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Thoughtfully, I reveal, “Mom and sister, Olivia. She’s sixteen and giving my mom hell, but she’s a good kid. Mostly... sometimes.” I chuckle at the too-accurate correction. “My mom’s amazing, though, especially now that she’s getting her groove back, Stella-style.”
“Good for her. What about your dad?” Chance asks carefully.
“He’s in the area, but he left us as I was starting college. Married his mistress who’s basically my age. I haven’t seen him in a long time.” I know my voice has gone flat. I can hear it myself as I basically quote facts about my father as though I have no personal ties to him. I might as well be giving a general description—six foot-one, hundred and eighty pounds, likes steak, hates his family.
“I’m sorry,” Chance says, taking my hand. His thumb slips back and forth over the delicate skin between my thumb and index finger soothingly. “He doesn’t know what he’s missing.”
I try to brush it off. “I turned my give-a-shitter off where he’s concerned. But it did help me figure out that I wanted to go into psychology. Mom sent me and Olivia to therapy during the divorce, and I could feel how it helped me reframe some of my thinking, so that became the jumping point. Then, the whole idea of how something like sex—so simple, yet so complicated, something everyone does, and almost nobody does well—drew me in. Intimacy and relationship counseling became my focus.”
Chance mulls that over, then asks, “Are you hoping to repair other people’s relationships since you weren’t at a place to help your parents?”
Shell-shocked, my mouth drops open and I sputter, “No. That isnotwhat I’m doing. At all.”
I don’t like the allegation, but luckily for Chance, the waitress returns with our salad course. “Thank you,” I tell her quickly before she can jet away.
The slight break gives me an opportunity to calm down. It’s not the first time I’ve heard that. Hell, even Sara has told me that. But I don’t like that Chance could see it so easily. Am I that transparent?
“I just want to help people be happy. In themselves, in their relationships, and in their sex lives,” I amend. “And yeah, I saw my parents in happier times, but I also saw them unhappy. And though my dad’s in love with his wife now, it started with an affair. With sex.”
It’s as much as I can give. Maybe as much as I can admit to myself.
Chance senses that and shifts our conversation. We finish the course with lighter topics, getting to know each other with any deep, dark, past trauma left in the rearview mirror. It’s easy first date stuff, likes (corndogs), dislikes (ripped jeans), loves (hot baths) and guttural hatreds (Pop Smoke).
And it’s fun. Chance is funnier than I expect him to be, and not at all caught up in his own amazingness. If anything, I think there’s more of the nerdy boy in there than he’d care to admit.
“The fish is locally caught,” he tells me as the waitress brings our main entrees. “They pride themselves on using fresh, line caught, sustainable fish.”
“I wouldn’t know the difference if it was caught this morning, frozen a year ago, or Captain Gorton’s fish sticks on a fancy plate,” I quip, looking at the lightly battered filet in front of me. It’s accompanied by some green seaweed looking stuff and little boba-looking ball things that I’m pretty sure are caviar.
I take a bite, expecting heaven. But it’s... salty. Like licking a margarita glass rim salty. And I don’t like it. But I don’t want to be rude, to Chance or the Michelin chef, so I swallow it nearly whole and smile. “Mmm,” I hum as I grab for my wine glass.
I take a too-big glug and then redirect Chance, pointing at his plate, “How’s yours?” He ordered mushroom Wellington, some sort of vegetarian take on the beef version that has mushrooms, squash, kale, and farro. That dinner option lost me at mushroom—gross, little, dirty forest fungi—and I don’t know what faro is and didn't want to ask and embarrass myself.
“It’s delicious! Would you like a bite?” he offers.
I pick at my fish and smile. “No, thank you. Saving room for dessert.”
I move more of the food around on my plate than eat it, but I do manage to get a few bites of the fish down, without the seaweed and caviar, followed by big drinks of wine to drown the taste.
It’s too bad I don’t have tartar sauce or some ketchup for the fish filet. It might be slightly more palatable then. But something tells me asking for that would be akin to standing on the table and ripping my clothes off—completely inappropriate.
Thankfully, dessert is delicious, a black bean brownie topped with crème brûlée, and I dig into that with abandon as Chance explains that the dairy ingredients are ethically sourced, the sugar is fair trade, and the black beans are organic.
All I care is that they’re tastily filling up the hole in my belly because the tiny tofu square, weed salad, and three bites of fish I forced down aren’t gonna cut it for the evening I have planned.
Because there’s another hole I need filled too.
CHAPTER18
CHANCE
As we pull awayfromMacrosine, I rack my brain because there’s at least one more stop we need to make. I just need to figure out the closest location without alerting Samantha.
“Where are we going?” she asks, her head lolled over to the side so she can stare out the window at the night.
I smile to myself in anticipation, knowing my answer is going to wind her up. “It’s a surprise.”
Her head rolls toward me. “What?”
