“Val.”
“So, Val,” he held my gaze with a slight smirk on his mouth, drawing out my one-syllable name, “I have two questions.”
I raised my eyebrows and let him go on.
“One, are you single? And, because I’m optimistic the answer is yes, my second question is, will you have dinner with me?”
My mouth quirked up as my cheeks heated. His assertiveness was so…flattering.
“Yes and…” I paused, holding his gaze the whole time, biting down the grin that threatened to spread across my mouth, “yes.”
“Phew,” he sighed, dramatically dragging the back of his hand across his brow. “In that case, I’ll need your number.” He leaned back, produced his cell phone from his pocket, and handed it to me. I typed in my name and number and passed it back.
“Val Leone,” he said, reading the new contact on his screen as he stood up to leave. “I’m glad I met you. I’ll let you get back to that project.” He winked.
“I’m glad you, uh…stopped by.” I gestured to the table.
“What can I say, nothing does it for me like a beautiful woman typing feverishly on a laptop.”
A laugh rattled out of me.
A glint of pride sparked in his eyes at his joke landing.
I watched him walk away, noting the way the golf shorts hit just above his knees. He was muscular, but on the lankier side. No more than one minute after he disappeared around the corner, my phone buzzed.
617-555-0818
Hey, it’s Max Phelps.
I smiled down at the little screen.
What just happened?
Just over twenty-four hours later, I took a seat at a small, white tablecloth-covered table on the second-floor balcony of Alchemy Bistro. It was a fancy (even by Edgartown’s standards) restaurant on Main Street that I’d only been to once before with my brother, years ago.
Max had asked me if I was free tonight a few hours after he left the café yesterday. Mimi had invited me to have dinner with her and her friends tonight but was thrilled when I reneged to go on a date instead.
I peered over the railing after the waitress handed me the menu. “The people watching from up here is going to be amazing,” I said to Max with a grin.Wait, is that a weird thing to say?
“Oh, for sure,” he agreed. He’d swapped the golf outfit for salmon-colored chinos and a casual white button-down, rolled at the sleeves. Similar expensive-looking loafers. The ensemble was unabashedly preppy, but in keeping with how a lot of the men dressed here. Probably a nice break from whatever stuffy suits he wore to work.
“We should count how many people walking by are wearing Lilly Pulitzer dresses or some version of these pants.” He gestured to his lap.
I laughed. At least he had a sense of humor about it.
When Max picked me up from Mimi’s half an hour ago, I was wired with a sense of bubbly anticipation I’d been feeling since he asked me out over text the night before—a mix of first date nerves and excitement to be going on a date with someone I’d already met in person and hadn’t weirded me out. It was an unfamiliar feeling after years of sporadic and disappointing dating app encounters. He’d looked me up and down from the bottom of her front steps. “I liked that tennis skirt yesterday, but I like this too,” he said of my green sundress. It had thin straps, a straight neckline with a tiny cut-out that hinted at some cleavage, and a skirt that flowed to my knees. When the woman at the boutique I went to after I left the café yesterday told me the color made my eyes look even more green, I was sold.
“I didn’t know you could be any more beautiful than when I first saw you,” he added when we reached his car. I blushed at the compliment. I couldn’t remember the last time a man called me beautiful, and he’d done it twice in under forty-eight hours.
I’d gone to the gym earlier, taken a long shower, and done my skincare routine meticulously. The slightly purple bags under my eyes that had become nearly permanent the last couple of years were gone now. I blow dried my hair and did my makeup, all while listening to music and puttering around in my bathrobe. Mimi had clucked her admiration at the dress and my hair. I felt good. Sure, I still had stress dreams where I was back at work sometimes, and I still wanted to get even stronger and leaner to undo some of the damage the stress of the last six years had done to both my mind and my body, but I already felt so much better than I had at any social event in recent memory. The result was that I was actually excited about this date.
By the time we ordered our drinks and some oysters, we’d counted two salmon-colored pants and three Lilly dresses.
“Tell me more about the sabbatical. What have you been up to? Have you traveled at all?”
I wrung my hands under the table, willing them not to start sweating. My normal-feeling first date nerves converted to a trickle of familiar cortisol-laced embarrassment, settling low in my belly. For some reason, I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to explain why I was on a sabbatical on this date. It felt too soon to share how I’d actually had a big setback in my career, that it was a mental health break, not an earned extra-long vacation, and even calling it a sabbatical didn’t totally feel right. I couldn’t quite regret using that term, though. He looked so impressed when I told him I was a lawyer yesterday…
I met his gaze. His expression was casual, like he’d asked me a straightforward, easily answered question like have I been to Italy before. At least his phrasing allowed me to skirt around thewhyof it all. I schooled my face into a smile and said, “Not too much travel. I spent some time with my parents in New Hampshire, andI’ve actually been on island since early May. I’ve been doing a lot of reading, long walks, gym. Clearing my head.”
