11. A Funny Thing
11
A FUNNY THING
Gage
Talk about swinging for the fences. I can’t believe she leveled up like that.
And yet here I am, going along with it. That’s the part I can’t believe the most. I’m Mister Responsible. But right now, I’m Mister Keeping Up With This Woman. I am not going to be the weak link.
“Yup. We sure are,” I say, reaching for her hand and squeezing it. Sending a message too. What the hell ?
She simply squeezes back and shoots me an adoring look. So that’s how she’s playing it. Over the top in love. All right then.
“Wonderful,” Felix says, beaming. “When’s the wedding?”
I scratch my jaw, stalling, since we don’t even have time to devise a single answer to any relationship question. Like…how did we meet?
Oh, the usual way. She accidentally sent an eight-inch dildo to me.
But Elodie jumps right in. “We’re still working on picking a wedding date,” she says, breezily. “Partly because we can’t decide on a venue. Part of me wants to get married in the Conservatory of Flowers, but that’s best during the end of summer. We were considering someplace in the Presidio because of the views. But there’s also City Hall. The rotunda there is simply amazing. But so is Shakespeare Garden in Golden Gate Park.”
What. The. Hell. She’s rattling off dream venues for our fictional wedding?
“You can’t go wrong with any of those,” Felix says, then shrugs playfully and gestures around…indicating the hotel. “But The Escape is lovely too.”
Elodie laughs, bright and golden. “As if we could get on the schedule here. I’m sure you’re booked solid.”
I fucking hope so.
“We are. But I might know a guy.”
My brain screams. What is she doing? Keeping up with this sexy tornado isn’t for the faint of heart. I squeeze her hand harder. “But it’s nice being engaged too,” I cut in. “We’re enjoying the engagement so much, aren’t we, cupcake?”
Translation: slow the hell down .
“We sure are,” she says.
“Plus, we have kids, so we have to think about the best time for them,” I say, since it’s best to turn this fake romance into a long, long, long never-ending, will-not-see-the-light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel engagement. “Mine’s eleven. Busy with school and softball and all that.”
“And mine’s thirteen. She wants to pick my dress too. Make sure it fits right. She loves outfits of the day.”
Felix leans back in his chair, seeming utterly charmed. “A family affair. How wonderful,” he says, then glances fondly at the photos on his desk. “And where did you two meet?”
Of course he went there. It’s a normal question. And I’m taking this one. I jump on the question before my fiancée can say a word. “Funny thing,” I begin, patting her hand once again. “Elodie loves the French fries at Sticks and Stones. She would always come in and order them. And I just thought: I need to meet that woman. So I did.”
There. It’s simple and true. Probably the first true thing I’ve said in the last several minutes. And I sure hope it’s enough.
“And you asked her out that night?”
“Well, sort of,” Elodie says with a light laugh.
I clench my teeth. Seriously?
But Felix is leaning forward in his chair, enrapt as Elodie spins more fables. “He came by my shop to ask me out. You see, the real funny thing is I accidentally sent him?—”
“A new showerhead,” I supply.
She blinks. Once, twice. Then smiles widely. “Yes. A showerhead and a book of love poems.”
Fuuuuck. She was going to say book not battery-operated-boyfriend. She’s smoother than I am. “And he returned the book of love poems to my shop,” she adds.
“I did. The showerhead too,” I say tightly, white-knuckling my way through this. So much for keeping up with Elodie. She’s way ahead of me, and I’m not sure I can ever match her pace.
Felix chuckles. “That is one of the best how-we-met stories I’ve ever heard. Perfect marketing, too, for Special Edition.”
Ohhh .
That was the method to her madness.
She’s genius.
“Huh,” Elodie says, like she just realized that. The woman can act. “I hadn’t thought of it that way, but you’re probably right.”
“It was kismet you stopped by the other night,” Felix says, then taps his desk and rises. “I have a few more candidates coming by later today, but unless someone wows me, you’re the front-runners.” I want to both punch the sky and curse the moon. “I’ll need to move on this right away. Holidays and all.”
“Right, of course,” I say.
No worries. You won’t see us again. Because this is not what I signed up for.
“If the timing works out, we should do a photo shoot of the two of you,” he says as he comes around the desk. “Put pictures on the hotel’s social media.”
“That would be great,” Elodie says, all cheery and bright, like her dress. Her totally delicious-looking outfit that’s not helping me stay mad at her, but I am mad at her. But I’m mad at me, too, for not having a better handle on the situation.
Felix shows us out and says goodbye in the lobby. The two of us remain tight-lipped on the way through the courtyard, then down the steps. Finally, when we’re walking along the block, a safe distance away, I hiss, “We need to talk.”
“I know,” she retorts, in a tone laced with vinegar.
She’s mad at me? That only ticks me off more.
We march out to the square in the center of Hayes Valley, where a man with a mustache rides a unicycle while moms and dads with toddlers drop bills into his hat. Nearby, a violinist tunes her instrument. Elodie gazes briefly at the buskers, then dips her hand into her pocket and tosses some bills for each. Once done, she turns to me, I’m waiting written in those blue eyes.
Shaking my head, I grasp her hand. “Not here.”
I tug her across the street, dragging her behind a food truck making Cuban sandwiches and playing a tune in Spanish. I cross my arms. “Talk. Why did you just up the ante like that? He might have rented to us because he thought we were together. Then you went and told him we were getting married. And you listed all those locations. What the hell?”
“Because you said we were committed,” she fires back, taking no shit.
“I was feeling you out,” I say, just as fast, just as furious. Doesn’t she get it?
Her eyes pop open wider, and she stares at me like I’ve lost it. “In a meeting? You were feeling me out in a meeting?”
“I was trying to read you like a pitcher reads a catcher.”
She scoffs, her brow creasing. “It’s not a baseball game. We don’t have signs. It’s a business negotiation. How could I possibly have known when you said who wouldn’t be committed that you meant you were feeling me out?”
But I’m not letting this go. I’m pissed for reasons I don’t even fully understand. “How would I think you’d jump ten steps ahead to tell him about the Conservatory of Flowers? The rotunda? He’s practically offered us space here to get hitched,” I say, gesturing wildly to the hotel in the distance, frustration rising high inside me. I stab my chest. “I’ve been married. I don’t need to do that again.”
She freezes. Then takes a beat, probably to process the truth bomb I just dropped. One I didn’t expect to blurt out. “Noted,” she says evenly, but in a way that’s clear I’ve hurt her.
Shit. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
She holds up both hands, shaking her head. “I get it.”
“I don’t have anything against marriage. I just…I don’t?—”
“It’s fine. You don’t need to explain yourself.”
But I do. Because now I do understand why I was angry at first. She’d hit a sore spot back there.
That’s all. “Eliza’s mom died when Eliza was one,” I say, heavily. “We’d been married for a year and a half. It was…hard.”
Her face softens, sympathy flooding her eyes. “Oh, Gage. I’m so sorry. For you and for your little girl and her mom.”
There’s so much more to the story though, but now’s not the time to tell her my marriage to Hailey was already on the rocks. Hell, it started on the rocks. I asked her to marry me when I learned she was pregnant. A few days later, we walked out of city hall as Mr. and Mrs. But that’s not the hard part. Yes, our marriage was tough. I’m not sure we were ever really right for each other. The real hard part is how it ended, and it’s pretty much never the time to tell anyone that terrible tale.
I drag a hand over my stubble, trying to reset my mind, my heart, the whole damn morning. “Anyway, my point is that I was just trying to figure out how to handle it with Felix. Maybe play along with him without promising him anything,” I say, and perhaps I’m grasping at straws, but they’re all I can find to hold on to.
“Just string him along?” she asks gently.
“Maybe,” I mutter, but for a guy who prides himself on being responsible that was pretty irresponsible. “I was hoping he’d just think we were together. And we wouldn’t have to…lie then.”
“Is that what you were trying to do? Just string him along and let him think we’re life partners?”
When she puts it like that it sounds pretty stupid. But, yeah. “I guess I thought we’d just sort of roll with it without ever actually having to say it or having to lie,” I grumble.
“Like we’re sort of engaged?”
I shrug, feeling foolish but digging my heels in. “Maybe.”
“Sure. We’re half engaged. It happens all the time. Actually there’s this new trend. It’s called partial engagement,” she says lightly, teasing me now. “If it works out really well, you open it up to mostly engaged. Only then do you decide you want to be all-the-way engaged. And if neither of those work out you just change your status to otherwise engaged.”
I meet her blue eyes, glad they’re playful again because I’ve run out of steam. “Fine. Point taken. The reality is I thought I could kind of have it all. To say we’re engaged without lying about it—that’s what I meant. I don’t want to lie.”
“I understand and I’m sorry, Gage,” she says with genuine remorse. “I was reading you too, and I must have read you wrong. I thought you wanted me to go along with it, so I went all in.”
I bark out a laugh. “You sure did. And that story, woman? About how we met?” I whistle in admiration.
“Hey, it was better than the showerhead!”
“I know! Love poems? Damn. I should have sent you love poems. Fictional Me is going to have a word with Real Me about doing better.”
She smiles softly. “I think taking care of my Lyft was better than love poems.”
I smile now too. “I was happy to help Friday night. And I’m glad Amanda was all good. And listen, I get that you were trying to help. But we clearly took it too far.” One more glance at the hotel across the street, then I shrug like I’m letting it go.
Her gaze drifts down to her big ring. “Funny thing. I picked this up at my friend Rachel’s jewelry shop when she first opened it a year or so ago. Bought it as a show of support for a friend. I suppose it does look a little like an engagement ring.” She shrugs, with a rueful smile. “But I guess Special Edition’s not in the cards.” She frowns. “None of this with us is.”
I sigh, wishing she weren’t so damn right. Every step of the way we were thwarted. “Neither dating nor business?”
“Seems that way.”
She’s resigned, and I suppose I am too. I still don’t have time for a relationship, and while it’d have been fun to date before, now things are…almost awkward between us. “It was fun while it lasted. Like…a tornado.”
She tilts her head, studying me skeptically. “Tornados are fun?”
“The tornado of you,” I say.
She smiles, then drops a chaste kiss to my cheek. “Bye, Gage.”
“Bye, Elodie.”
As she walks away, I can’t entirely believe we went from the greatest date ever to…nothing.
Well, more than nothing.
We went to a fantastic business idea that won’t see the light of day.
I watch the tornado retreat then go on my way.