Last Night Was Fun

Chapter 1

Emmy Jameson once heard a statistic that someone, somewhere gave out a fake phone number every twenty minutes. At the time

she’d heard it, she’d found it both sad and a useful addition to her list of reasons for not dating because surely and statistically,

she would end up on the receiving or giving end of one of those fake numbers eventually. And that was simply too tragic to

aspire to. But as she sat tangled in a blanket on her couch spooning cereal one Saturday morning, she received a text that

made her wonder if her time had finally come despite abstaining from the dating race.

Hey. Last night was fun ?

She squinted at the message from an unknown number. Her first instinct was it was her upstairs neighbor Tom messing with her

given the local area code and the fact they’d had a brief and unfun interaction the night before. How he would have gotten her number, she didn’t know. Nor did she know why she was fated to

live below a crotchety old man with a mean cat that had a habit of parkouring down onto her balcony just to lick its butt

when every single woman her age in a book or movie by law shared buildings with brooding, interesting men who looked good

leaning in doorjambs. Alas, the only brooding person in her Little Italy complex was the teenaged daughter in apartment 108

Emmy sometimes passed in the lobby, who she feared might melt her with all the angst shooting from her coal-rimmed eyes like

lasers.

The chance Tom had texted her was slim, but so too was the chance he’d ever call maintenance and get his leaking sink fixed and stop her ceiling from dripping—the very thing they’d argued about the night before—so she figured responding to the text with a reminder in the event it was him wouldn’t hurt.

Listen, Tom. I don’t know what passes for fun up there on the third floor, but those of us on 2 don’t consider skating around

the kitchen with bath towels for shoes a great way to spend a Friday night. PLEASE call maintenance about the sink.

She hit send and dropped her phone on the cushion beside her. If Tom had the nerve to respond at all, he’d write back a treatise

on all her shortcomings as a neighbor. As such, she had time to wait for a response and returned her attention to the Bake Off marathon she was watching in light of her terrible cramps.

Her uterus was a real cranky bitch sometimes, and Emmy didn’t feel the behavior should be rewarded with a morning at the farmers’

market tasting cheeses and picking out flowers. She wasn’t even feeling up for getting ahead on work as she was wont to do

on Saturday mornings. So instead, she was on the couch under a pile of blankets watching mild-mannered contestants do their

best with soufflé.

Her phone pinged from beside her, and she saw another message from the same number.

Umm... Who’s Tom?

Emmy frowned and lifted it to tap out a response with one thumb. She had to hit delete several times and watch the blinking

cursor eat her errors before she revised and hit send.

Is this not Tom from 304?

No.

A pause long enough to pique her curiosity passed before the typing dots reappeared.

This is the guy from the bar last night.

With a hot flash of embarrassment for them both, but mostly for him, she saw the situation for what it was. She had not been

at a bar last night; she’d been where she was now, working late on her laptop with one eye on a Real Housewives marathon—that was, until she’d had to mop up the mess in the kitchen from Tom’s sink. This guy obviously had the wrong girl.

She didn’t have any enemies who’d give out her number instead of their own just to spite her—except maybe Gabe Olson, her

archnemesis at work, the bane of her professional existence, and the last person she would ever willingly give her number to, so there was no chance he had it and could stage a prank—so she had to assume the man texting her was the victim

of being given a fake number that just so happened to be hers.

What were the odds?

She reconsidered his original message, the innocent greeting and the perky smiley face when he could have sent a dick pic

(she’d heard horror stories from her single friends on the front lines), and decided to go easy on him. If he was texting

his hookup smiley faces at 9a.m. on a Saturday, he was probably a decent guy. Maybe a young San Diego professional like her

given the crowd that went out on Friday nights and woke before noon on Saturdays.

I think someone gave you the wrong number last night.

The dots disappeared for long enough that Emmy assumed he’d left the chat to hurl his phone into the ocean in humiliation. Until there was another ping.

Well, this is embarrassing. Are you sure?

Emmy couldn’t help the quiet laugh that escaped her mouth. She wasn’t sure if it was pity or some inexplicable charm pulling

it from her, but it came out, nonetheless.

What did she look like? Your girl from the bar.

If he came back and said anything about her boobs or body shape or what she’d been wearing, Emmy was going to lose her faith

in men completely. Not that she had much to begin with.

Umm, about 5’8”, brunette, green eyes. Said her name was Lacey, which I’m guessing wasn’t true either.

Emmy tucked a rebellious blond curl back into place and looked down at her sweatpants as if to check if she’d grown two inches

while sitting on her couch.

Yeah, definitely not Lacey. Sorry.

Well I am mortified.

Don’t be. Happens every twenty minutes, so I’ve heard.

What does?

Getting fake numbered.

Is that a verb?

... asks the man in the throes of the consequences of said action right now.

Good point.

She found herself smiling at their exchange and oddly wanting to continue it. She swung her legs up onto the couch and leaned

back on a squishy pillow the color of a peacock.

Tell me about the date. Where did it go wrong?

Who says it went wrong?

The fact you’re texting with a stranger who happens to own the fake number someone made up to avoid you speaks pretty clearly

to the date’s quality.

Fair.

He went silent again. Long enough for Emmy to watch a Bake Off soufflé collapse to a restrained round of softly clucked tongues and disappointed sighs.

It wasn’t even a date, actually. We met at a bar and hung out.

Wait, you MET last night and you’re already texting this morning? What about the three-day rule?

(Emmy had only heard of this rule’s existence. She knew nothing about its application in the wild.)

Well, I thought things went pretty great, so I assumed it would be fine to text sooner.

(Aha! It did exist.)

You assumed wrong, buddy.

Clearly.

Did you kiss her?

That’s an incredibly personal question.

Hey, I’m just trying to diagnose your date’s cause of death here. I can take my services elsewhere.

What makes you such an authority on all-cause date mortality? Get fake numbered a lot?

One would have to actually date to get fake numbered.

Wait. Who am I talking to here? You’re not, like, a kid, are you?

No, perv. And how are you just now asking me that?

Honestly, it didn’t cross my mind until you mentioned your lack of love life.

His comment speared her like a cocktail umbrella through a wedge of pineapple. Her love life was certainly lacking—by choice,

thank you very much—and she hadn’t minded one bit until this strange encounter had put something that felt like tiny fluttering

wings in her belly, a symptom she would surely need to see a doctor about.

If you must know, I’m a 67-year-old grandmother in North Park with three chihuahuas and a parrot that knows all the words

to Call Me Maybe.

He responded with a crying eyes laughing emoji and then,

Wait. Are you serious?

I’ll have Cawly Rae Jepsen record you a voicemail to prove it.

That’s the best bird-band pun you could come up with?

List me three better ones. I’ll wait.

Beak-182, Bird Eye Blind, Cheep Trick.

She glared at her phone but couldn’t help smiling, not wanting to admit how impressed she was he’d come up with a response so quickly.

Okay fine. Good work.

Thank you. You’re kind of strange, Bird Girl.

I take that as a compliment.

I meant it as one ?

Well thank you. And if I’m going to be Bird Girl, then I’m saving you as Axe Murderer in my contacts. That way, the cops can

trace back to you when they find my body.

Solid plan.

Thank you, I agree.

Bird Girl?

Yeah?

I’m not going to murder you.

You certainly have a way with words. Is that what you said to Lacey last night before she fake numbered you?

She thought she could feel him cringing through her screen, and it made her bite at the smile pulling her lips.

Okay, well, I think that’s enough humiliation for one day. Thanks for the chat. If you hear news later of a man feeding himself

to the sharks because he killed two dates in under twelve hours, it was me.

Emmy laughed out loud, feeling bad for him.

I didn’t know this qualified as a date, unless you mean you are currently in someone else’s presence and ruining their experience

by spending the whole time texting me.

Indeed, I am not. I am alone at home enjoying this fortunate consequence of being fake numbered.

Heat splashed Emmy’s cheeks at the thought he was enjoying the fallout too. It was all very strange, and she had no idea who

she was really talking to—a hipster in Pacific Beach, a tech bro in Carlsbad, a pharma exec in his downtown high-rise—but

she would have been lying if she didn’t admit the whole incident had brightened her morning. She could hardly feel her cramps

anymore.

Well, fwiw, and even though this doesn’t count as a date, you didn’t kill anything here.

No?

No.

? Have a good day, Bird Girl.

Emmy grinned, and despite herself, she really did save his number in her phone under Axe Murderer. With a little smiley face

next to it.