Chapter Nine
She expected to be embarrassed when he emerged from the bedroom in the outfit she’d suggested.
After all, that was what usually happened when she freaked out over weird stuff, or spilled too much of her guts.
Five minutes spent away from whoever she’d spilled her guts to, and suddenly she’d be filled with emotional buyer’s remorse.
And this time she’d really spent a lot. She’d tried to hide in his closet.
Then told him things she had never told anyone .
Mortifying things that usually made her feel delusional and weird.
It made sense that she might be awkward with him.
It even seemed like a good thing, in one way.
If she was busy being nervous about seeming like a weirdo who freaked out over probably nonexistent things, she was less likely to make a fool of herself on a date that wasn’t even really a date at all.
She would be reserved, mindful. Not prone to gushing over him, or getting ideas in her head.
But then he finally strolled out in the outfit she’d suggested, and every single certainty and slip of reassurance she’d just felt dissolved in an instant.
Partly, she thought, because of how he seemed: a little nervous to show off his look, one hand pulling at his cuff, seeming slightly baffled over the choices she’d made, already mouthing, Are you sure this is right?
Partly because of the clothes themselves—that soft Hawaiian shirt contrasting sharply with the rough facial hair, the big shoulders, the belt she’d chosen with that heavy buckle.
But mostly it was the way her brain immediately registered him.
Not as a person she’d just embarrassed herself in front of.
Not as a source of awkwardness. No—all she could see was a kind man who’d easily accepted something so weird and uncomfortable and off-putting.
He was still accepting it now, in fact. He didn’t even mention it.
He didn’t even look like it was something worth going over again.
There wasn’t so much as a hint of judgment on his face.
Like it was normal to have odd things like that in your past.
And to the point where he still saw her as someone to be respected.
He still thought she had advice for him worth listening to, and ideas that would help him on his journey toward the affectionate, kind girl of his dreams. “What do you think?” he said.
“Good enough to pass for a normal, dateable man?”
So it really wasn’t a shock when her heart tried to answer for her.
It dissolved her from the inside out, immediately. Then just jumped directly into her eyes. She could practically feel her own gaze trying to swoon all over everything about him. Whatever you do, do not throw yourself at this man , she had to order herself.
About thirty seconds before she gave him a thumbs-up, his whole face brightened.
It brightened, and he came over to her, and then he offered her his elbow .
Like a fancy gentleman, ready to escort his date.
She had to take it while full of more affection and attraction and gratitude to someone than she’d ever experienced in her entire life.
Then she walked out the door with the person who made her feel like that, into the soft twilight, with the low purr of the woods all around them, and his heat warming her hand, and his gentle manner ever present.
He patted her as they crossed the porch.
To reassure her, or maybe to indicate gratitude, she thought.
Possibly he could feel her trembling a little, and believed she needed it.
But either way, it didn’t help. It just made that lush wave of feeling expand inside her.
She was full to the brim with it by the time they were side by side in the truck.
Restless, like someone waiting for an end to summer heat.
Only now she knew it would never come.
All she could do was try to distract it.
“You know, maybe you should put on music,” she said, as he turned onto the highway that led to town. But when she reached toward the stereo he shot her a nervous look. He put out a hand to kind of halfheartedly dissuade her.
“I don’t think any date of mine is gonna want to hear what I like to listen to.”
“So it’s an old CD of some death metal band from the nineties.”
“It’s not even a CD. I’m one step behind even that.”
She took a closer look at what she’d tried to turn on.
And came pretty close to gasping.
“Oh my god , is that a tape deck?”
“I told you, I don’t do well with digital stuff.”
“Even so, wow. That is really something to see.”
She reached out a hand again. And this time he let her. Or, more accurately, he eyed her on and off as she pushed her fingers into the little slot and brushed over the chunky buttons. Like it was fine, as long as she was just innocently curious.
And curious was the word, too.
There was something so odd about it.
Not like any tape decks she remembered seeing before.
It had this kind of… handmade look to it.
Like someone had carved it somehow, out of something other than plastic.
In fact, now that she was looking closely she could see that it had these little ornate edges, as if it had been made to fit in to some old-fashioned mansion.
She even went to ask him about it.
But before she could, there was a thunk .
Like she’d pressed something, even though she hadn’t.
And suddenly the car was full of music. Loud music.
Loud and absolutely shocking music, of the kind that made her wish she hadn’t accidentally turned it on.
It was already too warm in the car and her head was too full of nonsense.
Now they had a swelling background soundtrack of Celine Dion.
“See what you did. Exposed me completely,” he grumbled, as Dion started belting out that it was all coming back to her. She had no idea what he was grumbling about, however.
“Exposed you to who? Your imaginary date isn’t here. It’s just me. And even if it wasn’t, why would a date not like this?”
“It’s not that a date wouldn’t. It’s that it’s not right for someone like me to be listening to. I know it isn’t, don’t try to pretend otherwise this time. The men in the books—they always like stuff I’ve never even heard of. Sung by cowboys. Or angry men with weird hair.”
“I told you, they’re not exact lessons. It’s okay to be different.
It’s nice to be different. I like that you’re different.
Anybody like me would—and doubly so when you do things like what you just did for me in the house.
You accepted the weirdest thing about me.
Stuff like that matters, Jack,” she said, nervous to do it but glad when she had.
He didn’t even seem to care. He just took her point, with a head tilt that said fair enough , until she plunged on.
“It adds depth to you. Sensitivity. Softness.”
“Yeah, well. That might be good to you. But is it sexy?”
“It can be. It can mean it’s easier to be open with someone.
Even if they seem tough and scary. Suddenly they’re not so much.
Suddenly it’s easier to enjoy—like adding cinnamon sugar to something bitter.
A lick of it on the rim of the most bitter coffee.
Not enough to take the edge off, but so sweet it goes down easy. ”
Silence, then. One she really wanted to break with an explanation, a follow-up, that she actually didn’t mean that as sensuously as it sounded.
But he broke it before she could. “I think I’m a tough guy in the wrong way, though.
Not commanding. Just oafish,” he said, so matter-of-factly it seemed safe for her to continue.
“Didn’t seem that way when you got me out of the car.
Or when you took care of my ankle. Or when you said all that stuff about—” She stuttered over actually spelling it out.
Thought of those words, written down on a piece of paper, now neatly folded in her pocket.
The pen she still had, burning a hole there.
Then she shifted to something else. “Or when you offered me your elbow just now.”
“Yeah, but, I mean, I mostly did that so you wouldn’t fall through the porch.”
“That also seems like a sexy and correct way of doing things to me. So, you know, you probably shouldn’t worry too much about not knowing the right stuff. It kind of seems like you do a lot of it pretty naturally.”
“It’s just wanting to look out for someone.”
“Right. Exactly. You care, instinctively.”
“That can’t be it. I don’t even know how I would have developed that. I wasn’t really raised like that, so it shouldn’t be innate in me. I don’t get it. I’m trying to but I don’t know, kid. If you knew everything about me—”
He cut himself off before he could go any further.
Not that he needed to, really. She understood enough.
“I don’t need to know everything. I just need to know what you do, and what you say.
That’s what matters. That’s what defines you.
Not some asshole family or a horrible upbringing.
Your actions here, now. Your actions when you chose to move away from them, and make something better for yourself, and for someone else.
Someone who loves you. Who will love you, exactly as you are,” she said, so sure of it that she didn’t even think about how it sounded.
Or about the music that was rising to a crescendo as she did it.
Celine hit the high notes just as she spoke the word love aloud.
And in that moment he looked at her, all shock and something else—something she couldn’t read. Go on , his gaze seemed to say, but she couldn’t think what he wanted her to go on to. More words? More things like that? She didn’t know, and the idea of guessing made her stomach clench.
It almost made her grateful when something hit the windshield, right in the middle of that intense eye contact he was somehow doing while driving. It made him break away, and the stereo cut out abruptly, and all that weird tension just drained away.
Then they drove on, to their phony date.