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“Would I what?” He is sending me SOS signals with his eyes, and I’m trying to help. I really am. But he doesn’t understand that Hannah is like a shark who smells blood. Once she senses weakness, she never lets go.
“Don’t mind them. They were just leaving, right, Charlie?” She had said they would behave but this is not my idea of behaving, and I shoot her a look that says it’s time to get them out of the room.
“Right. We were just about to watch a movie, so we’ll get out of your hair. It was nice meeting you, Derek.” She motions for the others to join her.
“We’re watching a movie? When did we decide this?” Belle asks. “Can I pick the movie? I don’t think I can handle another war movie if you get to choose, Charlie.”
“We’re not watching a movie. We’re being banned from the room before we ask Derek if he would be Katie’s date to the wedding,” Hannah says, grabbing her dot painting and shooting a triumphant look at me.
“Which the eight ball said I don’t have to go to,” I shoot back, annoyed that she got the question in, even if it wasn’t directly.
She sticks her tongue out at me, but at least she follows the others out of the room, and then Derek and I are alone.
“Sorry about my friends,” I say as he sits beside me. “They mean well, but sometimes they don’t know when to quit.”
“What were they talking about? What wedding?”
I shake my head, hoping he’ll let the subject drop. “It’s nothing, really, forget about it.”
“If that’s how they treat nothing, then I’m scared to ask what something looks like.”
“Yeah, you really don’t want to know.”
“Look, it seems like they’re just trying to be good friends. If it’s important to you, I’d like to help.”
I look up at him. “You want to help me? Even after I tried to kill you this week?”
“To be fair, you tried to kill yourself as well.” He smiles and points to my ankle.
I suppose that’s true though I definitely wasn’t trying to kill myself when I stepped in that water, but I wasn’t trying to kill him by making him try new food either. “I guess I did.” My eyes drop to my hands in my lap and suddenly I’m picking at my nails. I need a manicure, but in all honesty, I’m trying to avoid the conversation. “Really it’s not a big deal. You remember the woman from the museum?”
“The one who stole your fiancé?”
Okay, it seems a much bigger deal when he looks at me like that. “Yeah, well she dropped off an invitation to their wedding that afternoon. The girls think I should go and bring a hot date to prove I’m over Adam, but the ball said I don’t have to, so there’s no use discussing it.”
“And they think I could be your hot date?” he asks.
“I know, right? I told them we’re just co-workers and I don’t even know if I’ll be able to dance-”
“I think we should do it,” he says, cutting me off and taking my hands in his.
“What?” I must have heard him wrong. That’s the only explanation. Except, is it? Because he’s still holding my hands. “Are you sure you’re Derek? That you haven’t been replaced by an alien or something?”
He chuckles and lets go of my hands to run his hand through his hair. “I’m not sure of much of anything right now to be honest, but she already thinks we’re together, so why not?”
I should be able to think of a million why nots, but for some reason, I’m so focused on the fact that we were holding hands and now we aren’t that all I can manage is, “Because it’s so unlike you. It’s not planned or part of our working together.”
He folds his hands in his lap and stares at them. For a minute, I think he’s regretting throwing his offer out there, but then he looks up at me. “Can I tell you something?”
“Okay.” But from the serious look on his face, I’m not sure I really want to know.
He nods and runs a hand through his hair again, something I have never seen him do before today, and now he’s done it twice in five minutes. I’d say it was nerves, but what could he possibly be nervous about?
He takes a deep breath. “When I was in high school, I was asked to run the lights for a play.”
I nod, not understanding where this is going.
“I really enjoyed running the board, but I found myself wanting to be on the stage. To see what it would be like to be someone other than myself for a bit.”
