Chapter Ten
She wished she hadn’t chosen the most romantic restaurant in town, once they were inside. But this time it wasn’t as much to do with how close they would probably have to sit together, or how soft and swoony the music was.
That was endurable. She was okay with it.
Whereas his obvious discomfort over the slick, fancy prettiness of the place?
Yeah, she wasn’t okay with that. And especially now it was clear why he’d always seemed annoyed about stuff like this: it made him feel even more out of place and awkward than he already did.
It made him stand out, in a way he clearly didn’t like.
He kept brushing through his hair with his hand. And smoothing down his shirt, even though it wasn’t creased at all. As if he still thought he was wearing the wrong thing, or that the things he was wearing seemed too messy. They went poorly with the entirely pink and very plush decor.
Plus she could tell how aware he was of his size. He moved between the tiny tables so carefully to get to their booth. Then when they got there, and he knocked the underside of the table with his knee, he actually cursed under his breath.
Then rolled his eyes at himself for cursing.
“Yeah, I know, I know, I’m already messing up,” he said, as he tried to mop up the water that had spilled from the jug on the table when he’d joggled everything. Though even that bothered him after he did it.
Most likely because he’d used a corner of his shirt.
Now the shirt was wet, and the table was still moist anyway, and people were looking, they were looking, she knew he could see them looking.
She could practically feel that never-ending judgment he’d endured pouring out from them and all over him.
So she gave in to the first urge she had.
She put a hand over the one he was using to grab a napkin.
She pulled it back and gave it a squeeze.
“You’re not messing up. It’s only a little bit of water.
And if they don’t want it spilled they should design tables for something bigger than a potato,” she said.
He wasn’t having it, however.
“I mean, you can say that, but you aren’t struggling.”
“Of course not. I am the size of one. Look at my tiny legs next to yours.”
She lifted the tablecloth so he could see her little stumpy things. And sure enough, they looked absurd. Her feet were barely touching the ground. He could have touched that same ground beyond the table they were sitting at.
And he seemed very annoyed that he couldn’t disagree.
“Can’t believe you actually just made me look under the table and compare.”
“Because you know it makes sense. Now let’s focus on having a good time.”
“Okay, but how do I do that?”
“You order food.”
She pointed at his menu.
“Right. Right,” he said, and opened it. He even looked like he was seriously perusing it. And he did come up with something, even if the something sounded a little dubious. “I was thinking maybe just a really giant steak.”
“That sounds good. I mean, I don’t know if they do massive ones but—”
“Oh, they don’t? Oh okay. So maybe I’ll just get, like, a huge pancake.”
“Well, I guess you could do that. They could probably make that.”
“Or I could get a shrimp cocktail and a Caesar salad.”
She frowned, baffled. It was like he wasn’t even paying attention to what was there. Like he was thinking of something else entirely, something he’d seen somewhere else, maybe.
And then it dawned on her.
“Are you just listing food John Candy eats in various movies?”
“No, of course not. I don’t even know how you would guess that.”
“The giant pancake. That’s pretty famously from Uncle Buck .”
“He doesn’t even do that on a date. He makes it for the kids he’s looking after,” he protested. Though of course the second he admitted he knew what she was talking about, he’d already lost. His shoulders dropped, he palmed his face. “It was all that would come into my head.”
“But why? You can just pick something good from here.” She tapped the menu again, encouragingly.
Not that it helped, at all. He sat forward, voice dropping low, expression just a little sad and a lot exasperated.
“I don’t know what good is, kid. Heck, I don’t even know what normal is.
Last time I ordered in a restaurant the waitress looked at me like I’d grown three heads.
And then when my food came it was brought by a completely different person who told me the other girl was never coming back. ”
“Oh my god . What did you get?” she asked, and knew she’d done it too salaciously.
Like it just had to be something disgusting and weird—a boiled turnip, maybe.
Or possibly something really macho, like raw bacon dipped in beer.
And of course he clocked her wide eyes and breathless anticipation, even as she tried to smuggle it down and look as understanding as she wanted to be.
“I don’t want to tell you. Just tell me what I should say I want.
Or tell me which dude from which book made the best choices when it came to something like this.
I mean, was it Greg from Completely Bared ?
Because I think he orders something in chapter eleven,” he said, then before she could answer, he fished out his notepad.
He flicked to the right page. He even got out a little pair of half-glasses and put them on before he read aloud.
No wonder he squinted the first time he did this , she thought.
Though she couldn’t giggle. She was too busy thinking about what it meant, that he hadn’t wanted to put on glasses before but did now.
And feeling a lot of feelings about how he sounded when he read a passage from the book aloud.
“‘He ordered a steak, bloody. Then a wine she had never heard of, the name of it rolling off his tongue deliciously. Soon he would taste her on the tip of it. They both knew it. They both reveled in it as the dinner went on,’” he said, all low and rumbly.
Softer than she expected, too, and just a little embarrassed.
Though even that was sweet to her.
She could have listened to him do it all day.
So much so that she didn’t even realize what she was doing until he looked up.
She had her chin in her hands and was leaning forward.
As if waiting for more. As if waiting for someone to read to her, just as she’d longed for when she was a kid.
Though of course she knew now that this longing wasn’t just about the act of it.
It was about knowing someone loved to read as much as her.
Who took her sharing her books with them and treasured it.
Because he clearly did. He looked up and saw her on the edge of her seat, and even though they’d been talking about something entirely different he said, “Do you want me to go on? I actually have the book in my back pocket. I kind of thought I might need it.”
And it actually pained her to shake her head.
“I would love that, I really would. But I feel like I have to stress—you should ask for what you want. Be true to yourself. Be honest. Women like me love that, too. They love someone just being who they are, and especially when you’ve been accepting of who they are,” she said, and was pleased once she had.
Because that standard of caring about someone that he had set was definitely trapping him now.
His jaw clenched; his eyes fluttered closed in a way that said he found this deeply irritating.
But he couldn’t get out of it.
“Okay. Fine,” he said, all withering acceptance and a hidden hint of relief.
“I don’t really like savory food. Any savory food.
The only thing I enjoy eating is desserts.
Pudding, pies, cookies, donuts. Anything sweet and I’ll eat it.
Anything salty I won’t. And I didn’t understand that this was weird, and so I ordered three whole cakes for my starter, entrée, and dessert. ”
Then he sat back and spread his hands. As if now everything was explained. Instead of being even more puzzling than it had been before. “But you don’t even like sugar in your coffee. The black coffee. That you always have. And get mad about when people offer you anything else,” she said, mystified.
She should have known, though.
“Because people look at me and expect that. You try being someone who looks like this and then ordering a pumpkin spice latte. They look at you like you’re nuts.
Sometimes they snigger behind their hands.
And yeah, I know I shouldn’t let that bother me, but growing up it was always about not being—”
He caught himself, clearly thinking he was about to reveal too much.
It was okay, though. She already knew what it was.
He’d said as much before, and even if he hadn’t she could almost feel it sometimes.
The embarrassment over being gentle, the certainty that he didn’t know how to be, the sense that he was letting someone down constantly.
“Your dad wanted you to be tough. Mean. Maybe even cruel, like he probably was,” she said, and he looked uncomfortable.
But he didn’t deny it.
“He was not a nice… person. And I guess that gets in your head.”
“Of course it does. You can see it did for me. And you understood, so let me do the same for you now. Let me tell you that I don’t care.
I don’t need you to be anything—and if the girl you like is anything like me, she won’t either.
So just focus on being yourself. Yourself is great, I promise.
In fact, what you’d like to order sounds exactly like what I’ve always wanted to, too,” she said, just in time for the waitress to arrive and help her prove it.
She asked for every dessert they had, including the one for sharing.
Then she looked at him when the waitress asked about drinks.
She watched him almost say wine . And almost say beer .