Fun Together, page 11
“Yeah, it’s nice having a place that’s convenient and has good coffee.” He looks out the window. He’s got a bit of sunburn on his nose, I guess from being outside helping his dad yesterday. “This is a cool neighborhood. Have you ever been to that bar across the street?”
“Yes, I love that place. It’s very cozy and dark.”
“Maybe we could go there sometime. We can get espresso martinis to satisfy our caffeine fix.”
“Yeah, maybe we can—” I stop, realizing what’s he’s doing. That was good. Too good. I sniff. “That proves nothing.”
He smiles, eyes twinkling with triumph. “It proves that it’s not that hard.”
“But it’s easy for you. You always know what to say, and . . .” I gesture to him. “You know . . .”
“What?”
“Your face . . .” I take a sip of my drink, wishing I’d never even said anything. “It’s a . . . good one.”
He seems baffled by this. “Thank you. But Faye, you are attractive. And he keeps looking back at you, too. All you have to do is bat those big blue eyes at him and he’ll do anything you like.” He sighs before continuing, “Trust me.”
“You can’t be serious.” It can’t really be that easy.
“Only one way to find out. It’s slowed down, so you won’t feel like you’re in his way.”
He’s right, so I can’t use the excuse that I’d be bothering him while he’s busy. “Fine, but you can’t watch.”
The idea of him watching me fumble through a conversation with someone is too much. This is already strange enough, going from pretend flirting to pretend kissing the other night. Before, I could use being drunk as an excuse, but it’s a bright, sober morning. I can’t pretend this isn’t weird.
“What if I close my eyes?” he asks, placing his hands over his face.
I take my hair down so I can re-do my bun. I’m stalling.
He peeks through his fingers and his eyes track the movement as I put my hair back up. “Stop stalling.”
“Okay, I’ll go talk to him.”
Eli stands up so that I can get squeeze past him, whispering, “Go get ‘em tiger,” to me as I pass.
I make my way up to the counter and tell myself this is going to be fine. He’s looking down at his phone. What if I’m interrupting an important text conversation, like maybe his great aunt needs a kidney transplant and if he doesn’t respond within ten seconds she will die, and he’ll have that on his conscience for the rest of his life because he had to be polite to a customer.
“What can I do for you?” he asks.
I smile in a way that I hope is warm and friendly and not like an alien who is mimicking human emotion. “Thought I might want to consume something besides caffeine this morning. These pastries look really good.”
He moves to stand behind the pastry case. “Good call. What are you in the mood for?”
“What’s your favorite?” This feels like something Eli would ask. I resist the urge to look back at where he’s sitting to make sure he’s keeping his promise of not watching us.
“The strawberry rhubarb danish is one of our seasonal pastries right now. It’s a fan favorite.”
“Okay, I’ll try that one.”
He moves to grab the pastry from the case.
“Actually, can I get a couple of those?” I ask.
“Sure thing.” He wraps the pastries in some tissue paper and hands them to me. He punches the order in. “That’ll be $8.50.”
“Thank you.” I swipe my card. “Um, I’m Faye, by the way. I come here so often, so I figured I should introduce myself.”
He smiles at me. It’s the kind of smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but still a pretty good one. “I’m Cameron.”
“Nice to officially meet you,” I say.
“It’s nice to meet you too.”
A woman comes up to counter. “Excuse me,” she says. “Do you have any French loaves left today?”
Cameron nods to the pastries in my hand. “Hope you like it. I’ll see you around?”
I nod emphatically. “Definitely.”
When I turn around to head back to the table, I notice Eli was absolutely breaking his promise and was not only watching the entire thing, but sitting up biting his nails like he’s trying to expend some kind of nervous energy.
“You said you wouldn’t watch,” I say, as he stands up to let me back to my seat.
“It looks like it went well?”
“I think so. I got his name.”
“And?”
“That’s it?”
His face changes and he now beams at me, like I’ve done something very impressive. “Well, that’s a start. Maybe next time you can get his astrological sign.”
I roll my eyes and hand him one of the pastries. “For your help today.”
“Thank you,” he says, smiling like I just gave him a gift he’s always wanted.
I take a bite of the danish. It’s good, but a little crumbly and some of it falls into my lap. I brush the crumbs off and in the process, they fall onto Eli’s lap.
He looks at me and arches a brow. “Was that payback for forcing you talk to him?”
I cover my mouth to hide my smile. “No, I’m sorry.” I almost reach down to brush them off his lap before catching myself. “I feel like I owe you more than a danish. Is there anything I can help you with, so I don’t feel like such a leech?”
“You’re not a leech.” He shows me his phone screen. I see a string of texts from his mom. “Got any ideas for how to help with a meddling mother?”
One good thing about having a completely hands-off mother is that at least she’s not a meddler.
“Who is Dani?”
“A woman she’s trying to set me up with.” He sighs and sets his phone down. “Apparently I have offered to take her to dinner this Saturday night.”
The butterflies that belong to Eli sink down, like they’re disappointed in this development. But this is good. Him encouraging me to talk to other guys and telling me about his dates with other women. I need the reminder that his help is strictly friendly.
“And you don’t want to go?”
“For some reason a blind date seems so . . . I don’t know. Bleak?”
“I get it. Kind of feels like the final dating frontier or something.”
“Exactly. My mom just worries about me, I think. My parents have a big anniversary coming up, and she’s got her mind on matrimonial bliss.”
“How long have they been married?”
“Thirty years.”
“Wow, that’s . . . rare.”
“Yeah, it is. And now they want me to give a speech.” He shakes his head and puffs air out of his cheeks. “Not sure how I got roped into that.”
I know exactly how he got roped into it. Because he’s charming and handsome and exactly the kind of person you want giving a speech at your party.
“I’m sure you’ll give a great speech.”
“Everyone keeps saying that, but I’m a little nervous about it.”
“Why?”
“Because . . .” He shifts in his seat and I’m seeing him express discomfort in a way I’ve never seen before. “I don’t know what it feels like.”
“What do you mean?”
“Being in love. I’ve never even been in a real relationship before.”
I’m honestly not super surprised by this, considering Eli always had a steady but short-term sort of dating lifestyle from what I observed during college. Maybe that hasn’t changed much. But I am surprised at how he seems to be disappointed by his lack of a serious dating history.
“I think you can still give a great speech about your parents without having experienced that yourself.”
“Yeah, maybe.” He looks down, almost like he’s feeling shy about what he wants to say next. “I just feel like I should have experienced that by now.”
“Have you . . .” I don’t know how to ask this because it’s none of my business. “Tried to be in one? A relationship, I mean.”
“Kind of, but not really. I’ve been told I’m not serious enough.”
Told by who? A previous girlfriend in New York? I want to ask more, but if he wants me to know more, he’ll tell me.
He shakes his head. “I just haven’t met the right person, I guess.”
I ball up the tissue paper my danish was wrapped in. “You never know, maybe Dani will be the right person.”
He chuckles. “I appreciate the optimism.”
“I’m sure it’ll be fun. You always make things fun.”
He tilts his head, and I swear I almost see him blush a little. “Thanks.” He leans back in his seat. “So, next time you come in you’re going to get that date, right?”
“I thought I’d just pine over him for a few years before doing anything about it,” I say.
He shakes his head at me, with a smile. It’s a real one; the kind of smile that makes you feel like the only person who’s ever been smiled at before. If he smiles at Dani like that, his mom will have nothing to worry about.
I shut down those thoughts along with my laptop and lift my empty coffee cup. “Cheers for good luck to both of us?”
His face is relaxed and earnest as he clicks his cup against mine and says, “Cheers to that.”
16
Faye
Rett and I are lying on my bed, newly clad in an overpriced striped linen duvet cover and sheet set I impulse-bought from an Instagram ad, staring up at my freshly-painted bedroom walls.
“What if I made the wrong choice?” I ask.
In the paint aisle of the hardware store, “Dark Burgundy Wine” felt very moody and relaxing. In reality, it’s making me feel like I’m actually inside a glass of merlot.
“I don’t really think there’s a wrong choice. You like this color, don’t you?”
“Do you think it’s a little dungeon-esque?”
She shrugs. “Maybe this is just the right color for you right now. You can always change it.”
The right color for me right now. That makes me feel better, like this doesn’t have to be permanent. But it’s a step in the right direction toward making some sort of change in my space and the Environmental part of my list feels less daunting.
But I really hope I end up liking this color once I live in it for a while. “I don’t know if I can ever look at a paint roller again.” It took us three coats before it stopped looking like a recent murder scene and the likelihood that I’ll be able to lift my arms tomorrow is looking slim. “I just need to put together that dresser and I’ll have a real, grown-up bedroom.”
“You’re on your own, there. I don’t do furniture assembly.” She rolls over onto her stomach and props her chin in her hands. “This is why you need to start dating.”
“So I’ll have my own personal Task Rabbit?”
“Exactly. Let’s discuss prospects.”
I dig my phone out from underneath the covers. “I’m starving. You want to order food?”
“Yes, please. Has anything more happened with barista guy yet?” I should have never told Rett about meeting Cameron, because now she won’t leave me alone about pursuing something with him. She even said that Eli was her new favorite person for making me talk to him.
“Cameron? I don’t think that’s a good idea. Pizza or Thai?”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know . . . don’t shit where you eat. Or fuck where you drink coffee. Or something.”
“Let’s do pizza.” She grabs her phone. “That’s dumb. Give me two seconds.” A few seconds later she shows me her screen. “Is this him?”
“Yep, that’s him.”
She presses play on his latest post, a video of him standing in a dark kitchen.
There are a few things I notice immediately about this video. First, he’s wearing an apron and nothing else. Second, he’s surrounded by white tapered candles that are dripping wax down onto the stainless-steel countertop. And third, he appears to be demonstrating how to create some kind of latte art.
“Well, I’m intrigued,” Rett says.
The video goes on to show him pouring the hot milk into the cup. He begins to make a squiggly, sort of ruffled shape with the foam. At first, I think he’s making a flower. But as he finishes the design, I think I must be mistaken, and this is some kind of inkblot test situation.
“Is that a . . . ?” I ask.
“A foamy vulva? Yeah, I think it is.”
Then, it jumps to a close-up shot of his hand caressing the rim of the cup until he slowly runs his middle finger down the center of the design.
“Is he . . . ?”
“Stroking the foamy vulva? Yeah, I think he is.”
“Please stop saying ‘foamy vulva’.”
But it’s not over yet, because the video ends with a shot of him running his tongue across the surface to lick up the foam before looking up to smirk at the camera.
“Message him,” Rett says.
“I’m sorry, did we not just watch the same thing?”
“I watched a very well-crafted video with some lovely cinematography.”
It takes a single second of eye contract between us, and we both burst out laughing while we watch the video again. There’s something weirdly fascinating about it, in a car crash kind of way. You can’t seem to stop watching.
“I’m serious,” she says. “Go out with him.”
“I can’t go out with a guy who makes latte art thirst traps. Now I’m going to have to find a new coffee shop to go to, as it is.”
“He’s perfect for your sex need!” She holds her phone up to show where she’s paused the video, Cameron’s face filling the frame as looks passionately down at his frothy creation.
I grab her phone to investigate his profile more. “I just want normal, run-of-the-mill sex. I feel like he would try to pour hot coffee on my body or something.”
She shrugs. “You know what, that’s fair. Food stuff isn’t for everyone.”
“Are you into that?” The closest I’ve ever come to anything like that was having sex on top of a pizza box once.
“No, but one time a guy did ask me if we could use local honey as lube.”
“Sounds . . . sticky.” I keep scrolling through Cameron’s page. There are a few similar videos that I don’t watch, along with quite a few mirror selfies and carefully crafted photos of coffee cups next to a journal that looks like it’s never been opened. “Wait, did it have to be local honey?”
“He seemed to be very specific about it.”
“Maybe he had bad allergies,” I say, and we both start laughing again. “Did you do it?”
“For a ticket to the worst yeast infection of all time? God, no.”
“See? This is the kind of thing I am severely unprepared for.”
“He won’t pour hot coffee on you. And doesn’t he get points for creativity?”
Creativity is one thing, but that video was maybe the most cringe thing I’ve ever seen. But maybe she’s right, though—someone like Cameron would be a low stakes start to my dating journey. “How would I even go about this?”
“First, follow him. Then, like a few of his posts. He’ll come to you. I promise.”
“Really?”
“Yes, I give it two minutes and he’ll have already followed you back and sent you a message saying something like, ‘Hey! How’s your day going?’”
I’m skeptical of this approach, but I find his profile on my phone and press “Follow.” Then, I like the video we just watched along with a photo of a crushed Sprite can on a sidewalk with the caption, “Find the beauty in the mundane.”
Sure enough, no sooner than I’ve placed the pizza order do I get a notification that he’s followed me, and I get a message from him that says, “Faye! What’s up?”
I show the message to Rett. “Guess I’ll never doubt you again.”
“Told you,” she says, clearly pleased with herself.
“What do I do now?”
“Say nothing.”
I toss my phone down and cover my face with my forearm. “I don’t want to play this game anymore.”
She gets up and picks up one of the drop cloths from the floor. “It’s all part of the mystery. You leave a guy on read and they go feral for you.”
“Maybe in your case.” Rett has always been a free-spirited kind of person, drawn to people who are a challenge. Men and women fall at her feet, but the people she likes are usually terrible. “I don’t want to be mysterious.”
“You’re the most mysterious person I know.”
I pick up the paint rollers and try to avoid smearing red paint on myself. “What are you talking about?”
“You don’t let anyone know anything about you. You float through the world like a mystifying little fairy.”
“Let me see your eyes. I think the paint fumes might have gotten to you.”
“I’m just saying, you need to use your mysterious ways to your advantage. Don’t respond to Cameron. If I’m wrong, I’ll help you put that dresser together.”
“Aren’t you supposed to tell me I should be more open to people, and that it’s okay to allow them to know me?”
“Sounds like you’re aware of that already.”
It’s 11:22 p.m. and I’m determined to sleep in my bedroom tonight. I close my eyes and attempt to relish the quiet, savoring the ambient noise of the traffic on the street below. A car door slams in the distance.
I hate it. I check my phone and nearly jump for joy when I see I have a text to distract me.
Eli: You got that date yet?
Faye: No, but I did stalk him on Instagram.
Eli: Find anything interesting?
I send him a link to Cameron’s video.
Eli: You think he ever burns his tongue?
Faye: 100%. Rett thinks I should still go out with him despite the cringey video.
Eli: What do you think?
Faye: I think I might die alone.
My phone rings and it’s Eli. I hesitate before answering, but I’m admittedly eager to feel someone else’s presence in the room with me. I pick up on the second ring.
“Don’t say that,” he says.
