Chapter 8 – piper #2
“I don’t care. I will marry it and have its babies. You’re okay with cheese sisters, right, Harps?”
Harper looks up from her plate with a little scowl. Her four-year-old expressions are extreme and still padded with so much baby fat that I spend an inordinate amount of time reminding myself to respect her boundaries and not squeeze my love into her too much.
“Cheese sisters would be stinky.”
Elena takes another bite. “That’s okay. We’ll buy more candles. Just try not to eat your siblings.”
Harper giggles. “Yucky, Mommy.”
“Funny,” Elena mutters under her breath. “That’s what all men seem to think, too.”
“Hey,” I snap. “No negative self-talk. Now give me three positives.”
She rolls her eyes. “I have amazing hair.”
That she does. Luscious dark locks from her Puerto Rican mother, who died when she was way too young.
I swipe a breadstick along the remains of my Alfredo sauce. “Two more.”
“My kid is wicked smaht.” There’s her Irish-Bostonian dad coming through.
Harper giggles again around a mouthful of pasta.
“And I’m good at my job.”
“You’re amazing at your job,” I agree. “So what if the losers you try to meet on that stupid app can’t see any of that?”
“Well, I won’t let them see the kid, for starters.”
“Smart move.”
“Dating is hard.” She looks at Harper when she says this, and I know it’s because dating means something different when she’s not just trying to find a connection for herself, but one who fits in with her most important person as well.
“When Dorian was in the shop the other night for the writing class, we kind of talked about this.”
Elena locks in on me, lowering her fork full of saucy pasta. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen her sacrifice good food for the sake of an answer before. “About dating?”
“Just what he wants in a partner. He was being hit on by this superhot chick, like Shakira meets Sabrina Carpenter, but she also writes.”
She whistles. “His dream woman.”
“Right? So I didn’t intervene. But he sent me a save me look. Save him! From that? I thought he was out of his mind. He just said that he’s looking for a connection.”
“And she was too beautiful to form one?” Elena asks.
“I don’t know what his deal was. She came on really strong, so maybe that was a turnoff.
But there are three more classes, so she has time to win him over.
” I twirl my fork around the last few noodles on my plate, but my stomach sours at the thought of anyone winning Dorian over right in front of my eyes.
I don’t want to watch that in real time.
“I still can’t believe you two are being cordial,” she says around a full mouth.
“Mommy, I’m done.”
“Finished, baby. A turkey in the oven is done.”
Harper sighs with long suffering. “Mommy, I’m finished.”
“You can be excused.”
Harper takes her plate to the sink and runs off to her room.
“Maybe I’ll sneak into one of these classes so I can see it for myself.”
I lean back in my seat and sip my ice water. “Paying customers only.”
“You just want Dorian all to yourself, don’t you?” She widens her big green eyes at me. “He’s hot now, right?”
“He’s always been hot.”
Elena sits up fast and points right at me. “I knew it! You’re into him.”
“Am not.” But my reply is lackluster. I just gave myself away.
She gasps. “You are. I thought you got over him when he was a total jerk to you.”
“I did…like, back then. But now he’s different? I don’t know. College Dorian and Current Dorian feel like two different guys.” Like one was leaner with an ever-present frown, and the other has forearms that make me drool. Oh my gosh, what are his calves like?
Elena considers this. “He’s a good guy. You should go for it.”
How deep did these brunches get for Elena to form this opinion of him? “And probably be rejected again?”
“What do you mean again?”
I can’t tell her about graduation. But there are plenty of other examples. “You know, how he used to move every time I’d sit by him. When he told Ashley he didn’t want to go on the Destin trip because he found out I was going to be there. How he left karaoke night as soon as I got up to sing.”
“Could have been a coincidence.”
“Unlikely. It felt like he was always finding excuses to leave places the moment I arrived. All four years of college were like that.”
“Yeah, those were all pretty pointed. I don’t know. Have you asked him about it?”
“I want to, but what if his answer is embarrassing?” I affect a low voice. “Sorry, Piper, I could tell you had a fat crush on me back then and didn’t want anything to do with you, so the easiest thing was to run away.”
“But he kept acting like that even after you started dating Kyle.”
“Right?” I toss my hands in the air. “I don’t get it. The only answer could be that I was annoying, right? He just didn’t want to be my friend.”
“But he does now.”
“Now he’s tolerating me.” But even as the words leave my lips, I know they’re not true. His signals have been strong, and nothing he’s done since the first moment he showed up in my shop last week has indicated any running away.
I don’t know what to think. I also can’t stop thinking about him, which is a little pathetic and makes me feel like a twelve-year-old hoping to get asked to her first middle school dance. Which means I need to nip this in the bud and have an adult conversation.
Shouldn’t be too hard, right?