“Penny works at a magazine,” Ian explained. Thank god for him, because if I had kept going, I would have admitted to something, even something I didn’t do, out of a guilty conscience. He stepped in at the right moment and prevented me from confessing to the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby. “I’m old friends with her boss, and she set us up. That’s really all that’s going on here.”
“Trespassing’s your idea of romance?” the cop asked, but he seemed like he was starting to believe us.
“No, I took her to a very expensive restaurant where neither one of us were having a good time. This seemed like the better option. So far, I think it’s going pretty well.” It was possible that Ian had the most charming smile on the planet. But it was also possible that charm wouldn’t work on a police officer who’d looked exhausted and pissed off the moment he’d approached us.
“I think it should be going away from the park.” The way the officer said it, I didn’t think it was a joke, but it seemed like it could have been a very dry one. He pointed his flashlight down the path. “I’m coming back around this way in five minutes, and I don’t want to see you here.”
I nodded, ready to prove that everything was on the up and up. “And we don’t want to see you, either.”
The look Ian gave me plainly said, “stop talking.”
“We’re going,” he promised the cop. Then Ian reached for my arm and steered me gently toward the bench. At his touch, my skin prickled all over with need.
One of the worst things about my breakup with Brad was the absence of cuddling. Brad had been a champion cuddler—though in hindsight I suspected he’d never really been all that interested in cuddling for cuddling’s sake—and I liked touching other people. I needed it, like plants need water.
“Are you cold?” Ian asked.
“No.” Then I realized that he’d felt the goose bumps on my arm, and possibly the slight shiver that had gone through me when he’d put his hand on my bare skin. I had to cover for myself. I rubbed my arms to feign a chill, even though the city night was like an oven. “Or, um. Yeah? A little bit?”
He took off his suit jacket before I could answer him when he asked, “Would you like my jacket, then?”
The last time a guy had done that for me, it had been at Dunkin’ Donuts after senior prom. It had made me melt then, and it made me melt now. “Thanks. That’s very chivalrous of you.”
He put the jacket over my shoulders—it was warm from his body and smelled like his cologne, and I had to restrain myself from openly sniffing the lapels—and said, “Aye, I learned it in the thirteenth century.”
He’d said “Aye.” Not “yeah” or “yes.” “Aye.” Like Jamie from Outlander.
An older, less muscular, graying Jamie from Outlander, but still. If I could get him to call me Sassenach just once, I’d be happy.
He gestured to the cartons and cups on the bench. “Let’s get out of here before Officer Friendly comes back.”
We grabbed up our stuff and found a garbage can, and I realized too late that I hadn’t kept my fortune for the jar. Crap. It wasn’t like I was going to go back and look for it in the trash. That seemed like the way to assure there would be no second date, and I was really, really hoping there would be one.
We made it to the sidewalk without being arrested. “I assume we’re safe here. Try not to solicit sex from me, though.”
Or, you know. Do.
“I already promised I wouldn’t. I’m a man of my word.”
I had to get myself under control. I reminded myself—as I often found myself reminding myself—that I’d waited this long for a reason. But damn, it was really hard when everyone around you was having dessert and talking about how good it was while you were on a diet.
Ian reached into his front trouser pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. “Here. Hopefully, this rings true.”
It was my fortune. He must have saved it for me when we picked up all our garbage.
I said, “We’ll look back on tonight and laugh,” because I couldn’t think of anything original to say. He’d actually listened when I’d said I believed in fortune cookie messages. That was so sweet it was like sugar poured into the gas tank of my brain, and I couldn’t make anything start up again. So I automatically asked, “Did you keep yours?”
I couldn’t believe I said that. I might as well have asked him if I was the love of his live.
“Nah,” he responded, and I could barely look him in the eye.
“Well, won’t you be embarrassed when you meet the love of your live tomorrow and you don’t have the proper paperwork.” Humor usually works at the point of awkwardness.
The corners of his mouth lifted, and he said, with obvious reluctance, “Let me walk you home?”
I didn’t have to check my phone to know it was getting late. At least tomorrow was a Saturday, and I could sleep in. But the night had gone so fast; I didn’t want it to end.
We walked around the corner. My building was the second down the block, with the heavy gray door slashed with lines of a sloppy spray-painted anarchy symbol. As we went, we kept that careful cushion of personal space that exists between people who have been flirting, but weren’t ready for purposeful physical contact yet between them. “This is me.”
Ian might have thought he’d covered up his horror at my living arrangement, but he’d failed. I’d challenge him to find rent lower than twelve-hundred a month without going to the other end of the of borough.
I remembered I was wearing his jacket and took it off. When he took it out of my hand, he did that thing guys in suits do, where they hold onto their jacket over their shoulder. Guys doing that? Did something to me physically. Something that involved a lot of throbbing.
“So…thank you. I wasn’t joking when I said I was having fun. Even after the cops came,” he said.
Then he looked at my mouth. He was going to kiss me. Oh my god, he was going to kiss me. My toes curled in my shoes. He was going to kiss me, a real, actual kiss, not just a peck on the cheek or an awkward first date hug. He leaned down, I took a breath and…
My breath! I jerked backward. “Nope! No. No, sorry, it’s not you. It’s just that my breath is really, really bad from dinner. I actually did that on purpose. I thought I might be tempted, so I went with spicy and full of cabbage.”
“Oh.” He felt rejected, that was clear enough from his surprised expression. Usually I wouldn’t have felt bad; guys need to learn to live with disappointment. But I actually wanted to kiss him, more than I’d anticipated, and with a clearer head.
I had to learn to trust myself.
But I also had to be honest, right off the bat. If this became anything, I had to prepare him for the fact there wasn’t going to be any third date sex. Or fourth or fifth. “It’s just that… I like you, Ian. And you know how you said you were old fashioned about paying for dinner? I’m old fashioned about this. I move really, really slow, and I think it’s only fair that you know that, if you were thinking about…calling me?”
“I was actually thinking about how much pepper spray was going to hurt,” he joked.
The night had had its rough spots, but not that rough. “Why would I pepper spray you?”
He chuckled. “Because this entire date has been a disaster, and I thought going in for the kiss might have been the last straw.”
“It wasn’t a total disaster.”
He cleared his throat. I wondered if it was a nervous tick. “I’m a bit out of practice with dating, and I overstepped my bounds. But slow doesn’t bother me. Slow, I can do.”
I really wanted to believe that. On the other hand, I wanted to believe that I could manage to be slow with him, too.
“You know, police involvement aside, I had fun tonight, too.” I twisted the toe of my shoe on the sidewalk. “Would you want to do it again?”
“Oh, I suppose I could stomach it.” How was he so cool and dorky at the same time?
I couldn’t be cool, not when I was thrilling to my toes abou
t all the possibility packed into the conversation. “Well, good. I think you should be old fashioned and call me.”
“No texts,” he swore, and I almost swooned. I hated texting. Everyone else on the planet seemed to love it, so I did it when I had to. It was nice to meet a kindred spirit who would rather talk on the phone.
I didn’t want to go inside, but it was perfect to end it right here. “Thanks for a really… Let’s go with memorable. A really memorable night.”
“It was my pleasure.”
I stepped away, but every cell in my body wanted to stay. I turned back and moved fast, grabbing his tie and pulling him down to kiss him on the cheek. There. That was cute, and just the right amount of aggressive. “Have a good night.”
My face was burning as I unlocked the door. Actually, it was probably flashing on and off like Rudolph’s nose. At least it didn’t make that weird noise.
I couldn’t resist a look back at him. He was not the kind of guy I was usually attracted to. But in the flickering glow of the nearly-broken light over my door, everything seemed unusual. This didn’t feel like a usual date, at all. It felt like the start of something important, and I couldn’t convince myself that it was my overactive imagination telling me that.
It was August twenty-first. I guess I would get my answer in a few weeks.
Chapter Three
My roommate, Rosa, would be on me the second I came through the door, and she would call me out if I was breathing hard and blushing, so I waited in the tiny vestibule at the bottom of the stairs, leaning against the mailboxes.
There was also no way she was going to miss the fact that my high-beams were definitely on. I had never in my life kissed someone on the cheek and had a physical reaction like the one I was feeling at the moment. The skin on my neck tingled—no, ached—from imagining his mouth there.
Then, there was the fortune. I didn’t want to get my hopes up; it would be silly when we’d only gone on a first date. But cookies have never steered me wrong. Was I destined to be the love of Ian’s life? Did I want to be? Was fate giving me a choice in the matter?
I climbed the four flights of narrow stairs to my apartment and slipped the key in the door. Our place is so small. Two teensy bedrooms on either side of a cramped living space with a weird, bay window-shaped end, despite the criminally steep rent we paid. I entered through the small kitchenette and saw Rosa had beat me to the dishes, again.
“I told you I would do those when I got home,” I said in lieu of a greeting.
Rosa was sitting on the couch, watching The Mindy Project. Her dark, curly hair was pulled up in a sock bun. The torn-out neck of her sweatshirt dipped on her shoulder, and no bra strap showed. “Does it look like I had a lot of exciting plans tonight?”
I smiled to myself as I slipped off my heels and padded toward my bedroom. Rosa was too distracted by the television to ask about my date. Thank god for Hulu. Thank god for Mindy Kaling.
Of course I would tell Rosa about my date with Ian, but I needed to process how I felt about the whole night. The evening really did have disaster written all over it, but it had been funny and exciting. He had been funny and exciting.
“No, no,” Rosa called after me, pausing her show. “You’re not getting off that easy.”
“I know. You get the beer. I’ll get my PJs.”
When I was comfy and changed and Rosa and I each had a Bud Light in hand, I made a “bring it” motion. “Let’s do this.”
She got straight to what had been her biggest curiosity since the first time I’d mentioned that I was going out with an older guy. “How did he look? Did he look rough fifty? Did he look Brad Pitt fifty? What’s up?”
I held out my hand and flipped it back and forth. “Business guy fifty? Is that a thing?”
She considered. “Hot dad fifty?”
I snapped my fingers. “Yes, exactly. But not in bad way. He’s handsome.”
“I’m going to need more.”
I considered a moment. Altogether, he was good-looking, but I couldn’t think of one feature that really stood out. Then I realized that it had been his expressions, his face in motion, that had made him so appealing. Without his goofy charm, he would have been average. “He has really nice eyes, and his smile is kind of… I don’t know. Like a naughty little boy.”
“Hot. Hair?”
“Black. With a lot of gray in it.”
“Nose? Ears?”
“Eh. Ears just slightly on the large side.”
Rosa nodded, with exactly the same expression Oprah has when she’s interviewing Lindsey Lohan. Finally, she said, “Okay. So you think he’s good-looking. How about the personality?”
“Really sweet.” I snickered, remembering the way he’d said he came off as a “fucking prick” when talking about his artwork. “He swears like no one I’ve ever met.”
“Even me?” Rosa sat up, like she was accepting a call to protect her honor.
“Yeah, unbelievably. But it doesn’t even seem crass when he does it. Maybe it’s the accent.” Ooh, that was gonna make Rosa jealous. She had such a thing for accents.
Her eyes widened. “What kind of accent?”
“Scottish. He grew up in Glasgow.” I grinned at her from ear to ear. “Not gonna lie, it’s pretty hot.”
“So, the date went well, then?” Rosa wriggled on the couch cushion. “You’re going to see him, again?”
“Oh, the date was horrible. He took me to this crazy fancy restaurant and ordered octopus.” It made me sad to even think about that, but he had changed his selection to avoid offending me further, rather than telling me I was overreacting. “It was going so not well he suggested we go somewhere else, so we ended up eating Chinese takeout in the park.”
“Okay, that’s kind of cute and romantic,” Rosa insisted.
“Yeah, it would have been.” I paused. “Except for the part where we got busted for trespassing and the cop assumed I was a prostitute.”
“Nothing wrong with prostitutes,” Rosa reminded me.
“I know. But there is something wrong with going to jail on a first date.” Still, I couldn’t help my giddy smile as I said, “And he tried to kiss me.”
Rosa took a sip from her bottle. “Did you?”
I shook my head. “I kissed him on the cheek, though. And he said he wanted to call me.”
“So, you’re going to go out with him, again.” She shook her head. “Okay. If that’s your deal.”
“What?” Here it was. I’d been expecting this ever since I’d told her I was going on a date with a much older guy.
“Well, I’m just saying. When you’re thirty, he’ll be sixty—”
“And I might not be dating him.” Oh really, Miss August Twenty-First? I ignored that snarky part of my brain. “I’m not making a lifetime commitment here. He’s just really sweet.”
“And you told him…” She raised an eyebrow.
“Ugh, no. I did not tell him.” I rolled my eyes at her. “You don’t have to say that like I have a terrible secret. You make it sound like I murdered someone.”
“I just don’t want this to go down like Brad.”
My heart was still tender when it came to the subject of Brad. I’ve spent two years waiting. Maybe if I’m not the one, I should go find someone who isn’t afraid to fuck me.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. Even though I’d dated Brad for two years, there had always been something about him, something I hadn’t been able to put my finger on, that had prevented me from being totally convinced that he was the one. He’d managed to hide it for two years. “Any guy I go out with could end up being a jerk about it.”
“That wasn’t fair of me. It’s not my place to worry about it. Sorry.” She took another sip of her beer.
“It was weird, though. When I mentioned it, Ian didn’t even react.” Most guys either made a huge deal about how unusual it was for someone to be a twenty-two-year-old virgin or tried to joke about how they’d be the first. One guy had described it as
“voiding the warranty”.
I had not called him back.
After my early morning, the date, and now, the beer, I could barely keep my eyes open.
“Maybe it’s better that he’s an older guy. He won’t come with any of the younger guy bullshit.” Rosa shrugged. “I need sleep, and you look like you’re going to pass out. But I’m glad you had fun tonight.”
“Yeah, I really did.” I motioned to the bottles. “Leave those, I’ll get them in the morning.”
I yawned and shuffled the few steps to my bedroom. “You wanna get breakfast?”
She made an apologetic face. “I can’t. Transgender women of color support group brunch.”
“Right. Last Saturday of the month.” I’m not such a bad friend that I would begrudge Rosa her time with girlfriends who shared the same experiences as her. “Tell Amanda I said hi.”
Rosa shook her head. “I would rather stick my face in the blade of a riding lawn mower than talk to Amanda, but for you, I will convey this message of misguided politeness.”
“Rosa and Amanda sittin’ in a tree—” I didn’t even get to the first s before she threw her slipper at me, and I shielded myself by closing the bedroom door before she could throw the second one.
As small as it is, my bedroom is like a little oasis for me. The twinkly white Christmas lights were something I should have totally left to my dorm room days, and I could barely fit my full-sized bed and nightstand between the walls. At least I had a shallow closet and two outlets, and there was space at the foot of my bed for a storage cube upon which to perch my teensy little twenty-seven-inch television. In a city of a bajillion people, I would take whatever private space I could get, even if it was tiny.
I decided I’d take off my makeup and brush my teeth in the morning; my feet hurt too much from wearing heels all night. My snuggly bed awaited.
Also, maybe some light research.
I’d held off on Facebook snooping before the date. That had seemed rude. But now that I’d met him, I wanted to know more. If he had a public profile, well…it wasn’t really intruding, right?
First Time: Penny's Story (First Time (Penny) Book 1) Page 3