Throughout her monologue, she sits, stands, adjusts her dress (which I don’t think she does because she notices me staring at her chest, but I can’t be sure), sits again, starts to take a sip from the empty highball glass that’s there, stops, realizing it’s not hers and it’s empty anyway, puts her bag over the left arm of the chair, takes it off, puts it over the right, pulls the chair forward, pushes it back, picks up a piece of baguette, puts it down, and then finally flops her head forward, letting her hair fall in front of her face.
Man, oh, man. I am so fucked.
“Hi,” I say, and smile.
She laughs a little. “Hi. Hi. Sorry. I just, I feel… Do you ever feel overwhelmed?”
“Everybody feels overwhelmed sometimes.”
“Do you?”
“Nah. Not particularly.”
She stares for a beat and then she laughs. She’s got a fantastic laugh. The waiter approaches.
“Monsieur. Mademoiselle. Shall I get another chair for the table?”
“Oh…” I start.
“Another chair?” asks Eden.
“Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, for, uh…”
“Or,” comes the voice from behind me, “You know what I could do? I could find her, fuck her, THEN sue her. I mean if the face is anything like the tits, then I should at least sample the wares. Apparently, she’s chock-a-block full of great sex tips. Jesus. Anyway. Hi. Who’s this?”
He looks at Eden. He looks at me. Eden smiles at him with a painful grin. Then Eden looks at me too. I look at them both. I start to speak. Then I stop. Then. Finally.
“You know what?” I say aloud to no one in particular. “I guess it’s possible for me to feel kind of overwhelmed sometimes.”
Sexpert Advice
CHAPTER NINE – EDEN
Fast-forward forty-five minutes. Because I don’t have it in me to describe this first-date disaster in minute detail. My boss is having a very bad day because some tart has stolen his idea, so just insert one long tirade about how anonymous me is ruining his life and there you have it.
It’s talk about trademarks, and he takes a call from his lawyer and has a three-minute conversation about how he’s going to sue the fucking pants off me once he figures out who I am, and then his steak comes while Andrew and I are ordering, so now that we’re back in present time, he’s throwing his napkin on the plate as he stands up.
I smile with relief. Because I have maybe thirty more seconds of this before he leaves.
“Eden,” he says.
“Yes?” I say, almost choking on my wine.
“It was a pleasure. Weird. But an absolute pleasure. I don’t know what’s going on here.” He pauses to do a back-and-forth finger wave at Andrew and me. “But it’s a good look for Andrew. And I get the feeling that me showing up early wasn’t in the plan, so I am acutely aware that I just ruined your date, and for that I apologize.” And then he reaches for my hand, kisses it, and lets go as I look nervously over at Andrew. “I just needed his ear. It’s the only ear I can count on. So thank you for indulging me.”
And for a second I wonder if he’s going to reach for Andrew’s hand and kiss it as well. But he doesn’t. He just points his finger at his friend and says, “Welcome to Colorado. Don’t worry, I’ve got the check. So you two kids just enjoy yourselves.”
We watch him leave, then our heads slowly turn and our eyes meet.
“Holy shit,” I say. Because that was stressful.
“Yeah,” Andrew says. “Um… So you run his social media?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“Because, uh, I don’t know if you noticed but…it seems like he doesn’t know who you are.”
“Yeah. I fly under the radar.” I smile and glance down at my plate.
“How’s your food?”
French food isn’t my thing but I got the coq au vin because it said chicken in parentheses. I just didn’t realize it was an entire jumbo leg. So while Pierce was lamenting his bad fortune at being the target of some massive conspiracy to ruin his life, I got nervous and started cutting up my meat into little pieces a toddler would be able to chew so I didn’t have to look at him.
Which is stupid. And ridiculous. But mostly embarrassing.
“It’s good,” I say, answering Andrew’s question as I scoop up some mashed potatoes with my fork and put it in my mouth.
I pause like that. And not because I’m trying to seduce him as I eat, either. He’s just… he’s looking at me like… “God, you’re kind of adorable.” And then he glances at my plate of tiny, bite-sized pieces of chicken and laughs.
I blush. I can feel it. My cheeks get hot. “Mmm-hmmm,” I say, swallowing my potatoes. I place my fork down and say, “Well…”
“Oh, are we done?” Andrew asks. “Because we’re going to have to do this again, of course. Properly next time with no third wheel. Um. Can I walk you home?”