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“Will do. Bye! Love you.”
“Love you too!”
I hung up and took a big breath in, then let it out slowly. I might’ve actually told my mom about the new development in my relationship with Matt, but then she said that thing about me not being the type of person who would get involved with my boss, and I had no idea how to respond. Before recently, I would’ve whole-heartedly agreed with her. I never thought of myself as someone who would keep up a secret love affair with her employer, but here I was, doing just that. I was making excuses to talk to him, I was thinking about him non-stop, and dreaming about him when I wasn’t awake. My thoughts were consumed by him, and I didn’t even care! I knew there was a possibility that this whole thing would blow up in my face, that it would end in a fiery mess, but there was also a possibility that it ended in a fairytale. Matt and I could fall in love, and we could get married, start a family. We could grow old together.
That’sthe possibility I decided to focus on, instead of the many bad possibilities. Everything was going to work out.
He and I were going to work out in the end. I just knew it.
ChapterFourteen
MATT
“Are you sure about this?”
I was on the phone with Will, who had rung me on my drive home from work that Friday afternoon. He called to tell me he made a new friend at school and asked if he could go spend the night there. The request was shocking, honestly. It took Will a long time to warm up to people, and I wasn’t sure he had ever asked to spend the night at someone else’s house. I was wracking my brain to try to come up with an instance in which that had happened, when Will started to beg me.
“Pleeease Dad,” he said. “Another boy from my class is going and Jason said he has theJurassic Parkvideo game.”
“Are you sure the video game isn’t too adult for you?”
He groaned. “Dad—really? It’s theLego Jurassic Parkgame. It's basically made for babies. It’s not going to be scary at all, and we won’t watch any of the movies.”
I sighed. “Alright. You can go. Is Stephanie going to take you? Technically, it’s her night off.”
“Yeah,” he said. “She already told me it was fine. She’s helping me pack a bag right now.” It was at this point that I realized what this meant—Will was going to be gone for the whole night, leaving me and Stephanie alone for the first time since we made our new little arrangement. I couldn’t help but smile to myself.
“I’ll call you later tonight, okay?” Will said.
“Fine,” I said. “Make sure you leave the number of Jason’s mom with Stephanie, okay, just in case we need to contact you for any reason.”
“Sure,” he said. “But isn’t that sort of why you bought me this cheap plastic cellphone?”
I laughed. “It was supposed to be why we bought it for you, but you never seem to remember to charge it, so half my calls don’t even go through!”
“I’m throwing my charger in my bag right now.”
“Good.” I took a right at the next stoplight, heading in the opposite direction of the house. “Have a fun time tonight, buddy. I love you.”
After we hung up, I was filled with a mixture of emotions. I was happy that Will was making friends, and glad to hear he was breaking out of his shell, but I also worried about him. A sleepover was a big step, and I just really hoped he was ready for it.
At the next block, I turned into this little strip mall that had a wine store I was fond of. I went in and bought two bottles of wine, some fancy cheese, and threw in a few of the dark chocolates that were sitting in a tin by the register. They bagged this all up for me, and then the lady behind the counter gave me a wicked smile as she handed me my card back. “Got a hot date tonight?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I hope so.”
“Bummer,” she said. “I would’ve gladly split that bottle of red with you.” She had dark purple lipstick and thick eyeliner. She wasn’t exactly my type, but I smiled back at her anyway.
“Who knows?” I said. “Maybe once me and my friend finish off the bottle of white, I’ll come by to see you.”
She winked at me. “Please do. I’ll be here until ten; after that, I’ll be at the bar down the street.” She waved seductively as I gathered my things and left. On the drive back to the house, I got caught in traffic, so I ended up eating two of the chocolates while I waited in a red sea of brake lights. Finally, I got home an hour after leaving the office, and walked into what appeared to be an empty house.
“Will?”
Nobody answered. I figured he was already at his sleepover. “Stephanie?”
Again, no answer. I frowned and closed the door behind me. I went to the kitchen and started unloading the goodies I got from the wine store, then I heard the sound of a shower running down the hall. A few seconds later, the water turned off, and I heard someone draw back the curtain. I took a moment to imagine what Stephanie might’ve looked like, stepping out of the steamy shower, naked and dripping wet.
Soon, however, I didn’t have to imagine anymore, because she stepped out of the bathroom with just a towel wrapped around her. Her wet hair cascaded down her slender back, and she shook some of the water out with her free hand before turning around and seeing me.
