His eyebrows drew together but his smile remained. “Because I wanted to.”
I brushed my lips with my fingertips. They still tingled.
“Was I not supposed to do that?” he asked, tilting his head. I loved the way his dark eyes almost gleamed when they were focused on me.
“It’s just—” I sucked in a breath, completely flustered. “Aren’t we still in that weird phase were we’re stepping on eggshells around each other? Like all awkward and uncomfortable because we’re unsure of how to act because we don’t know what the other is thinking and we haven’t talked about anything?”
He put his hand to his chin and stroked it. “I don’t feel that way around you,” he said, as if it was the simplest answer in the world.
I feel that way around you, I wanted to yell. But I bit my tongue. Hadn’t I been thinking a fling was exactly what I wanted? Who was I to try and dictate on what terms they happened. Just because every other guy would have been playing games right now, didn’t mean that Oliver had to. Hewas different in every possible way, so it made sense that he wouldn’t act how I expected.
“Doyoufeel that way aroundme?” he asked, his gaze carefully studying my face.
The question caused a slightly chaotic giggle to burst out of me. “What? Me? Uncomfortable? No, not at all.”
He laughed, and I thought for the millionth time how jealous I was of his confidence.
“Well good, because I wanted to ask you something.”
“What?” I asked hesitantly. “You have some new crazy adventure planned for us or something?”
“Kind of.” He stared down at me. “I wanted to see if you were free tomorrow night.”
“For some more fun therapy, or whatever it is you’re calling it?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Kind of. I was just going to call it a date this time.”
Heat pricked my skin. “A date,” I repeated, convinced I’d misheard him, even though there was no possible way.
“Yep.” He nodded slowly, raising his eyebrows.
“But, we’re—but you’re leaving soon. And I’m, like—” I was sputtering, unable to form a coherent sentence.
Oliver didn’t seem fazed in the slightest. “I like you,” he said, matter-of-factly. “And I want to take you on a real date. Sure, I could invite you on another excursion with the thinly veiled motive of spending more time with you, but I’d rather just ask you out.”
“But—”
He held up his hand. “I know, I know. I’m leaving soon, you’re job hunting. We have no future. Whatever. Who cares? I like you, and I know you like me. What’s more fun than following through on how we feel? Not everything has to bethis carefully laid-out plan with a guaranteed future. We can just have fun, Frankie. Forget about everything else.”
A fling. Basically exactly what I had wanted. Every instinct I had itched to ask for rules and set guidelines on what this was. Where was this going physically? How long would we have? How deep were we getting? I forced myself to let it go, though. Those types of thoughts had no place in what he was asking.
“S-sure.”
He grinned, leaning in for another kiss. It felt natural.
Which kind of freaked me out if I was being honest.
FIFTEEN
Frankie
“I’ve never seenyou this nervous,” Mattie said from behind me as I franticly brushed out a curl that looked too curled.
“I amnotnervous,” I snapped, tugging at the curl more. Should I spray it with water? The last thing I wanted was for Oliver to think that I had tried for this…for this…for whatever this was. Date, I guess. But when I thought of it like that, my stomach instantly rocked with nerves.
“If you tug at that piece of hair anymore, you’re going to be bald,” Mattie pointed out.
“I don’t want him to think I curled my hair!” I said, giving up and plugging in the flat iron.
