Chapter 9
Graham
“So, Francesca said you’re a writer?”
Francesca was my agent. And Cara, the woman sitting across from me at the sunny little spot I’d picked for this blind-date lunch, was delicately picking at her salad as she asked about me. A salad that wasn’t on the menu but one she’d explained in very specific detail to the waiter.
“I’d like the greens from the mixed green salad, as well as kale and spinach from these other two salads on the menu. And then, instead of chicken I’d like salmon. Three ounces, roasted. And no sauce or dressing.”
When it had come, she’d finished off her third glass of water, signaled for more, and then removed a small container of pumpkin seeds from her purse and sprinkled them on top of the salad while launching into a speech about eating enough greens and protein.
I’d responded by taking a large bite of the toast that came with my quiche, to which she’d said:
“Do you know what’s in that bread?”
“Tiny flecks of heaven?” It was delicious.
My answer had apparently given her license to school me on additives.
But the joke was on her – my ex-wife had already scolded me numerous times during our marriage for eating bread, so the information she was giving me was old news.
Also, I didn’t care. But I was smart enough not to say any of that and instead we ate in silence for a few minutes before she returned to asking what I did for a living.
“What kinds of things do you write?” Cara asked.
“Novels,” I said. “And a weekly article for the Brooklyn Tribune. Francesca is actually my literary agent. Do you enjoy reading?”
“Ugh,” she said, clearly not since she wasn’t reading the room. “No. I’m not into sitting for hours reading made-up stories.”
“Oh,” I said, wondering exactly why Fran and her wife, who were known in their circle of friends as “the matchmakers”, had thought this would be a good match.
Unless the match in question was the kind you lit and then paired with a bin full of trash, doused in gasoline. “Well… there are always audiobooks.”
But she wrinkled her nose and shook her head.
“I’m just not into this mass consumption of fiction that our society seems to be devouring.
People are absolute slaves to it. They’ve become zombies.
It’s no way to live. I prefer to be outdoors, interacting with nature, seeing new places and learning new cultures.
Do you like to hike? Do you travel much?
What do you do for exercise? How do you keep the blood flowing and the brain alive? ”
When Fran had told me Cara was a yoga instructor I’d thought, great! Yoga was a peaceful practice. She must be a gentle soul. But I’d never felt more stress around a person as I did with her. And after Nadia, that was saying something.
“I do like to hike,” I said. “Though I don’t go often. I do travel, though in the past few years it’s been mostly for work, and I’ve basically bounced from one city to the next and haven’t had much down time to explore much. As for exercise, I walk my dog Bronte every morning and lift weights.”
Again with the nose wrinkle.
“I mean,” she said. “Lifting weights is good and all, but truly, you should really consider yoga instead. It’s gentler on the body and you become more in-tune with it the longer you practice.”
“And the studies that say lifting weights is good for bone density and has numerous other health benefits?”
She waved a hand. “I’m not saying it’s bad. Just overrated. Anyways… Bronte. Is that a family name?”
I nearly spit out my gulp of Bloody Mary.
“Ah… no. She’s named after the Bronte sisters?” I posed it as a question, hoping she’d just forgotten the name of the dynamic literary sisters. But at her blank look, I knew I was mistaken.
“Mm,” she said in response, her chest rising and falling in a long sigh.
I tried to move the conversation to other subjects, but things I was interested in held no value to her, so I moved back to travel.
“So, have you gone to many exotic locations?” I asked, taking the last bite of my quiche and noticing she had finished off her salmon. Please let this be over soon.
She perked up again.
“Yes! Costa Rica, Bali, Bora Bora, the south of France, Tahiti, Belize…”
“Lots of warm areas then,” I said. “You must like a good tan.”
Her hopeful expression turned disappointed and a buzzer went off in my head. Wrong again, Mr. Forrester. You lose one hundred billion points. Turn in your dating badge and go home.
I wished I could.
“I don’t go for the tan lines, Graham,” she said, her voice bitter.
“I go for yoga retreats and the holistic experience. To connect with myself and the earth.” She peered at me.
“I really think you would benefit from the practice. You probably sit a lot for your job and your joints and tendons and muscles would thank you for it.”
She wasn’t wrong, but her holier than thou attitude, along with her disinterest in anything I liked or found fun had sealed the deal on any hope of this going any further. Now it was time to have a little fun. I mentally flexed my fingers and decided to put my storytelling skills to some use.
“The truth is,” I said. “Yoga scares me.”
“Scares you?” She gave me a confused smile.
“Yes.” I turned my eyes downward and took a long breath in before meeting her gaze again. “Yoga is what killed my mom.”
“What? Is that… that can’t be true.”
“It is. The doctor said she got so flexible that when she was walking down the stairs at her house, the muscles and tendons around her hip joint were too pliable and when the bone popped out, they couldn’t hold it in and she fell.”
The horror on her face was a delight.
“Oh my gosh. That’s terrible. I can’t— Is that really true?”
I nodded solemnly.
“I’m so sorry.”
It was hard not to laugh and I almost felt bad for lying, but I was bored and irritated and I’d just wasted valuable writing time on this woman.
“Yeah. So you can see why I haven’t wanted to practice it myself.”
As she tried to wrap her mind around it all, I signaled for the bill, downed the rest of my Bloody Mary, paid, and led the way to the door.
“Cara,” I said on the sidewalk. “It was lovely to meet you. Good luck with your practice. Maybe have your doctor check your hip flexors next time you see her or him.”
“Oh. I don’t see a medical doctor.”
“Of course you don’t,” I said, and turned and walked away.
As I headed home, I called Francesca.
“Hey buddy,” she said. “How was the date?”
“Fran, you are a brilliant agent. An incredible cook. Your taste in books and movies is impeccable.”
“Yessss?” I could hear the smile in her voice as she waited for what she probably assumed was my gratitude at being set up with her friend.
“But I will quit writing before I let you set me up on a date again. Ever.”
“What?” her wail of disbelief filled my ear. I pulled the phone away and grinned at a guy walking by with raised eyebrows.
I put the phone back to my ear. “Never again, Frannie.”
“But Cara’s lovely!”
“Fun fact, Cara is zero amounts of fun. She eats salad with no dressing, thinks fiction is a waste of time, and travels to beachy locations not to get tan lines, but to be one with the earth. Do you know me at all?”
“I mean, I knew about the salads, but I always thought she was just joking with me about not reading because of what I do.”
“She was not. In fact, I don’t even think Cara understands joking, so she couldn’t have been joking with you.”
“Damn. I owe you one. We do have this other friend—”
“Never again, Fran!”
“Fine. Next time I see you, I’ll buy you a salad with extra dressing.”
“Next time you see me, you’d better run in the opposite direction.”
It was a relief to get home. I kicked off my shoes and found Bronte waiting for me on the uncomfortable couch she wasn’t supposed to be on instead of one of her half dozen beds.
“Hey girl,” I said, sitting beside the world’s best dog. “I just had a date with someone who definitely could’ve used a little of your poo on her shoe…”
I stopped myself immediately, my mind going to where I’d been trying to keep it from going all morning.
Lior Flynn.
While the date with Cara had been awful on its own, it hadn’t helped that I’d woken to Lior’s face plastered all over social media due to her having her own date the night before. With Alex Clarke.
“Alex freaking Clarke?” I’d said to Bronte earlier, practically slamming my cup of coffee down on the table.
I’d closed the tab on my laptop in disgust and opened the document for my book.
There was no reason for me to feel any sort of way about who Lior Flynn went out with.
But Alex Clarke was a pompous prick. We’d met three years ago at a conference when his first book had come out.
Being the friendly sort of guy I was, and knowing how daunting it could be to go from writing in seclusion to being put on a stage of sorts and expected to be charming, I’d introduced myself - and regretted it immediately.
I’d never had a man look me up-and-down before, but Alex Clarke had done just that before smirking, giving me a limp handshake, and then turning and walking away.
Later, while on a panel, when he was asked what he thought about his books being compared to mine, he’d said, “Who? I don’t know his work.”
We were not friends, and seeing him with his hand on Lior’s arm made me angry for reasons I couldn’t comprehend. Why should I care who she went out with? Maybe I didn’t. Maybe it was just seeing two people together who’d been rude to me. It was infuriating. They deserved each other.
In an effort to clean the slate of the day, I boiled water for a cup of tea, ate a cookie while the tea steeped, and then sat down to work.
I was so near the end of the first draft of this book I could practically taste the victory.
Victory being a celebratory drink with Fran, as was our tradition.
And apparently now a salad with extra dressing.
After an hour my alarm went off, signaling I either set it again and keep going, or take a break. Knowing there was little in the fridge and if I didn’t shop now I never would – thus either eating cookies for dinner or getting takeout… again – I decided a break was in order.
I made a quick list, grabbed my reusable grocery bags, gave Bronte a kiss on her head, and hurried out the door, walking the few blocks to the local grocery store.
A few minutes later I was walking through the produce section when I saw her.
At first I wasn’t sure it was her – with her hair pulled back into a low ponytail, and a baseball cap pulled low over her face.
It was the pale-yellow overalls that gave her away.
I’d seen her wearing them in a couple of her photos on her social media page.
They’d stood out to me because it wasn’t something I would expect a famous fashion model to wear.
And she’d looked adorable in them.
“What are the fucking odds,” I murmured, wondering if I should duck and cover, turn and run, or act like an adult. I was still deciding when she saw me.
She stood staring at me for a moment, as if she too were determining her next move, and then grabbed a small bunch of bananas, put them in her cart, and walked the other way, disappearing around the corner.
A few minutes later I was perusing the pasta options when she turned her cart down the same aisle.
She turned her head, her chest rising and falling in a sigh.
I had that effect on women it seemed. Grabbing what she’d come down the aisle for, she tossed it in her cart and turned back the way she’d come and disappeared again.
I was suddenly angry. First my horrible blind date today and now this.
I hadn’t done anything to warrant the kind of treatment I was getting.
I was a nice guy! I was thoughtful and empathetic and some people even found me charming.
I’d done nothing wrong and had no reason to cower and hide in a damn grocery store. She should be hiding.
I turned down the next aisle with a newfound smugness.
She wasn’t there. Distracted, I forgot to grab the cereal I wanted.
I turned down the next aisle. Again no Lior to see how unbothered I was that she was at the same store.
I quickened my step, hurrying past the peanut butter on my list. Two more aisles and I’d now basically forgotten I was there to buy food and was angry at myself for wondering if she’d left.
One more aisle with no sign of her and I assumed she’d gone. Irritated with myself for having to now backtrack to grab all the things I’d passed, I spun my cart around and nearly collided with her’s.
“Shit,” I said.
“Again?” she asked, lifting her foot and looking at the bottom of her shoe. When those eyes of hers met mine again, she was pursing her lips as if trying to stop from smiling.
She was quick, I’d give her that.
“Well,” I said. “So much for my valiant efforts to avoid you.”
And so much for showing her how unbothered I was.
“I thought if I waited it out in the bakery department long enough, you’d surely be gone by now.” She glanced down at her cart. “Instead, you’re still here and I apparently have no self-control.”
I looked into her cart now too and couldn’t help myself.
I grinned at the three packages of different flavored donut holes sitting in the basket of her cart alongside one small bunch of bananas and a bag of pasta.
Seems she too might have been a little distracted.
I wanted to say something funny, but the image I’d seen of her and Alex Clarke this morning flashed in my mind and I was instantly no longer amused. My smile disappeared.
“Can we call a ceasefire while we’re here?” I asked, all business now. “I’ve missed half the things on my list and I’m starving.”
“Same,” she said, and then lifted her hand, made a finger-gun, and holstered it. With a little grin she turned and walked away while I tried and failed not to check out her ass, remembering that red thong from the picture online.
“Get it together, man,” I whispered to myself, and then headed down the aisle in search of cereal.