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“Nice. Congrats, I guess.”
“But what do I do now?”
“What do you want to do?”
Penny thought about Caleb’s fingers sliding into her hair. The gentle scrape of his teeth on her bottom lip and the taste of his tongue. “I want to kiss him again.”
“I thought you swore off dating?”
“That was before a super-hot guy kissed me in a hospital stairwell.”
“Fair point.”
The microwave dinged and Penny reached for a potholder. “I’m going to see him tomorrow and I don’t know how to act.” She carried the steaming container over to the table. “Do I pretend it never happened? Do I follow his lead and see how he acts?”
“No, fuck all that,” Olivia said. “He kissed you and you deserve an explanation. You’re not a character on a badly written TV show. Don’t be too gutless to have an adult conversation. Be direct. Ask him outright what the fuck the deal is.”
Penny’s stomach clenched in apprehension. “Just like that? Just walk right up to him and say, ‘Hey, Caleb, why did you kiss me and run off?’”
“Why not? It’s not like not talking about it is going to erase the fact that it happened or make it any less weird. So you might as well deal with it and move on. One way or the other.”
Penny stirred her soup and tried to imagine herself having a dialogue like that with Caleb. She could barely manage benign, easy conversations with him. How were they going to talk about something like this? “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t think I can do it.”
“It’s either that or never go back there again. Ghosting’s the only other option.”
Penny sighed. “This is exactly what Esther warned me about.”
“Yep.”
“I don’t want to ghost,” Penny decided. “I like Antidote. I’m not giving it up because of him.”
“Then you should make him talk to you.”
Sure. Make Caleb talk. Easier said than done.
At eleven the next morning, Penny set out for Antidote. Her legs felt like jelly, even though it wasn’t a spin class day.
She still had a lot of work to catch up on from yesterday, and if she was going to visit George in the hospital this afternoon, it would cut into her work time even more. Probably she should skip her coffee break today, but that would mean not seeing Caleb, which wasn’t an option. The anticipation might actually kill her if she put it off for a whole other day. Plus, she didn’t want him thinking he’d scared her off.
She still hadn’t decided what she was going to say to him. Her stomach hurt every time she thought about it. But it also went all fluttery at the prospect of seeing him again. A happy kind of flutter, like you get when you have a crush. Her stomach was hurting and fluttering simultaneously, and it was making her nauseous.
Her trepidation increased with every step that carried her closer to Antidote, and to Caleb. To her impending death by mortification.
No, you know what? He’s the one who should be embarrassed.
She’d done nothing wrong. He was the one who’d kissed her and run away. He’d acted weird, not her. Olivia was right—he owed her an explanation. It wasn’t like Penny was expecting him to marry her or anything. She just wanted to know what was going on in his head. And also, if he had a girlfriend. That wasn’t too much to ask of someone who’d kissed you.
Her pulse pounded in her ears as she approached Antidote. She clutched the door handle in a white-knuckled grip, took a deep breath to steel herself, and pulled it open.
Malik was working the register today and Caleb was at the espresso machine with his back to the door. The sight of his muscled upper back pulling his T-shirt tight across the top of his shoulders sent a shiver of lust-slash-dread down Penny’s spine.
“Penny!” Malik called out as she got in line behind a woman in workout clothes.
Penny saw Caleb’s hands still at the sound of her name, but he didn’t turn around. So that was how he was going to play this.
“I heard you were here when George keeled over yesterday,” Malik said when he’d finished ringing up the woman ahead of her.
“Yeah.” Penny glanced at Caleb again. He was still turned away from her, pretending not to hear, even though he was only a few feet away and it was quiet in the shop except for the muted sound of electro jazz playing on the sound system. Malik must have picked the music today.
