18. Looking but NOT Touching
eighteen
Jack
What the hell am I doing at a singles night?
I shouldn’t be here. I have no intention of dating, and I certainly don’t want to give any of these women the wrong idea. But all of the guys from the shop were coming and convinced me—if for nothing else than just to grab a couple of drinks. At first, I thought we were all going just to goof on this whole thing, but as the week has gone on, it seems that everyone else is taking it more seriously than I am.
But I’m nothing if not a team player, so here I am.
I look around at the converted town hall. Truth be told, it’s not much more than an old wooden pole barn, but it cleans up nicely. Every time there’s any type of event, they hang up some pretty string lights and replace the typical rows of chairs with some tables. Since there aren’t a lot of event areas nearby, a lot of people have weddings and baby showers here.
Wasting no time, I walk over to the open bar and get myself a beer. I barely have time to do anything else before Misty shows up by my side.
“Well, well, well, look who decided to show up.” She beams from ear to ear.
“Yeah, I made a promise to the guys at work that I’d make an appearance,” I reply, taking the first sip of what I’m sure will be many.
“You think you’ll still be single by the end of the night?” She looks up at me, trying to give me her very best Bambi eyes.
“Oh, I’m sure I will be,” I reply with complete certainty.
“Maybe if we are both still single, we can go rattle my headboard for the night.”
Here we go again.
“Misty,” I begin, knowing what I’m about to say may not be very nice, but it needs to be said anyway. “I know you and I had fun that night, but we were drunk. I was wasted, and it shouldn’t have happened. We are friends. Let’s keep it that way. I don’t want to have this conversation again.”
At this point, most women would storm off while telling me how much of an asshole I am. But yet again, Misty is much too sweet for that. She just puts on her fake smile and says, “Okay, then. Have a good night.”
I don’t know if I’ll ever stop regretting that she and I slept together. That’s what I get for thinking with my downstairs head rather than the upstairs one.
I lean against the edge of the long bar and look around as the room slowly starts to fill up. A couple of the guys from the shop are here, but they seem to already be hitting on some of the eligible ladies, so I opt to leave them alone.
Maybe all of them will be easily distracted, and I can slip out without staying too long. Going home and spending the evening curled up on the couch with Ellie sounds like a better time. At least, there, I can’t get into any trouble.
Something to my right catches my eye. When I look over, I about choke on the drink of beer I just took. Liz Lawson comes strolling up to the bar looking like a whole damn snack.
Talk about trouble.
Her ankle must be feeling better because she’s in her pointy high heels again. My eyes travel from the shoes all the way up her long, lean legs to where her short black dress falls. It covers everything up, but if she bends over, I’d imagine everyone around would get quite the view.
Immediately, I wonder if she’s got that little stringy thong underneath.
Damn it.
This woman drives me up the fucking wall. I shouldn’t have any type of attraction to her—let alone be thinking about her undergarments.
You can look, Jack. Just for the love of God, don’t touch.
When I finally pull my eyes away from her body, I move up to her face. Her curls are wild and crazy, but her makeup is flawless with her smoky eyes and dark lipstick.
“Hi,” she says, stepping up to the bar to get a drink.
“Hello,” I reply, hoping she didn’t notice that I was staring.
“I’m a little surprised to see you at Singles Night.”
I nod. “Back at you.”
I don’t why this is so awkward right now. We may not like each other, but usually, our banter and insults can bolster the conversation fairly well. Now, we seem like a couple of nervous kids at a middle school dance.
“Is your ankle feeling better?” I ask.
She looks down at her foot while twirling it in a circle. “Oh, yeah. Much. You were right. I think I just sprained it. Thank you, by the way, for making sure I was okay and all that.”
Trying not to appear as in shock as I am, I reply, “You’re welcome. Just glad it wasn’t anything worse.”
“Me too. Hopefully, I can get back to running this week.” She pauses a moment and asks, “Will I see you there?”
I nod. “Every morning.”
With a sly smile, she says, “Good. You’re going to need to get in some practice to keep up.”
That gets an unexpected laugh out of me. “You’re sure full of yourself for someone who fell and twisted her ankle in a hole.”
Without missing a beat, she quips, “I was running too fast to see anything on the ground that wasn’t more than a blur.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
When the bartender hands her a drink, Liz takes a sip, and says, “Well, I guess I’m going to go mingle.”
As I watch her ass walk away, I find myself hoping that the short dress rides up a little.
Stop it.
Swigging the last of my beer, I realize that I’m going to need quite a few more of these to make it through with her around.
An hour later, a woman named Angie is standing in front of me, telling me all about the charity organization she works for. She’s cute and apparently lives in one of the neighboring towns. She’s nice enough, but I’m only half listening to everything she says.
My interest is occupied with watching Jamie do his best to hit on Liz. I figured he would crash and burn within the first few minutes, but he’s had her laughing for the past half an hour.
I like Jamie, but the whole idea of him trying to get with Liz is absurd to me. Not only does the age gap between them seem a bit much, but as Dylan said, Liz would eat Jamie alive.
And I can’t imagine they have anything in common. What the hell would the two of them do if they went out?
If Jamie had his way, I’m sure that they’d fuck, and he would end it there.
What about that makes me so mad?
I shouldn’t give a shit about who Liz hangs out with. Yet, as I sit here and watch Jamie coyly set his hand on her thigh, I feel my blood starting to boil.
Next thing I see is him standing up and holding out his hand. When she takes it, he leads her to the dance floor and starts moving with her in his arms.
Where the fuck did this kid learn to dance like that?
I try focus on what Angie is saying. I even nod and try to engage as best I can. But out of the corner of my eye, I can see Jamie dipping Liz and then pulling her close.
I want nothing to do with this woman, so I can’t explain my jealousy, but I’m clutching my beer so hard that I worry I may break the bottle.
I don’t know how much more of this show I can take.