Chapter Six
As soon as his back is against the door, Scott breaks down and calls Jason.
“As much as I am reluctant to indulge you in any way”—he’s whispering so as not to be heard over the rushing of the shower—“I need advice.”
He hears Jason shout “Babe, it’s happening” and then high-five someone, presumably Emily, before returning to the microphone.
“I knew sooner or later you’d come around to recognize the value of my wisdom. What’s up, man?”
“You were right about 3B,” Scott says, stripping off one sock and then the other. He already feels bad about wasting water, so he’s trying to multitask.
“Sabertooth?” Jason sounds delighted.
And god, Scott really wishes he’d called Beth instead.
“No.” He shoves down his scrub pants one handed. “Remember the comedian we saw last week? Piper Sadler. It turns out she’s my next-door neighbor. The one I’ve been texting.”
“Wait. Wasn’t she at the ER a few days ago?”
“Yeah.” Scott drops his boxer briefs. “She was my last patient on Tuesday. She’s okay. Workplace laceration. Five stitches. Healing well, from what I can observe.”
He puts the phone on the sink for a second, whipping off his shirt as fast as he can.
Unfortunately this doesn’t substantially mute Jason saying, “Damn, I guess asking Santa to bring you a girlfriend was, contrary to your protests, pretty cool of me.”
Scott pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s now naked and cold, standing on Piper’s fuzzy peppermint-stick-shaped bath mat.
He explains his current situation in a rush. Getting locked out. Finding out that Piper has been 3B this whole time. Her inviting him in.
And lands on, “So, how do I tell her that I like her without making it weird?”
“Hmmmm. That’s a tricky one. Because, yeah, it seems like she’s probably into you based on the plant care and the exchange of horny glances—”
“I never said anything about horny—”
Jason snaps his fingers. “I’ve got it.”
Scott rolls his eyes. “Okay. Tell me.”
“Use the power of Christmas.”
Scott takes a bracing breath. In through his nose and out through his mouth.
“Dude, what?”
Jason issues a dramatic sigh, like he’s the reasonable one in this relationship.
“Mistletoe, my man.”
And oh, that’s actually a somewhat coherent idea. Too bad it occurred to Scott about ten minutes after he entered Piper’s winter-wonderland-decked-out apartment.
It would have been perfect. He could have found a way to stand under it and see if she approached, if she leaned in. Alas.
“She doesn’t have any. At least, not in any of the public areas of the apartment that I’ve been exposed to.”
To be honest, Scott wasn’t even sure they sold mistletoe anymore, now that the general public had started to realize it was poisonous.
“Okay, well, just find something similar.”
“There’s nothing similar.”
“What about . . .”
Scott swears he can hear Jason thinking.
“A missile toy! Does she have a toy missile that you can hold over your head?”
Scott hangs up the phone and climbs into the shower.
The problem, he thinks as he massages Piper’s lavender scented shampoo into his scalp, is he really can’t afford to be wrong about this.
He doesn’t want to make Piper uncomfortable if it turns out that she doesn’t feel the same way he does, especially not right before he’s supposed to sleep on her couch.
But if she’s not into it, he’ll just leave. He was planning to go to his parents’ tomorrow anyway. There won’t be a bed for him tonight, but at this point in his residency he can sleep basically anywhere.
If he’s totally honest, he’s more scared that she’ll say yes than he is that she’ll say no.
Scott hasn’t dated anyone seriously since Cheryl in med school. He’s been so focused on becoming a good doctor, he’s pushed everything else in his life to the back burner.
He takes it for granted, coming back to work in the same familiar town where he grew up, that the people he cares about will wait in the wings for him to get a little more settled, a little more secure.
Part of him—the part that’s cocky and prone to compartmentalizing—whispers he could make the same gamble with Piper.
In the hopes that one day he’ll wake up and feel ready. Trust himself enough to make another person a priority. To not feel intimidated by how funny she is, how beautiful. How unflinchingly determined she is to be comfortable with herself.
He could risk this. The way he feels when he’s with her. Inspired, hungry, so goddamn nervous.
He still has a choice, now, before the actual words are out there between them.
He could wait. Take the chance, however slim the odds, that someday he’ll feel more confident. That someday, he’ll know. And she’ll still be there, next door. Waiting for him.
The rest of Scott, the parts that are vital, thinks about Piper the first time he saw her, sitting on the curb, breathing through her fear. The way her curly hair caught in the wind. The cold-induced crimson in her cheeks.
And knows, without question, that if he doesn’t try to be brave in this moment, he doesn’t deserve her.
Piper, I’d like to take you on a date.
Piper, I think you’re amazing.
Piper, I know we just met, but I’ve never felt this way before.
“Fuck,” Scott says into the spray of the shower.
The sentiment is all true, but the expression? Everything sounds so cheesy. Like the words have been worn thin from overuse by every other sap who’s found themselves with a crush on Christmas.
This is so nerve racking. Not least of all because she’s a writer. And he knows she’s great with words. Scott has always struggled with them, sitting with sentences so long before he says them that more often than not, he opts to keep his mouth shut.
Jason’s voice in his head suggests writing her a prescription for love, and Scott has to shove it violently away.
Maybe a little schmaltz could be forgiven this time of year?
He could send her a Christmas card.
Confess his feelings to the tune of “Jingle Bells” or “Silent Night.”
He’s in the middle of debating the pros and cons of trying to pipe “May I buy you some Chinese food?” onto a sugar cookie when he turns around and sees the spider.