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She blinked rapidly, her eyes losing that unfocused look they had held for the previous ten minutes. “Um, I never thought about it,” she said. “Why?”
“Everyone has a favorite color,” I insisted. “You were never asked in elementary school?”
She put on the placid look I had come to expect from her.Annoyed,I realized with a start.She’s annoyed.
Still, her words were pleasant enough. “Never had much time between being asked and when I was expected to answer,” she said.
I leaned forward, brushing my fingertips across the back of her hand. She snatched her hand away as if burned. “Ciara,” I said gently. “Can you look at me for a moment?”
Her body tensed, but she dutifully brought her gaze to meet my own.
“Listen, I’m sorry for being a jerk,” I said. “We barely know each other and I’m already criticizing your outfits, and pushing you to tell me more about yourself, and reprimanding you for not having a favorite color. I’m gonna have to do better if we’re going to go through with this thing, so I promise to dial it back. Okay?”
She nodded, dropping her gaze to the table. “Okay,” she said. “Forgiven.”
Then she sighed, leaning back in her chair. “I don’t have a favorite color,” she admitted. “It’s too hard to choose.”
I tilted my head, frowning. “Too hard to choose?” I repeated.
One side of her mouth tilted up, a self-deprecating look. “Yeah.”
“Care to explain? Only if you want to,” I added.
She chewed on her bottom lip, the gesture reminding me about how full they were. I sat mesmerized by this simple action that led to a barrage of fantasies that included cupping her face and tracing her lips with my tongue. I shifted in my seat.
“It’s just that…there are so many,” she explained haltingly. “Colors, I mean. How does a person choose between the vibrant orange of a sunset and sapphire blue? Or between rich blood-red and cheerful lemon-yellow?
“And by the time I think I’ve settled on something, people have moved on to the next question, so it doesn’t matter what I choose. And my answer changes every time. So it became easier to say I’d never thought about it before. It confused people enough that they didn’t push me on it.”
“Because saying you didn’t have one would elicit more questions,” I guessed.
“Exactly.”
I nodded, picking up my spoon to eat more froyo. I laughed, though, when I looked into my cup. It was basically soup.
“I think I’m done with mine,” I said. “You ready to go?”
She shrugged. “Okay.”
We stood up and made our way to the bin, tossing out what was left of the froyo and heading out the door.
As we walked to her car, she turned to me, eyes inquisitive. “What’s your favorite color?” she asked.
I laughed, now seeing the question for what it was: my feeble attempt at making conversation with a woman who awed me more than I was expecting.
But I had no trouble answering. “Blue,” I said, smiling at the memory it elicited. “It was also my mom’s favorite color.”
I felt a dull ache start in my chest, and I rubbed my hand across it. Mom didn’t just love the color blue; she wore it every chance she got—in her outfits, on her engagement ring. Any holiday that had an inkling of blue gave her the chance to decorate with the color.
And it wasn’t just any blue. No, she loved royal blue—deep, rich—both cool and inviting. Just like her.
Ciara tilted her head, a question in her eyes, but she only said, “That’s a solid choice.”
We walked in silence for a moment before she looked up at the sky. “I wish I knew more about my mother,” she said softly. “She died when I was young.”
I murmured my condolences. “That must have been hard, to be a girl without her mom,” I said. “How old were you when she died?”
“Seven.” She blew a quiet breath into the air, the smoke curling in front of us. “My family’s not that big—my dad only has one brother, and my mom was an only child—so any female relatives I have are second and third cousins, and they’re much older. And they’re all out of state. My family’s originally from Georgia.”
