Chapter 7 #2
“Simply being a dick, Distefano.”
“Am not,” I said with a laugh.
“You know, I think it might be a red flag that in your eyes, me not being Bill Cowher is a flaw,” he teased. “The man is old enough to be your father.”
“Are you judging me?”
“I would never.”
“Also for the record, I no longer romantically love him. It’s simmered into a respectful appreciation of his legendary career.”
“I see.”
“Your eyes tell me that you don’t.”
“That’s because according to Tony—”
“Don’t bring my dad into this,” I admonished.
“—it was only a year ago that you brained yourself over him in the TSA line.”
“Are we really going to waste precious minutes of this date talking about my former loves?”
“Is that bad form?”
“The baddest.”
“Okay, moving on, then. I need to know your favorite film, favorite food, favorite TV show, and also your favorite color.”
“Wow, okay,” I said, noticing that he was good at eye contact. Not in a creepy way, but in the way that let you know he was genuinely interested in hearing what you had to say.
It was nice.
And surprising when he was someone whose entire life was far more interesting than mine.
“My favorite film is probably Crazy, Stupid, Love., favorite food is spaghetti, favorite TV show is Monk, and I don’t believe in favorite colors.”
“I’m sorry—you don’t believe in favorite colors?”
He said it like I’d stated I didn’t believe we’d landed on the Moon.
“That’s right. Because I have a preferred car color—black—and most of the clothes I purchase are black because they’re more versatile, but how can someone have a ‘favorite’ color?
Like, you look at that color and feel happy—is that it?
Like I love orange and the color orange just fills my happy cups? ”
“Your happy cups.” He cleared his throat before giving his head a shake. “Please kill me if I ever use that expression.”
“Gladly. But you see what I mean, right?”
“I mean, yeah, but I think most people just like a certain color.”
“What’s your favorite color?”
“Why do you make me feel like a clown for liking red?” He set his chin on his hand and said, “Who hurt you at Crayola?”
I laughed, but then noticed that the woman at the table behind Connor had her phone pointed at us and was filming.
And I was immediately back to being too stressed to enjoy myself.
Suddenly, I couldn’t relax because I could feel everyone staring at me.
The Carl Incident—my brother Matty’s label for the whole debacle—had left me absolutely paranoid, all the time. Too many instances I’d assumed a smiling stranger on the sidewalk was just being polite, and then later I’d see they’d posted a snarky comment with a sneaky photo they’d snapped.
Football Karen looking ROUGH AF tonight.
So on any given day, anytime someone looked at me for more than a half second, I assumed they were up to no good.
And tonight—tonight I wasn’t paranoid; tonight the entire place was literally watching me.
Which now made it impossible to focus on the date itself.
With each bite after that, I worried I was chewing weird.
Every time I smiled, I was concerned there was something in my teeth that would be captured with a hidden camera.
And when I accidentally set my wineglass on my knife and it tipped over, causing the fancy waiters to rush over and clean it up, I wanted to die of mortification.
To make matters worse, Connor was so nice.
To me, but also to his fans.
When a middle-aged man came over and asked if he could get a picture with Connor, my date was incredibly sweet about it. After asking me if I minded, he excused himself and went over to their table, smiling and chatting while restaurant employees took photos.
Damn, he looks nice in a sweater.
He was wearing a cashmere sweater and the kind of perfectly tailored pants that screamed money, and he was flawless. He could’ve been on a magazine cover with the way he looked right now.
I watched him charm the diners, which, of course, led to more customers approaching him, and suddenly Connor was working the room, being the nicest guy on the planet to everyone in the restaurant.
But instead of this distraction giving me a quiet moment outside of the spotlight, where I was able to let my guard down, it was somehow worse.
Because everyone who wasn’t watching him appeared to be looking at—and discussing—his date, who was sitting awkwardly by herself.
I wanted to hide out in the bathroom, but I didn’t have the courage to walk across the room, knowing so many eyes were on me. I wanted to disappear so badly, but that thought served only to remind me that there might still be people waiting outside to snap photos.
God, I couldn’t wait to be home.
“I am so sorry about that,” Connor said when he finally returned to the table, and I could tell he meant it, that he hadn’t intended for it to get so crazy.
“It’s fine,” I said, working up my best smile. “Gotta give the people what they want.”
When we finally left, I could feel every person in the restaurant still watching us, and the second Connor held open the door and we stepped outside, the cameras were back.
Fantastic.
Someone yelled my name and like the clueless nobody that I was, I said, “Yeah?”
The second I said it, I realized it’d been a photographer, but it was second nature to respond to your own name, right?
“How was your dinner?” the guy said.
“Is this the hard launch?” said another guy. “Are Connor and Duffy official now?”
I glanced at Connor, and he was stepping forward and opening his mouth to answer for me, clearly showing that he didn’t want me to feel pressured to speak.
And for some reason, it made me want to beat him to it.
To reassure him—and myself—that I could do this.
I said, “Dinner was good, no one’s launching anything, and Connor and I are officially done with our first date.”
“Is there going to be a second?” someone else asked.
“Hopefully,” Connor said at the same moment I replied, “Probably not.”
He raised an eyebrow and gave me a half smile. “Probably not?”
“I mean, I don’t think either of us saw fireworks in the restaurant,” I teased, unable to hold back a smile. “Did you?”
“I would’ve set the damn dessert on fire if I knew you were looking for fireworks,” he said with a huge grin.
“And I would’ve set you on fire if you’d torched my chocolate cake,” I said, grinning back.
I heard a couple laughs, which was a relief, and then Connor grabbed my hand and started leading me down the long sidewalk toward his car, which the valet had already pulled up.
I tried to keep a normal pace on the steep decline, acting like walking downhill in heels was easy and not something that should be an Olympic sport.
“Shit,” I muttered when my heel got stuck in a sidewalk crack and I stumbled.
He calmly stopped and looked down at me, his fingers squeezing tightly around mine, those digits seemingly strong enough to prevent a grown woman from falling simply by flexing.
“Uh-oh,” he said.
I looked down and couldn’t believe it. “Uh-oh, indeed.”
My heel was broken. The freaking heel had literally broken off. I knew there were probably pictures being taken at that very second of the girl who couldn’t afford quality shoes.
I leaned down to grab it—although what the hell was I going to ever do with that stupid heel—but Connor beat me to it.
He snatched up the dead heel and said, “Get on.”
“What?”
He pointed a thumb over his shoulder. “Piggyback. Way better than having to limp all the way to the car.”
I normally would’ve argued, but suddenly I just wanted out of there—now. So when he turned his body, I hopped onto his back.
Strong hands grasped my legs and he immediately started hauling me toward his car, and I giggled despite the embarrassing nightmare because this was just so absurd.
People were photographing me being carried to Connor Cunningham’s car.
On his back.
Absurd.
It was probably easy for someone like Connor to be used to the attention, since he was confident and not socially awkward, but I couldn’t wait for it to end.
He set me down beside his car and then finally—finally—we were out of there.
As he pulled up to a red light a few blocks later, he asked, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied with a big smile.
“I know it can be a little intense, being the center of attention.”
“Yeah, it was definitely that,” I said casually, like it’d been no big deal.
“You handled it well, though,” he said, grinning. “You’re a natural.”
“Bullshit,” I said with a laugh. “I’m pretty sure I was in a full body sweat and all bug-eyed. Just wait until you see a picture from tonight; guarantee I look like a ghoul.”
“I love ghouls,” he teased.
“Yeah, I’m sure. How do you deal with that all the time?” I asked, genuinely curious.
“I’m kind of getting used to it, but sometimes when I walk into a place like that, my brain starts serving up all the things I could do to completely destroy everything.”
“Please explain,” I said, turning a little in my seat, intrigued.
“Like…kissing a cameraman on the forehead, jumping on top of a table and tap-dancing, proposing marriage to the old woman at the table next to us; the possibilities are truly endless.”
“Okay, I wish you would’ve told me that before we went because that could’ve made things a lot less stressful,” I said with a laugh. “I knew I should’ve proposed to the old lady.”
That made him laugh and God, I really liked his laugh. He had one of those wide-open, throw-your-head-back laughs, like he was soaking in every bit of happiness out of that particular moment.
He drummed his thumb on the steering wheel, his eyes slightly narrowed in thought, and then he said, “Listen. It’s still pretty early and I know that was a lot, but do you want to go home already?”