Daphne Vs. Daddy

“So,” Becca asks as we stand on the curb, waiting for our Uber to show up, “have you heard from Mr. Sexy Outlaw lately?”

“No. We’re supposed to go on that date on Wednesday night, but I haven’t heard anything from him since yesterday.”

Not, of course that I have been checking my phone obsessively all day long to see if he’d called or texted me. I’m not desperate.

I have, however, checked occasionally…as long as the definition of “occasionally” is every five minutes. That, I’ve done.

I pull out my phone and check again. Nothing.

“He said he was going out of town for three days, so that’s probably why,” I say confidently.

“And wherever he’s going, they don’t have cell service?” Ashley asks with a cocked eyebrow.

I ignore that question. It was the same one that had been haunting me all day and quite frankly, I didn’t like the implications, so straight into the ignore category it went.

“God, the Uber is taking forever to get here,” Becca complains, looking up and down the busy street as if that’d magically summon the vehicle to us. She always was impatient.

Unlike you? a voice inside my head asks.

I ignore that question too.

“Have you Facebook stalked him?” Ashley asks, apparently also onboard with the Ignore Becca’s Impatience plan.

“No,” I say wonderingly, “I haven’t. Let’s do that right now!” I dig back into my purse, my heart racing with excitement again. I cannot believe I didn’t think to do that before now. Leave it to Ashley to think of these sorts of things.

“Okay,” I say, hitting the search button to bring up the search screen, “let’s see what Facebook has to say on the topic.”

I type in Carlton Caldwell and even, I’ll admit, Diesel Caldwell. Do outlaws have last names?

But, nothing.

How is that even possible?? Who doesn’t have a Facebook page? I scrunch up my nose, suddenly unsure about Diesel the Outlaw. What the fuck could we have in common if he didn’t even bother to have a Facebook page? I bet he doesn’t even have an Instagram account. I pull up the Instagram app and check.

Nope.

Wow. It’s like he’s from the 1980s or something.

“You should google him,” Becca suggests, still staring up and down the street of vehicles whizzing by, car horns honking…and not an Uber in sight. “He has to be on Google.”

“Oh, I like that,” I say, switching apps. “C’moooonnnnn Google. What do you have?”

I start thumbing down the list of results, scanning as I go. “Caldwell Corporation,” I mumble to myself. “God, what a boring name.”

Becca waits for the Uber, staring at her screen willing it the car to come faster while Ashley and I stare at my screen, reading through the articles.

“He’s a real estate guy?” I ask, disappointed. I want a caveman. I want a Viking. I want a man. I don’t want some guy who makes real estate deals while sipping high-end Scotch with a bunch of old white guys.

Like, ugh.

“Oh my god, the Caldwell family?” Ashley asks and starts laughing. “They vacay with the Kennedys, for fuck’s sakes. Every time those two families go to Martha’s Vineyard together, it hits all the tabloids. That’s your outlaw?”

I swear to god, if she’s starts crying with laughter, I’m gonna punch her in the nose. Or at least order decaf the next time I buy her coffee. She did that once to me, and I almost died that day.

She’s still laughing.

And…wiping away tears.

Oh yeah, definitely decaf revenge time.