Chapter 3
Chapter Three
ELENA
The second I step onto the sidewalk outside the gym, my phone buzzes.
DATE GUY: Hey, sorry… something came up. Rain check?
I stare at the screen.
Something came up?
On a Tuesday night?
At eight p.m.?
What came up? A meteor?
I sigh and text back a polite, “Sure, no problem,” because I'm mature, stable, emotionally regulated, etc.
But inside?
I am already pre-exhausted by the modern dating landscape.
I call Harper before I even reach the subway entrance.
“Tell me everything,” she says.
“He canceled.”
“What? Girl, that’s the universe telling you you’re meant for someone hotter.”
I snort. “He was cute.”
“Eh. Did he have abs like your trainer?”
“Harper!”
“I’m just saying the quiet part out loud. Now get home and get on the apps. We’re fishing tonight.”
By the time I change into sweats and heat up leftover pasta, Harper is FaceTiming me with a glass of wine the size of a toddler.
“So,” she says, “show me the new prospects.”
I flop onto the couch. “This is sad.”
“This is self-care.”
“That’s a stretch.”
She grins. “Stretching is good for you. Swipe.”
So I do.
Swipe.
Swipe.
Immediate left.
A maybe.
A “God no.”
A forehead-only picture.
A man holding a fish. Always a fish.
“Why does every guy think posing with salmon proves masculinity?” I mutter.
“Because men are weird,” Harper says. “Keep going.”
I swipe right on a guy named Mark, thirty-four, looks normal, possibly owns a vacuum. Within minutes, he messages:
Mark: Drink Thursday?
I blink and describe him to Harper.
Thursday…
That’s after my next session.
“Say yes,” Harper insists. “You need practice.”
“Yes?” I type back.
Mark: 8 PM?
I tell Harper. She claps like I just passed the bar exam.
“Perfect. You’ll already be hot and extra glowy from your workout.”
“Wow.”
“Own it. Now let’s talk about the real issue at hand.”
I pause, mid-forkful. “What real issue?”
She arches an eyebrow. “You know exactly what real issue.”
I do.
I really, really do.
Because the moment I walked into my apartment, I typed his name into Google.
Colt Evans.
And now I’m staring at my laptop—the screen paused on a YouTube thumbnail of an even younger, sweatier, helmeted version of the man who adjusted my hip with two fingers today and nearly made me see God.
“I shouldn’t,” I whisper.
“You should,” Harper counters.
“I’m not going to.”
“You already pulled up the video, didn’t you?”
I cover my face. She, apparently, googled Colt Evans as well. “Yes.”
“Play it.”
“No.”
“PLAY. IT.”
Fine.
I click it and the video loads.
There’s crowd noise and bright stadium lights.
Not to mention Colt in a navy-and-white uniform, number 14, running a perfect slant route. He’s fast. Ridiculously fast. The kind of fast that looks like the world is in slow motion and he’s the only one who didn’t get the memo.
The announcer says his name as a pass lifts in the air, and he catches the ball with this beautiful, effortless grace that makes my breath catch.
Damn.
“So he wasn’t just a football player,” Harper says. “He was, like, a player. On a pro team.”
I swallow. “He looks…young.”
“Hot.”
“That too.”
I click another video.
A highlight reel.
Him smiling in an interview.
Him signing footballs.
Him hugging teammates.
Then Colt landing weird on his knee.
I wince. “Ouch.”
Harper goes quieter. “That the injury?”
“Looks like it.”
Colt’s face on the screen twists in pain, then determination, then agony again as he’s helped off the field. I have a sudden, sharp urge to reach through the screen, pull that version of him off the turf, and tell him he’ll be okay.
Completely normal reaction.
Totally stable.
Not at all stalker behavior.
“Oh my God,” I say, slamming the laptop closed. “I need to be arrested.”
“You’re online browsing his résumé,” Harper says. “Not hacking the Pentagon. This is normal dating research.”
“It feels illegal.”
“Everything feels illegal to you.”
“Harper, I Googled my trainer.”
“And? You Googled your dentist once too.”
“That was different.”
“He had nice forearms. Same thing.”
“Oh my God.”
Harper smiles softly. “Look. He’s cute. You’re single. You’re allowed to wonder.”
“I can’t do anything about it.”
“I didn’t say do anything. I said wonder.”
I groan, dramatically flinging myself backward onto the couch. “I’m done for the night. No more decisions. My brain is soup.”
“Wine and reality TV?”
“Wine and reality TV.”
“If you see a guy on the show with abs like your trainer, don’t cry.”
“Goodnight, Harper.”
I pour myself a generous glass of Merlot, grab the remote, and put on the trashiest dating reality show Netflix has to offer—Love Mansion, Season 14, where twenty adults in bikinis pretend to be surprised they’re all horny.
Halfway through the first episode, I’m giggling at the contestants’ confessional interviews.
“Oh my God,” I mumble into my blanket. “I need a life.”
Onscreen, a muscular guy named Chase says he’s ready for “a woman who can handle a real man.”
I make a face. “Absolutely not.”
My mind—traitorous—supplies an image of Colt saying something like that.
Except he wouldn’t say it like that.
He’d say it in that quiet, confident tone he uses when he corrects my form.
My stomach does an embarrassing little flip.
“Stop it,” I mutter at myself. “Stop thinking about him. You have a date on Thursday.”
A date.
After my session.
After seeing Colt again.
After hearing that low voice say my name again.
After watching him adjust my posture again.
I take a large sip of wine.
“This is fine,” I whisper into my glass. “This is all fine.”
But as I settle deeper into my couch, as reality TV blares and wine warms my veins…
All I can think about is how excited I am to see him again.
Two days.
Just two days.
I set the wine down and stare at my reflection in the black TV screen during a commercial break.
My braid is messy.
My lips are smudged, and my sweatshirt is gigantic.
But underneath that?
There’s still a woman who used to turn heads. Still does, on occasion.
There’s still a woman men used to flirt with at bars before she got swallowed alive by corporate life and a long relationship that featured mediocre sex and, lately, terrible dates.
I heave a heavy sigh.
“Okay,” I say out loud. “Enough.”
I get up too fast and wobble slightly, catching myself on the arm of the sofa.
“I am going to wear something hot.”
Harper would be proud.
Harper would also be screaming at me.
Maybe she’ll do both.
I stumble into my bedroom, wine buzz making the room feel warmer than usual, and yank open my leggings drawer like I’m trying to rescue someone trapped inside.
Most of it is boring: black-black-black, navy, these weird gray ones I bought on sale and hated immediately.
But then, way at the back…
There it is.
My special workout set.
The one I bought three years ago, back when I felt confident enough to wear it.
A matching deep forest-green sports bra and high-waisted leggings, made of buttery compression fabric that hugs every curve.
The bra has a longline cut that hits exactly at the narrowest part of my waist.
The leggings sculpt my hips and butt in a way that feels borderline criminal.
I run my fingers over it.
It’s the outfit I wore to a yoga retreat in Tulum, where three different people complimented me before breakfast.
It’s the outfit I stopped wearing because…honestly?
I stopped feeling like the woman who belonged in it.
But tonight?
Tonight, with wine-soft bravery and a head full of Colt Evans adjusting my posture with those hands?
I pull the set out and hold it up to the light.
“Oh my God,” I whisper. “I’m really going to do this.”
Thursday.
5:30 PM.
This outfit.
This body.
Me.
I toss it reverently onto the foot of the bed, like it’s made of gold.
For the first time in months… maybe years… I feel something fizzy and hopeful and reckless in my chest.
Confidence? Maybe.
Reckless? Probably.
I slide back under my blanket on the couch, wine glass in hand, flipping the reality show back on.
But this time, when the contestants strut around in swimwear, I don’t feel invisible.
I feel…strangely ready.
A little tipsy, a little dangerous, a little alive.
And all I can think is:
Thursday, he’s going to see me.
And I’m going to flirt. Shamelessly.
I take another sip.
“Just two days,” I murmur.
And for the first time…two days feels too long.
Why is my heart hammering like a little school girl?