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“I think it’s perfect,” she said. “Just ignore me and my social anxiety. I must be comfortable to be able to admit it.”
“I want you to be comfortable,” he said, holding the door for her. “You know, we are really a lot alike.”
“You think so?” she asked, frowning. “I don’t see that at all.”
“Except for the self-confidence thing, we both avoid a lot of the same social situations.”
“Like a gala dress-up event at the casino?” she asked. “There blows the theory that we don’t like the limelight.”
“What if we win?”
“Oh, right, you and me winning a dance contest. We should have practiced!”
“I have two left feet,” Jason said. “No worries about winning any dance contest.”
Chapter 3
In his Miami Beach condominium, Herbert Fairchild sat at the kitchen table on the Saturday morning before Christmas, drinking coffee and reading the Detroit Free Press online. Suddenly, after taking a big swig of coffee, he started coughing and choking.
“Oh my, Herb, is it too hot?” his adoring wife, Suzette, asked.
“No, it’s not too hot!” he croaked, sputtering. “Look! Look at this!” He twirled his laptop around on the counter, pointing at the headline.
“What is it? I can’t see it,” she said timidly, hating to see Herbert so upset.
“It’s your daughter, Lily. Look! She won some low-life dance contest at the casino with that grease-monkey John Karas’s son.” Eyes bulging in a bright red face, his fury was explosive.
“Herb, it’s okay. It was just a dance.”
“I didn’t raise her to end up in the arms of that greaseball,” he screamed.
Their neighbors were used to his tirades, but this time it upset Suzette because it was so blatant. She had to try to get him to calm down before he had a heart attack.
“Herb, Jason’s going to be a doctor. This is his last year of medical school. She’s never mentioned his name, so how serious can it be?”
He ran his fingers through his few strands of hair, the pain in his chest alarming enough to make him try to calm down.
“Hand me my nitro,” he cried, holding his hand out and shaking it at her, like the gesture would make her move faster.
Normally, she’d just hand him the container, but in his current state of mind, the possibility that he’d accidentally pour all the tiny pills out was too great, and she didn’t want to exacerbate his anger. She quickly opened it and handed him one.
“Thank you,” he said, a rare and frightening response to anything she could do for him.
He pushed away from the counter. “Pack. We’re going home.”
“Herb, we have tickets for next Friday. It’ll be too expensive to change them now, right before Christmas.”
“I don’t care. This is serious. Look at them; she’s beaming!”
It was true. When the reporter asked her how she felt after the MC put the crowns on their heads, Lily positively shone. “I’ve never had so much fun in my life!” she answered, her arm around Jason’s waist.
But what she didn’t say was that it was because of Jason, that he was the perfect date in every way. When they had walked across the street earlier that evening, still laughing due to his choice of outer garments, he held on to her hand, and when they reached the snowbank at the curb that the snowplow had left behind, he picked her up and carried her across. Then the coat check person flared her nostrils at Jason’s jacket.
“Take good care of that coat,” he said. “I’ll lose my job if I don’t have my coat.”
Jason led Lily out into the casino, the noise of bells ringing and cheers deafening. “I have a roll of quarters,” he said. “Do you like the slot machines?”
“I love them!” she said, jumping up and down as much as her heels would allow.
