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Chapter Ten
Emily
“I was surprised you said yes.”
I look across the table at Aaron and feel my cheeks flush. “Trust me, nobody is more surprised than me.”
“So why did you say yes then?”
It's a question I've pondered endlessly since I uttered those words. Why did I say yes? Although I've turned the question over in my mind a hundred different ways, I've yet to come up with a satisfactory answer. Being as self-aware as I am, I know that the isolation and loneliness I've been feeling for a while played a role in my decision to finally give in. After more than a month, I realized that Aaron wasn’t nearly the jerk I’d made him out to be in my head. He actually turned out to be kind of sweet, which blew my preconceived notions of him right out of the water.
I shrug. “Maybe I'm suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. Or maybe you just wore me down,” I joke. “Maybe I’m just going out with you just to get you off my back.”
His smile is warm and welcoming. I’m starting to see why he’s so popular around here. He never pushed – well, never pushed too hard – but in most everything he said, he showed me that he valued me as a person and a friend.
I don't know how he did it, but he managed to turn my opinion about him one hundred and eighty degrees. Even though our conversations were usually pretty short, I saw something different in him. He didn't quite come off as one of those entitled prep school boys I despise. The sort of guy I'd just assumed he was.
Oh, he certainly has a bit of arrogance about him, don't get me wrong. He sometimes borders on the annoyingly cocky. He knows he's a good-looking man and knows that he can have any woman he wants – whenever he wants them. Despite that, he never made me feel as if I was just some sort of pawn in a game of chase and conquer. He never made me feel like he was just trying to get into my pants. Something about all of the things he said made me think he valued me as a person, rather than as just another notch on his bedpost.
If it was all posturing and just an act, it was a very convincing one, I'll give him that.
“Get me off your back?” he grins. “You might just be encouraging me.”
I laugh. “It's possible.”
“All kidding aside, I'm glad you finally said yes.”
“Yeah, me too,” I reply and actually mean it.
Believe me, I had plenty of reservations about coming tonight. Part of me still wonders if he's just waiting to drop the act and show me everything I've feared him to be. As I look at him from across the table, I wonder if he's wearing a mask that he'll take off and reveal himself to be a monster and try to slime his way into my pants.
I want to think he's not. I want to think better of him. I mean, would a guy like Aaron, somebody who has all the options in the world when it comes to getting laid, really bother with somebody as ordinary as me – for as long as he did – if he wasn't actually interested in me as a person?
I know I'm naïve in a lot of ways. Having never really been out of LA until I came to school out here, I haven't been exposed to a lot. But I like to think I'm a pretty good judge of people. Back home, I knew the guys who actually wanted to date me, as opposed to the guys who just wanted to screw me. And sadly, there were few of the former, while the vast majority fell into the latter category.
And I want to think that once I stopped reacting to Aaron so viscerally and actually listened to him, I learned something about him. I want to think I learned that he's actually one of the better guys out there. Or at least, among the guys who've shown any sort of interest in me since I've been here at Rodham.
The waitress comes by to clear off the dessert plates and drops off the check. Aaron hands her a credit card and turns his attention back to me. It's been a surprisingly nice evening. The conversation has been fun, lively, and incredibly interesting.
Aaron normally wears a veneer of cold, calculating logic. To look at him is to see somebody who just seems detached and emotionally vacant.
What I've learned tonight, though, is that he's anything but that. He's charming and sincere. Beneath that hard outer shell, he's engaging and warm. And he's a lot funnier than I ever would have guessed. He's had me laughing almost the entire night.
The waitress drops off the check and he signs for it, then turns his attention back to me.
“Want to get out of here?”
A bolt of nervous energy shoots through me as I hear the double meaning in his words. I can't know exactly what his intention is, but I feel like he's leaving a door open – a door I don't want to go through right now.
“Aaron, I – I'm not going to have sex with you tonight.”
He laughs and there is a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “Who said anything about sex? I was just asking if you wanted to go for a walk with me.”
My cheeks flare with heat and I lower my gaze, feeling profoundly stupid and presumptuous. He reaches across the table, takes my hand, and gives it a gentle squeeze, which makes me look up into eyes the color of ice crystals. He gives me a soft smile and there is such understanding in his expression that I feel some of the frost around my heart melt.
“Would you?” he asks. “Like to go for a walk?”
I nod. “Yeah. I'd love to.”
