"Oh my God, if you say you do, we are not finishing this date," Julie stated, turning around and looking at Aaron, eyebrows as high as they could go.
He raised his eyebrows in response and said, "Me? No, I don't think she is personally. She's… totally unattractive to me, but when I'm hiring waitresses… in the back of my mind, yeah, I might consider how the average customer might… You know what, never mind. Let's make a bear."
Julie made an exaggerated pout, then she turned around and picked another bear skin out of the bin. Turning back around, she held them both up. "Which one do you like?"
He glanced between both of them and then pointed to the one in her right hand. "I think that one."
"Okay," she said with a nod. "I like this one too. And yes, the bubbly blonde is attractive."
Smiling, he said, "We have dropped the subject."
Sighing, she said, "We don't have to drop the subject. I'm just… not used to you, I'm used to Jack, and if I went out on a date with Jack and he saw a girl he found reasonably attractive he had absolutely no problem telling me just how hot he finds her. It has always made me crazy, even back when we were friends and not really dating. But you're not Jack, and you're not going to sleep with her, so… you're right. She's very pretty, she's very friendly, and she would probably make a very good waitress. Now, let's go stuff the bear."
"Hey," he said, lightly grabbing her around the waist and pulling her back, leaning around her shoulder and placing a little kiss on her cheek. "I have no interest in anyone but you, Julie."
Grinning, she said, "I know. And I'm sorry if now and in the future we have little moments like that where a trigger of mine is… pushed."
"Hey, we all have triggers. I'm hardly the most trigger-free guy in the world. If someone says the name Matt even talking to someone else, I feel every nerve in my body tense."
"Well, at least we can be freaks together."
Chuckling, he said, "There's your silver lining."
With a smile, Julie took his hand and hauled him back to finish making their bear.
---
Aaron took Julie and their new bear named Poppy Seed back to the car after Build-A-Bear, then he hauled them away from Navy Pier and onto the second portion of their date.
"So, where are you taking me now?" she asked, taking his hand as they walked up the sidewalk. "Crib-shopping?"
Smiling, he said, "No, this is the more traditional part of our date. I hope you're hungry."
"Mm," she said, rubbing her tummy. "I'm pregnant; I'm always hungry."
"When you're not nauseated, you mean?"
"Eh, the baby is being very good recently. Hopefully I'm on my way out of morning sickness."
Glancing down at his feet, he ventured to say, "You know, we should probably start going through places. I know it seems like we still have a while before the baby comes, but there's paperwork to take care of once we find a place you actually like, the nursery and everything needs to be decorated, our stuff needs to be moved…"
"I thought we had already discussed that it's too soon for that."
"But I don't think it is," he disagreed. "And next month I'm opening up Flavor; I'm not going to have a lot of spare time to go apartment hunting. I was hoping we could get started on that soon, that way if we find something we both like, we can start the ball rolling."
"Well… I haven't been looking or anything, I thought we still had a lot of time."
"I found one you might like. I actually stumbled across it on accident," he admitted.
"Oh yeah? How's that?" she asked curiously.
"Well, I was looking at this other property from a guy I know—he's in the middle of a pretty ugly divorce and he was selling this space cheap to free up some money, so he was showing it to me to consider buying it off him. Anyway, the realtor and I got to talking and I told him about my situation and needing a bigger place, and he suggested this nice little two bedroom condo. I saw the print-out, it looks really cute, he said it's bright inside, everything is really nice, and… I don't know, I thought it was something you might be interested in."
Frowning, she said, "You're buying another space?"
"I already did. I had to, the deal was too good to pass up. It's eight apartment units and two retail units and he sold it to me dirt cheap. The apartments needed some work—I've actually already been over there and fixed some of it when I was trying to avoid you—but I already have one of them rented out, one of them that I just cleaned up I already have someone scheduled to go through, and… I mean, it was a golden investment."
"Are they livable?"