Chapter 1 #2
It takes me by surprise. I made a snap assumption that he was a tourist, like me, but I shouldn’t have.
I know there are desi people living in Scotland.
My dad, for one, but he immigrated here from India when he was an adult.
He’s got no trace of a Scottish accent, even though he’s lived here for thirty years.
From the way this man speaks, I’m guessing he was brought up here.
“No, I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I thought you were someone else.”
He looks over his shoulder. “The seat was empty when I got here, but if you were with someone—”
“I’m not with anyone,” I say quickly.
He blinks.
“Here, I mean. Or anywhere, really.” Ugh. Maybe I am more jet-lagged than I thought.
“Right,” he says. “Okay.”
The bartender chooses the perfect moment to make a reappearance, but the mystery man starts talking before I can place an order.
“Erin!” he says warmly. “You’re doing okay, then?”
“As well as I can. Your usual piece?”
He nods, a lock of hair falling over his forehead, and it’s cute—this buttoned-up, cardigan-wearing man looking somewhat disheveled. I wonder if his hair’s as soft as it looks. What it would feel like if I ran my hands through it.
“And what would you like?”
I jump. “What?”
“To eat,” Erin says. She glances between us, her mouth raised in a slight smirk. She clearly didn’t miss my ogling.
“Uhh.” I haven’t seen a menu anywhere. “I’ll get the same as him.”
“Same drink too?”
“Sure.”
When she steps away, I find the man watching me, his forehead slightly creased.
“You don’t even know what I’m getting,” he says.
“Doesn’t matter. I’m not a picky eater.”
“Really? So, if my usual order was haggis, then—”
“I’ll be eating haggis.” I shrug. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”
He huffs out a breath at that, something bordering a noise of amusement. “So, you’re adventurous.”
“I guess?” I pause. “I mean, I think I am, but not because of this. I don’t exactly consider trying local cuisine to be all that adventurous. It’s just food.”
“Just food?” he repeats skeptically.
“Yeah. And when it comes to the more, uh, unique dishes around the world, haggis isn’t all that abnormal. The only thing I have a hard time with is insects.”
He smiles uncertainly. “Like when you see them around the house?”
“No, I mean I have a hard time eating them.”
His mouth parts, and surprise lights his eyes.
“It’s more of a mental block,” I say. “But I’ve worked through it before. Honestly, they’re not that bad once you get past the crunch.”
He shudders, and it makes me want to laugh.
“I don’t think I could do it,” he says. “I know it’s good for the environment and all. I’ve read those articles, but…eating something like that would be adventurous for me. I’ve never even had haggis.”
“What?”
He winces. “I know. Embarrassing for someone from here, but it wasn’t like haggis was something I grew up eating at home.”
“But you never wanted to try it?”
“Never. In fact, when you see what I’m having for dinner, you’ll realize just how unadventurous I am.”
“Hmm.” I look him over. My “Brains” assessment from earlier seems to have been correct. He’s a homebody, introverted, intellectual. But I still have the sense that there’s something beneath all of that. Some hidden talent or interest. I just don’t know what it is yet.
When my eyes meet his, I realize he’s watching me watch him, a slightly quizzical expression on his face.
Erin returns a moment later, setting two pint glasses filled with amber liquid in front of us. I take a cautious sip, and then a longer one once I taste it. Malt and caramel and something bright. Overall, it’s a little bitter, but not in a bad way.
“It’s good,” I tell him.
“It is,” he says. “It’s local. It’s what I always get.” His lips lift into the smallest smile. “I’d say you have good taste, but now I know about the insects.”
I laugh. “They were chocolate-covered crickets. Nothing’s that bad once you cover it in chocolate.”
He shakes his head, lifting his glass to his mouth. “I don’t believe you.”
He drinks, a long swallow, and I’m transfixed by the way the muscles in his throat constrict and flex. By the firm way he sets his glass down, and the way his lips glisten after, a perfectly formed droplet of beer hanging from the corner of his bottom lip, sparkling in the light.
I want to wipe it away with my thumb.
Or lick it.
Whoa. I try to reel my wayward thoughts back in, but then he raises his hand, rubbing the back of it against his mouth, and the movement is erotic somehow. Indecent.
Heat flares up the back of my neck.
I’d thought this stranger was attractive before but in an aesthetically pleasing sort of way. In a he’d-look-great-on-television kind of way. Not in a I want to go home with him and lick beer—and maybe other things—off of him kind of way.
Now it’s all I can think about. I wonder if they sell aerosol cans of whipped cream here, or if that’s purely an American thing.
“So, I take it you’ve been to Scotland before,” he says, breaking me out of my foggy, addled haze.
I nod. “Yes. I was born in the UK, actually. In London. Then we moved to Glasgow, but we left when I was really little. I barely remember anything from back then. But how did you—”
“You said you’d tried haggis. I just assumed that meant you’d had it here.”
“Oh, I did. I came back to Scotland when I was ten or so. Just for a short visit, and it was…kind of a dare.” I’d been sitting across the table from my father at a pub not unlike this one.
I’d ordered it off the menu, not knowing what it was, and he’d told me that I wouldn’t like it, which had only made me determined to prove him wrong.
“This is actually my first trip back since then.”
“Ahh.” He takes another sip of his beer, his eyes bright, his lips shining.
He’s practically glowing under the warm yellow light in here, and really, it’s unfair.
My clothes are still damp, my hair’s been towel-dried with a dish rag, and my bangs are limp and sticking to my forehead.
He should have some flaw to balance out the scale, but so far, I can’t find one.
“So, what’s brought you back?” he asks. He grins, a cheeky sort of look, and it somehow seems at home on his face, like it’s an expression he wears often. “Besides the haggis, I mean. What are you here for?”
I hold back a grimace. My father, with whom I have a complicated relationship, is getting remarried.
“Pleasure,” I say instead, and he lets out a choked, garbled sound. Oh, god.
“Uh, that’s not what I meant.” My face flushes.
“I was thinking along the lines of the standard reasons people travel. You know, ‘business or pleasure’? So, if I were to answer it that way, I’d be here for pleasure.
I didn’t mean that I came here seeking out pleasure specifically.
Just that I’m not here for work. I’m here for… for fun.”
He coughs again, lifting a paper napkin to his mouth. “Right,” he says, his voice low, and a little hoarse. “I understand.”
There’s nothing unkind about the way he says it, but still, it makes me want to sink into the floor.
The food finally arrives, and Erin apologizes for the wait. “We’re busier than normal,” she says, “but we’ll always make time for your off-menu special.” She winks at the man, and he rounds his shoulders, slightly sheepish when he responds with a quiet “Thank you.”
Erin asks if there’s anything else we need, and when we say no, she takes off again.
I lift the piece of white bread off my plate, take a bite, and cast a curious look at the man to my left.
“Jam and bread?” I ask.
“Yes, it’s a jeely piece.” He sighs. “Told you it was unadventurous.”