Chapter Nine
My palms felt itchy in the back of the car, a symptom of an anxiety I hadn’t felt for some time now.
Perhaps it was the taciturn mood of the driver rubbing off on both of us, but Kai was quiet next to me, too.
I stared out the window at the evening streets, wondering against my better judgment about what my ex might be doing now.
I didn’t know what I’d expected from the restaurant Kai had suggested. It hadn’t even crossed my mind to ask what sort of food they served, which seemed a little odd now that I thought about it. Mid-week, I decided, it couldn’t be too busy. That made me feel a little less nervous.
From the outside, it had that weathered-wood look that was popular.
The sort of design which you suspect was intended to express “we threw this together because we were too busy concentrating on our good, honest recipes.” As Kai pushed open the door, it triggered a series of beaming, welcoming smiles from about three servers and a girl behind the register.
I fought the urge to grimace, then wondered if I was always going to be an antisocial pessimist now.
There was, at least, minimal fuss in getting us to a table.
The place was a little over half full, a mixture of families and couples.
I let my eyes drift across chalkboards on the wall filled with today’s specials.
It seemed like New American had discovered farm-to-table, and set up shop somewhere between the two.
When I looked back, it was to find Kai staring at me, frowning slightly.
“You hate it,” he accused, mildly.
I found myself shaking my head, automatically. “Not at all,” I protested, “just, y’know... taking it all in.”
His expression suggested deep skepticism. “Look, I get the decor is a bit hokey and played-out, but the food is good.”
I held up my hands, placatory. “Seriously, I’m not judging,” I lied. “I was literally just checking out the specials.”
I suspected he didn’t believe me still, but he settled on sighing with exaggerated melodrama and looking down the single-page menu we’d been left with. “If you really didn’t want to go out,” he observed, head still lowered, “you could’ve said.”
I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. My first reaction was to point out that I had said, but I knew that I hadn’t, actually.
Not really; not in so many words. I’d done my usual vague demurral, to see if that would be enough to get me out of something without having to be so blunt as to say “no” outright.
And now I was sitting here being so passive-aggressive that someone who, frankly, hardly knew me at all could read it clearly.
Man, I pissed myself off sometimes.
“I’m sorry,” I said, then, instead of protesting. “I think I’m just out of the habit of, well, going out. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
Kai glanced up at me, a small smile twisting the corner of his mouth. “It’s okay. If you’re embarrassed, we don’t have to tell anybody that it’s a date.”
I gaped at him. “I... I mean, I didn’t... You never...” My stuttering was only ended by his laugh.
“Tate, calm down,” he said, through chuckles, “I’m teasing you.”
The gape became a glare. “You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you.”
It had been a comment, not a question, and Kai responded as such - by basically ignoring it. “I’m trying not to be offended that the thought of going on a date with me would be so terrible.”
Any response I could’ve given - and, frankly, I wasn’t sure what I could say to that - was interrupted by the server.
Kai clearly knew what he wanted, and I made a spur-of-the-moment decision that the woman suggested was her favorite thing on the menu.
I resisted the urge to ask whether she said that about every selection, deciding it would probably not help my argument that I wasn’t entirely antisocial.
By the time she’d taken our drink orders, had left, and then someone else had poured us water, Kai was looking at me with a knowing expression on his face.
“If every moment of this is killing you, we really can just leave,” he offered.
“We’ve just ordered,” I pointed out, frowning.
Kai shrugged. “So, we can leave anyway.”
Shaking my head, I took a sip of water. “Don’t be ridiculous, we couldn’t do that.”
He sat back, arms folded, looking satisfied. “Ah, so you do have limits; you’re not a total social monster after all.”
It felt like I’d spent at least fifty percent of our time here glaring at him. I was beginning to worry I’d have a permanent wrinkle in the middle of my forehead before we got the check.
“You have such a low opinion of me,” I observed.
Kai shook his head. “No, I have an urge to go out with you. I just need to know the limits so that you don’t kill someone while we do it.”
I blinked at him, momentarily lost for words. As usual, a little self-deprecation eventually filled the gap. “All this because you want to use my pool,” I said, inwardly wincing even as the words left my lips.
He refused to rise to the bait. “I thought that was why we had sex,” he said, matter-of-factly.
I looked around us, hurriedly, to see if anybody had overheard. The people at the tables nearest didn’t seem to be paying any attention.
“Do you have to be so loud?” I asked him, feeling awkward again.
Kai stuck his tongue out at me; I had a glimpse of him as an unruly child, making life hell for his parents.
“Do you have to be so uptight?” he countered, answering my question with one of his own. “Are you really so ashamed of sleeping with me?”
I couldn’t help it, I had to laugh at that.
Kai stared, seemingly confused by my reaction.
“Seriously?” I asked him, still chuckling. “I’m pretty sure if you asked anybody in this room, they’d express clear and significant surprise that you’d wanted to have sex with me, not the other way around.”
He snorted. “I mean, I can ask...”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Don’t you dare.”
Eventually he held up his hands in submission.
“Fine, fine, no impromptu surveys tonight. But I’m just going to point out that this is another of those times when you’re being super-critical of yourself, and it’s getting kinda annoying.
Can we have one evening where you’re not completely down on yourself? ”
Turning the water glass in its ring of condensation on the table, I mulled the possibility. “If I say yes, what exactly does that entail?”
He stared at me in what I could only read as amazement.
“I think you’re the only person in the world who needs a contract for something as straightforward as “don’t be a dick about yourself,” and it’s blowing my goddamn mind.
” Kai shook his head, slowly. “Okay, I’ll make it easy for you.
You don’t get to say anything negative about yourself.
If I pay you a compliment, you accept it.
Hell, you even think it over and try to see why someone - anyone - might say something nice about you.
Maybe none of it will sink in, maybe we’ll get lucky and you’ll decide, oh god, I don’t know.
.. decide that you have nice fingernails or something. Anything!”
I made a show of examining my fingers, glancing from left hand to right. “Well, I suppose I do have rather shapely cuticles,” I conceded.
He gulped down some water, then let his head fall back in exasperation. “Fine,” he said, eventually, “I’ll take whatever I can get.”
I resisted the urge to suggest that must’ve been his attitude when we’d had sex earlier. It only seemed like it would aggravate him again.
“So,” I asked, as salads arrived in front of us. I had to admit, they looked good. “What made you want to go into medicine?”
Kai pushed a forkful of leaves into his mouth, then gave a tight grin as he chewed. “I didn’t have much of a choice, really,” he explained, swallowing. “It was basically the parental expectation.”
“Both your parents are doctors?” I prompted, stabbing a piece of cucumber and then using it to round up a chunk of goat’s cheese.
“My dad is, yes. And his dad, too. It was always just assumed that I’d follow in those family footsteps.”
I nodded, wondering how it might have felt had my parents decided there was a hereditary legacy I was required to continue. We didn’t have that sort of relationship.
“Do you at least enjoy it, though?”
Kai paused, clearly thinking through his answer.
“I resented it at first,” he said, finally.
“When it seemed like it was being forced on me. But over time I think you start to find something good in anything.” He skillfully captured a few slivered almonds on the tines of his fork.
“I enjoy getting to work with people, and trying to help them figure out answers to stuff that has been frustrating them, or making their lives difficult. And it turns out I’m not bad at remembering long reams of facts, which doesn’t hurt when it comes to exams.”
I tore off a piece of bread, gesturing with it. “So you want to be a doctor when you qualify? Like, in a hospital?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Good question. I don’t really need to decide quite yet, and to be honest I’m still not entirely sure. How did you decide that you wanted to be... oh.” He set down his fork. “I just realized that I don’t know what it is that you do.”
It was a pointed reminder that, for all we’d done together, we were still effectively strangers.
“Well, I’m basically the person who makes sure shit goes to plan for a big company nobody has ever heard of,” I explained.
“Think of, like, a party planner, but instead of cake and balloons and a DJ, it’s keeping lawyers and contractors and managers in line.
Turns out, I’m actually unexpectedly good at it, which is weird what with the rest of my life being so fucked up right now. ”
Kai wagged a finger at me. “Positivity, remember?” he scolded.
I gave him a lopsided grin. “Look, some things are just the honest truth, y’know? Failed relationship, moving out, turning into a 21st century hermit, that sort of stuff. Forgive me if I don’t attempt to sugar-coat it.”