Someone Like You
Teddy thought about that. She was confused about her reasons for considering the Marriage Pact. She’d never wanted to be married in the past. Even though she loved the planning of someone else’s wedding, she’d never thought of doing it for herself. So Adam should be a perfect candidate in her life. He didn’t like weddings, didn’t want to have anything to do with happily ever after. So why didn’t Teddy just take him up on the Marriage Pact and fall in with his plans? It would make everyone happy. Did she really want to continue seeing Adam? Granted, if she’d met him on her own, she’d have no problem going out with him. But in her usual manner, as Diana put it, Teddy would quickly move on to someone else.
There was a certain chemistry between them. Teddy felt it. Her mouth tingled just thinking about the kiss the two of them had shared. Was that the reason? Was she afraid of spending time with him? They could become close. Was that so bad? Diana and Scott hadn’t begun on the best foot and they were happily married now. Was Teddy protecting herself, putting up barriers to prevent her life from changing?
Neither she nor Adam really needed to fall in with their parents’ wishes. She was her own woman, with her own needs and plans. So why was she so undecided about Adam?
* * *
Adam stared at himself in his bedroom mirror. Who was this guy, he mentally asked himself? He’d never acted this way before. He liked Teddy. He really liked her. And that was his problem. He really liked her. In fact, he felt as if his feelings were morphing into something else, something more. It didn’t make any sense. If there had been a lineup of beautiful women before him, Adam would never have selected her as someone he wanted to get to know, but he did want to know her.
Grabbing a sweater from the drawer, he shrugged into it, dropping the one he’d spilled beer on in the hamper. Then he went into the kitchen and popped the top off another can of beer. Joining his brother in front of the big-screen television in his family room, he dropped down next to him and tossed him a can.
There was a baseball game on ESPN and Quinn was watching it. The moment he arrived, he went straight for the TV and turned on the game. When Adam joined him, he took his eyes away from the screen for a moment. Quinn was the athletic brother. He not only watched every sporting event possible, but in high school and college, he played baseball and tennis, and competed in track. He was still active in tennis and jogged several miles a day. Adam didn’t envy him his biceps. Adam had his own workout routine that could rival his brother’s.
Adam knew Quinn had been observing him closely for the past few days. He didn’t think he’d changed since he and Teddy talked about their Marriage Pact, but he knew his observant brother must have noticed a change in him. Anything that removed Quinn’s attention from a game in progress had to be important.
“What are you thinking?” Adam asked.
“That something is wrong with you.”
“I’m fine,” Adam said.
“Since Mom fixed you up with that blind date, you haven’t been the same.”
“Which blind date? There have been several. Often I can get out of them.” Adam knew the routine with his mother. She would call, pretend to ask him something about investing or going through some amount of small talk, before mentioning that she’d run in to so-and-so from his past or that she’d met a very nice woman who was unattached and who would like to meet him.
Other than giving her an out-and-out no, which he’d done on one occasion, he put them off by telling her he already had a date. Sometimes that was true. Sometimes he then found a date to make the lie come true.
“You know which date,” Quinn said. “The one you had a few weeks ago.”
Adam took a sip of beer. “How have I been different?”
“You’re quieter.”
“Aren’t you the one who’s always telling me to be quiet so you can hear the television?” Adam said, glancing at the TV screen, and sipped his beer to cover the uncomfortable feeling that washed over him.
“I never thought you’d actually do it.”
“I’m getting older…and wiser.”
“Nope,” Quinn said.