249 Days
On date number five, Rhea and Danny went to LACMA.
One week earlier, on date number four, while hovering over bowls of steaming ramen, they’d discovered they both had an appreciation for art, and they watched the same art history show on the BBC.
It was an obscure program in America, and the fact that they both happened to watch it created yet another moment of smug rejoicing in how much they had in common.
It was in these smug moments that Rhea felt such solid certainty she had made the right choice; she and Danny were made for each other.
She knew from every interaction that they were supposed to be together for the rest of their lives, and she would have known this even if she had not met him on a golf course or run into him randomly at a soulmate retreat.
They walked around LACMA hand in hand. Holding Danny’s hand felt homey, as if they were made to fit together. And every time they touched, no matter how innocently, she felt heat rise in her body. Since they had not yet gone past first base, there was an underlying longing in their clasped fingers.
Rhea always waited at least one month before having sex with a new partner, and although technically they’d started dating over a month ago, they had taken a break before Esalen, so she’d decided to restart the clock.
Abstaining was becoming quite challenging, so she had to really focus on distracting herself when she was around him.
They wandered through exhibits, each pointing at whatever painting grabbed them the most. They were playing a game and had to pick their favorite before reading the label next to the piece.
They were continuously surprised to discover that the majority of the paintings they pointed to turned out to be works by famous artists.
Thus proving the most famous artists were indeed the most talented, or, Rhea argued, they were just so used to seeing the famous works throughout their lives, they had been subconsciously trained to prefer those techniques over the less famous ones.
Or, Danny argued, they unfortunately had very basic tastes that matched the rest of the general populace.
It was fun little games like this that distracted her from dragging him inside the darkly lit Zheng Chongbin video installation and ravishing his body.
When they were sitting outside at the LACMA café, sipping cappuccinos, Danny casually floated the idea of taking a trip to France to see Impressionist art.
The thought of taking a European vacation with Danny made Rhea feel like she was living inside an Impressionist painting; a soft-edged, pastel-colored image of the two of them walking along the Seine floated through her head.
She had been to Paris once, when she was twenty-nine, with the boyfriend du jour.
She mostly went for the fashion, which was breathtaking, but the romantic portion of the trip was unmemorable.
With Danny, however, she knew every moment would be perfect.
She saw him unzipping a suitcase and hanging his clothes next to hers in a Parisian closet.
She saw him lying next to her in a Parisian bed, and her cheeks flushed.
Around Danny, she was a teenage boy; her thoughts always circled back to sex.
After date number three, he’d put her paddleboard in her shed and walked her to her door.
They made out on her front porch. She unlocked her door and looked back at him suggestively, waiting for him to join.
He stepped inside and pulled her close, kissing her neck, her face, her lips.
He picked her up and put her down on the couch, and just as he was moving on top of her, she said, “Wait! Sorry, I don’t mean to be a weirdo, but I need more time. ”
“I totally get it.”
They sat next to each other and talked for several hours.
After date number four, he walked her to her door, and they made out on her porch again. She abruptly pulled away from him, breathing heavily, and said, “I have to be inside—I mean, go! I have to go inside—good night—thank you for ramen—”
She shut the door, leaned against it, slid down to the floor, and curled into the fetal position. Abstaining from having sex too soon had never been quite this brutal.
From her ball on the floor, she pulled out her phone and sent a text: Just to be clear. I wanted you to come inside. I just don’t trust myself around you and horizontal furniture
Danny: I promise that won’t happen until you are ready. No matter how perfectly horizontal the furniture might be
Rhea: Are you still here?
Danny: Yes
Rhea: Do you wanna come inside?
Danny: If you’re comfortable with that
Rhea opened the door as Danny was walking back up her fifty-two steps, and they immediately started making out again.
They moved together into her room and fell onto her bed, kissing with the passion of abstinent high schoolers.
All of Danny pressed against her body made her dizzy and weak.
She reached down and started to unbutton his pants.
He took hold of her hands and pressed them against the bed, pinning her down.
He whispered close to her ear, “I can’t let you do that. I just made you a promise.”
“But what if I just realized…I am ready?”
“Hmm…I think all this horizontal furniture is messing with your head.”
He kissed her hard and pressed his hands into her wrists. She felt like she was tied up in a gentle version of S they had technically been dating for three months, if she counted Zoe’s baby shower as their first date, and why shouldn’t she?
They were her arbitrary, made-up rules. What was she so afraid of?
She’d developed the one-month rule to weed out bad men, but she’d known from date one that Danny Beckett was not a bad man.
He had continuously proven himself to be the best man she had ever met, so what was holding her back?
Rhea noticed a hummingbird flitting in a lavender bush; her mother was also wondering what was holding her back.
As Danny continued talking about a possible trip to Paris, Rhea realized how much she was genuinely enjoying this child-free existence—planning romantic vacations, strolling through museums, and savoring bowls of ramen in crowded, kid-unfriendly restaurants.
She was looking ahead at a very different future than the one she had imagined, but different did not have to be bad.
An answer to the question of how their fifth date would end soon arrived in the form of a text from Ada: Ree Kee! Zoe’s baby girl has arrived! At Trinity. Tiny just got there. We’re heading there now
Rhea stood up suddenly and explained, “Oh, Zoe just had her baby—at Trinity—I should…do you mind taking me there?”
Danny paid for their cappuccinos and drove Rhea across town.
She wanted Danny to come up and meet her friends, but the maternity ward felt like an intense location to introduce everyone.
So, she kissed him goodbye, thanked him for a perfect date, and headed into the hospital alone.
However, unlike many maternity ward visits in the past, Rhea did not feel alone.
This time, she had a boyfriend. Although they had not used that exact word yet, they were behaving like a serious couple.
Rhea stopped at the gift shop, and instead of browsing onesies and stuffed animals with grievous longing, she was honestly enjoying picking out a gift for her friend’s new baby.
Sure, she would never receive a onesie or a stuffed animal for her new baby, but she would be too busy traveling the world with Danny to care about that.
She found a onesie that made her laugh. Printed on the front: A Star Is Born at Trinity Medical Center.
She was fairly certain Zoe would love it and her husband would hate it, but she decided to let them argue over it.
She purchased the onesie and headed toward the elevator with the energy of a woman in love with her new almost boyfriend.
At a nurse’s station, under a sign that read Labor and Delivery, Rhea was given Zoe’s room number.
The friendly nurse added, “We’re technically only allowed to let three visitors in at a time, but Zoe promised you’ll all be very quiet and well-behaved.”
Rhea wondered if the rules were bendier when your name happened to be Zoe Hornbrook and there was a Hornbrook Cancer Center inside the hospital in which you gave birth, but instead of asking if the bendiness was due to blatant nepotism, Rhea said, “I will personally ensure everyone follows those rules.”
Rhea stood in the doorway of a bright room with large windows; there were at least fifteen people inside. Zoe was in bed but sitting up and looking almost too alert for someone who had just pushed life into the world mere hours ago.