked, “Were you expecting me to look different or something?”
“No. You’re fine how you look,” he assured her absently. He had to jump into what he really meant to say. “I just don’t think you really want to date me.”
“Holy cow. Are you gay?”
“Wait, what? No, I mean, I didn’t ... No. Just listen.” He clenched his sweaty palms. “It wasn’t me you were emailing. It was my mother.”
“What?”
He nodded. Now that his tongue was loose, he couldn’t have tightened it to save his life. “She’s kind of ... well, it’s like this, see. She thought I should find someone to date. The girl I took to homeschool prom, she just got married, you know, and I guess Mom always thought that the two of us would end up together, but obviously we didn’t, so she ... I’m botching this all up, aren’t I?”
Carly bit her lip and adjusted the strap of her purse. “So you
drove all the way out to Wenatchee to tell me I was really emailing your mom?”
“Yeah. I’m so sorry. I tried to send you a message through the Soulmate website, but your inbox was full ...” He let out his breath, finally able to look her in the eyes. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know she was doing it, honest. As soon as I found out, I tried to let you know. And if you still want to, you know, eat or something, I hear the breadsticks are really good here. But it’s ... I just wanted to get that out in the open. And apologize again for wasting your time.”
She stared at him. “Wow.”
“Yeah,” he agreed dejectedly. How did you go about ordering a table for one around here?
“No, I mean, wow,” she repeated. “Nobody’s ever been that honest on a first date before.”
“Like I said, I’m really sorry I wasted your time. Hey, maybe if you want, I’ll buy us some breadsticks to go and you can take some home with you so you don’t get too hungry.”
She frowned. “You mean you don’t want to have dinner with me?”
“No, I mean, yeah, I’m starving, but I figured you wouldn’t want to go on a date with someone you thought was a dude but turned out to be a middle-aged woman emailing you on her son’s behalf and making you think that ...”
“All right, enough about your mother already.”
“Come again?”
“I said enough about your mother. I get it. Parents can be interfering pains in the neck. But that was really brave of you to come clean right away, and like I said, I’ve never had anyone be that open on a first date before. I’ve got to admit, I think it’s kind of hot.”
“You do? I mean ...” Ricky stared at her turtleneck sweater, wondering why the Olive Garden turned on its heater in the middle of the spring.
“So should we stay for a while?” She wrapped her arm in his.
He gulped. “Yeah, I mean, sure. Why not, right?”
He started to charge ahead but she pulled him back.
“What is it?” he asked. “Did you change your mind already?”
She nodded toward the podium. “They haven’t called our names yet.”
“Oh.” All the nervous energy he’d been storing up escaped in a laugh that was far too boisterous, but he couldn’t help it. “Yeah, okay. Well, let’s wait over here. This bench is pretty comfortable. I know that from personal experience.”
CHAPTER 23
RICKY THOUGHT THAT once he and Carly were seated at their own table, he’d feel slightly less nervous.
He was wrong.
Fortunately, when he spilled his glass of ice water, both he and his new date managed to stay dry. That was a step in the right direction at least.
And when he banged his knee against the table, Carly reached over and rubbed it, asking gently if he’d gotten hurt.
Another positive sign.
He even managed to get through the part where you order your food off the menu without getting too tongue-tied. Maybe he was more cut out for this dating stuff than he’d given himself credit for.
Carly scooted a little closer to him on the bench they shared. “So tell me,” she said, “how many of these dates has your mom set you up on?”
“Oh, this is my first,” he answered before he thought to check her face to see if she was mocking him. With the lighting so dim and her leaning so close, it was hard to tell. He cleared his throat and scooted back an inch. “What about you? I mean, not about your mom setting you up, but dates like this. Have you been on Soulmates very long?”
She shrugged. “I’ve done all right.”
“Do you get a lot of messages? I mean, that was my first thought when it kept telling me your inbox was full.”
Another shrug. “I get enough, I guess. But right now, I’m not interested in any of that. I’m more interested in you.”
She was so close he could smell something like strawberries on her breath. He cleared his throat again and reached for his water.
“Tell you what.” Her hand was on his knee again, and she pressed up against him until he could feel each curve of her body.
Every one.
He reached for another drink of water, just barely managing to keep from spilling it down the front of that teal sweater she wore. As a turtleneck, it certainly covered everything up nicely, but as a sweater, and a fairly tight one at that ... Why were they blasting the heat in here?
He gulped down another sip of water. “So listen.” He tried to move his shoulder over just a little, but there was no room between them now. “I, um, I think maybe we should sit across from one another, and then ...”
“I’m sorry,” she crooned. “Am I making you uncomfortable?” She whispered the word in his ear, invoking a shiver reflex that started at the base of his spine and traveled all the way up to his neck.
“Listen,” he tried again, but his words were interrupted by a curse from the table behind them. It was a rude enough remark to snap Ricky out of his near panic at sitting next to a woman who apparently wanted to climb onto his lap.
“Did you hear what that guy just said?” he asked.
Carly glanced back. “What, that? Just ignore them. Probably just a first date gone bad. Not at all like what we’ve got going on here, right? You’ll have to thank your mommy for hooking us up.”
“H-h-hooking up?” he stammered.
“Yeah. Or did you skip that class in homeschool?”
“No, it’s just that I ...” His leg was going at about a hundred bounces per millisecond. There was something he had to sort out right away. “It’s just that, I may as well tell you, I haven’t dated all that much, so I guess I’m still a little new at this ...”
“I like that about you,” she said in a voice he could have sworn was lower than what it had just been.
“But see, I think I was picking up on the wrong signals. I’m a guy, you know.”
“I did notice.”
“And as a guy, my brain’s a little bit ... I don’t know how I’m supposed to say this ...”
“I can see that.”
“Okay.” He took one more sip of water even though his hand was shaking nearly as fast as his leg was bouncing. “Okay,” he repeated. “This is going to sound really silly to you, but you said earlier you like honesty, right?”
“I dig it,” she purred.
He laughed nervously. “Okay, well don’t be offended or anything. I’m just laying it all out here, but I actually thought for a minute that ... and this is going to sound totally crazy ... but I seriously thought you were trying to come on to me.”
The laugh he expected never came.
“Excuse me?”
“No, I mean, I know you’re not really that type of girl, but before things get even more awkward ...”
“Oh, we’re way past awkward now, buddy.”
Ricky wasn’t all that good at reading a woman’s body language or picking up on subtle changes in vocal inflection, but he was pretty sure that the way she said buddy meant that he’d done something wrong.
Unforgivably wrong.
“I’m sorry for offending you,” he began. “Like I said, I know you’re not really that sort of girl ...”
Carly was now so far to the other edge of the bench Ricky was ready to reach out and catch her if she lost her balance and fell off. She glared at him, and even in the restaurant’s dim lighting, he could sense the anger in her expression. “Wait a minute, did your mom set up your profile for you?”
“Yeah. I already told you that. Is that why you’re so upset and angry?” He was so confused. Hadn’t they already moved past that first awkward confession?
“So your mom set up your profile page, and you have no idea what she put?”
“No. She did it all without me knowing. I already told you that.”
Carly scoffed and grabbed her purse. “Great. Just great.”
“What is it? What did I do?”
“It isn’t what you did,” she snapped. “It’s what you didn’t do. Did you at least look at what she
said about you?”
“Yeah. Once I found out about it at least. I was really curious about what she wrote.” What had he done to upset her? Things seemed to have been going so well. Too well, in fact, but now, with Carly standing up and holding her purse, Ricky wondered if the date was about to end before he even got to try one of Olive Garden’s famous breadsticks.
“So you read every single question she answered about you?” Carly pressed. “Even the heat scale?”
“Yeah. I’m a big fan of Mexican food. That’s why I thought it was funny you suggested Olive Garden when your profile said you like hot and spicy too.”
Carly whipped her hair out of her face. “Unbelievable,” she huffed. “You and your mom both. You’re totally unbelievable.”
He stood up too when she took her first step to leave. “Wait a minute. Let’s talk this through. I thought we had a good connection just a few minutes ago. I thought you liked me.”
Carly pulled her keys out of her purse. “Listen, kid. A quick word of advice for both you and your mama. The next time you fill out one of those questionnaires, you forget all about hot and spicy and put down warm milk. Got that?”
“What are you talking about? I don’t even drink milk. Why did you ...”
“Have a good night.” She tossed a five-dollar bill onto the table. “This covers my half of the tip.”
It wasn’t until then that Ricky realized how many other people at the restaurant were staring at him. He sat back down, wondering what was supposed to happen next and trying to decide if tasting an Olive Garden breadstick was worth the past ten minutes of humiliation.
CHAPTER 24
“HERE YOU GO, HON.”
Ricky thanked the middle-aged waitress.
“Can I get you anything else?” she asked.
“Maybe one more basket of breadsticks?” he asked hopefully.
“No problem. And I talked to the manager. He said that since the young woman was gone by the time the food came out, we’ll just charge you for one dinner instead of two.”