Page 21 of The Irresistible Distraction

Clark chuckles and waves me off. “It is. Don’t worry, I’m uniquely qualified to condition you until you’re more comfortable with compliments.”

It takes less than a second for me to figure out what he means. “Exposure therapy?”

Clark’s smile warms me from the inside, and I’m grateful when he offers to let me play DJ on his radio, providing a needed distraction from a moment that suddenly felt too serious. He drives slowly, clearly knowing where he’s going without GPS, and I relax in his car, letting the air-conditioning ease my tired muscles as we learn that we have strikingly similar tastes in music.

“Even our musical tastes are compatible,” Sexy Tourist tells me with another sidelong glance, his hand coming to rest on my thigh.

“Or we just grew up in the same decade.” I pause as I watch a series of messages from Discord appear on my phone.

SEBASTIAN: When will you come home?

SEBASTIAN: Vera says you’re staying out late?

SEBASTIAN: Hello?

SEBASTIAN: ^^

I tilt the screen to type out a quick reply: that I’ll be out until late, that he’s to text me if he has any concerns, that I love him and is it still okay that I come back late? His response is as short as it is instantaneous: Great.

“Everything okay?”

“My kid’s going through this age where I can never tell if they’re being genuine or sarcastic.” He squeezes my thigh lightly in reassurance, and without allowing myself to overthink, I place mine over his. “Sorry, it’s just life, interrupting my vacation.”

A broad smile spreads across his face as he looks first at me and then the road.

“What?”

He shrugs a little, the smile still ever-present. “It feels like I just received a promotion, from distraction to vacation.”

“Don’t celebrate too much. At least half of my enjoyment might be from trying to embody the persona of someone named Raquel, who actually goes on vacations and lets herself get distracted by strange men.”

Less than a minute later, he pulls into the Mountain Skies Astronomical Society, which is a place I’ve only been to a few times, middle and high school field trips, as a student and later as a chaperone for Sebastian’s class. The small building is dark, decidedly closed.

“Are we picnicking in the parking lot?”

Sexy Tourist gives me what I think of as the ultimate Sexy Tourist smile, all dimples and boyish charm. “I have the key. Don’t ask how.”

He stops to grab a huge picnic basket from the trunk before handing me a large blanket and taking my hand.

Given it’s closed, we are (by definition) the only ones here, which I’d worry about more if I wasn’t already location sharing with both Vera and Maggie, if Maggie hadn’t already taken a picture of Clark’s driver’s license, and if Clark hadn’t obviously told his coworkers he’d be taking me out.

Do I still worry I’ll be a conquest story? Perhaps, a little.

But that goes both ways. Because even as I take his hand and follow him through the observatory, I know that whatever happens tonight, it will live on as a memory I’ll be revisiting long after it’s over. We’ve done nothing more than turn on a few lights in a closed building, and it’s already the best, most effortful, memorable date I’ve ever been on.

He must see the wistful expression on my face, because he squeezes my hand a little before pushing open the door to the gated outdoor grounds.

“There’s not a ton to see inside, but we can look if you like. Or save it for next time?”

I smile and mouth something like, Sure, thinking what a nice fiction it is, to imply that there will be a next time. Together, we find a secluded and mostly flat area that has a picturesque view. Clark takes out a set of small speakers from the basket, and the effect is transformative. Between the gate-level bushes and sunlight filtering through the sparse trees, the music that seems to surround us and the soft blanket he pulls me down to, it’s as though we’re the only people on the mountain.

By tacit agreement, we take out the food together before he lies back, half reclining against a tree that provides a modicum of shade, while I remain sitting, staring out at the San Bernardino Mountains that ought to feel familiar, but in this particular setting and situation they appear new, magical in a way they haven’t before.

I lace my fingers on raised knees, my poodle skirt puddling around me, seeming less out of place because of his leather pants. Time passes as we listen to Train and Santa Esmeralda, Blue October and My Chemical Romance, and I enjoy food that is not a customer’s leftovers and is also not the last few bites on Sebastian’s plate. I drink flavored sparkling water (because, according to Clark, “I wouldn’t want alcohol impairing either of our judgment tonight”). And only after I’ve had my fill do I also lean back, letting Clark charm me with stories about his childhood—misadventures that reveal nothing beyond the fact that he was a very mischievous boy. That he shaved his hair on a dare, that he shaved a friend’s hair also . . . on a dare. That in sixth grade, he spent all recess cutting every flower from his elementary school’s gardens.

“Sold them door-to-door, because my father said I was too young to appreciate an allowance.”

“What happened?”