Ask Me If I Care (SWAT Generation 2.0 4)

“I need help,” I said, sounding a bit desperate. “I have this dinner tonight with a man. A man that says we’re dating. But it’s with the SWAT team, and there are going to be other women there. So it’s not a date, really. Just a get together… what do I wear?”

“Wait, wait, wait. Back up,” Way said. “There is so much there that I have to process. Let’s start with my first question. There’s a man that says you’re dating?”

I licked my lips nervously.

“See, it goes like this…” I said, telling her about what happened at the school the other day.

“Is this the same man that you couldn’t stop staring at during the police banquet? The one that hangs up in your office that you refuse to change to any other months?”

I felt my face flush.

“Yes,” I said softly. “That’s him.”

“Whew, boy,” she said. “Okay. So what are your options on what to wear? I mean, I know that you’d much rather wear sweats and all but you can’t. Not if you ever want your vagina touched again.”

I choked. “Calloway, Jesus.”

She snickered.

Calloway didn’t have a filter. Even worse, she didn’t feel regret when she pissed people off.

That was what made her such a good journalist.

Oh, and also a bad one.

Sometimes she didn’t care who she hurt in the pursuit of a story.

Calloway wrote and managed a magazine called ‘Hero’ in her spare time. In her magazine she focused on firefighters, and paramedics, as well as all public service professions and all military. She tried to bring light to the struggle of the professions and make sure that everyone could get their story heard. Meaning, sometimes she stepped on toes when it was needed.

“On top of that, he asked me to wear my hair down and curly for him,” I said. “I don’t wear my hair curly…ever.”

“Well,” she said into the silence. “He had to have seen you with your hair down and curly to know that it was curly in the first place.”

She had a point.

“And he had to have liked it,” she continued.

I sighed.

“I honestly don’t see why you don’t like it.” She paused. “Wear it down. What’s it going to hurt?”

It wasn’t going to hurt per se, but it was going to feel incredibly awkward. Not to mention I knew half the men on the SWAT team, and those that I didn’t, knew of me because of my dad or my brother.

This needed to go smoothly.

“Where are you going to eat?” she asked.

I moaned. “I didn’t think to ask.”

“Hmm,” she said. “Can you text him? Find out?”

I could.

“Yes,” I answered.

“Then do that,” she ordered. “And play it safe. Don’t sound overly eager. And don’t sound awkward. Just say something simple and to the point.”

Ares: Where are we going?

Ares: Not that it matters. I’m just trying to find the best outfit to wear.

Ares: I’m leaning toward sweatpants. Sweatpants make me happy.

Ares: They have a stretchy waistband in case I want to eat a lot.

Ares: Not that I’ll embarrass you or anything. I’ll try to control my hunger.

Ares: Unless you say El Sombrero. If that’s the place we’re going, I have zero control there. Like, I’m talking fat kid in a candy shop no control.

Ares: Maybe we should just reschedule?

Ares: Yes, that’s the best option, I think. Maybe come see me afterward?

Ares: Not that I’m inviting you to my house for anything nefarious.

Ares: Unless you wanted to do something nefarious with me.

Ares: I’m done now.

I slapped my hand over my face and cursed myself.

Then I placed the phone back to my ear and said, “Texting him was a mistake.”

Calloway was already laughing her ass off.

She knew based solely on how long it took me to get back on the phone that I’d gone overboard.

My phone beeped during her guffawing, and I couldn’t scrounge up the courage to look at the message.

“He messaged me back.” I moaned, dropping down face first onto the bed.

“What did you say to him?” she asked, giggling now.

I gave her a recap of what I’d said, ending with a moan of embarrassment.

“Just look at the message,” she ordered.

I reluctantly propped myself up onto one arm, put the phone onto speaker, and cringed visibly as I went into the messages.

Hayes: Sorry to burst your bubble, but I’ll still be there as soon as I get off. Sadly, or maybe good, it is at El Sombrero. We have the whole back room. Wear the sweats. I’m going to be wearing mine.

He’d handled my awkwardness well.

“He said I can wear my sweatpants. We’re going to eat at the bane of my existence, and that we at least have some privacy so that I can embarrass myself in secret,” I said to Calloway.

She snorted.

“Wear the sweatpants,” she ordered. “He flat out gave you permission. And you’re going to overthink everything else.”