But I don’t ask any of those things, because that’s not the conversation we’re having or going to have.
Instead, I return to her other question, answering as best I can. “I suppose I better make that GoodinBed profile tonight.”
“Are you ready to take the plunge?”
Am I? That’s a damn good question.
“As ready as I can be.” I pat where the pockets would be on my bike shorts, as if checking for my keys and wallet. “Small talk? Check. Questions about the other person? Check. Skin as thick as a rhino’s? Check.”
Chuckling, she shakes her head. “Ability to make a rhino sound both appealing and off-putting? Check.”
“I guess I am ready, then.” I try to imagine what this great dating escapade will look like as I admit to the ladies of the apps that I hate green beans and love brownies and enjoy a good audiobook on science and live for long, punishing bike rides that make my thighs scream and clear my mind of whatever is weighing on it.
A hard ride is blissful oblivion.
Except today, for some reason, with the trip down relationship memory lane. But thoughts of love and dating have dug in deep, and they’re hard to bat away when they’re tied to my plans for the near future.
“You’re brave, Liam,” she says, her voice kind, almost like a gentle caress.
“How’s that?” I ask.
“For putting yourself out there.” I look for sarcasm, but it seems to be a true and earnest compliment.
I like the sound of it. I like the feel of it. “You think so?”
“I do. It takes courage to be honest about what you want, like you were with me at IKEA.” Her smile is so warm, so inviting. It’s like the blue sky above.
But am I braver than her? Than this woman standing in her garden, who’s been equally forthright? “You’re honest too. About what you want, what you don’t want.”
She simply shrugs and shakes her head. “I don’t know. It seems easier to shut down an idea than to open up to one. Is it courageous to say I’m not interested?”
I nod, and keep nodding, like the movement of my head can underscore the truth of my words. “Yes. I think it is. Knowing and saying what you don’t want is just as brave. Maybe more.”
She lifts her chin, looking a little bit proud, and taps me on the shoulder in playful acknowledgment. “Then, we’re both brave.”
“We’ll be brave together, just in different ways.”
“Yes. I’ll hold down Fort Single, and you trek into the dating wilds,” she says, sweeping her arm out wide as if to indicate the rocky terrain I’m about to traverse.
Rocky indeed. “Sounds like a plan.”
That evening, I find a white Pyrex dish on my porch with a note affixed to it. I unfold the paper, an unexpected warmth bursting in my chest chased by a widening smile as I read, “I promise these will melt in your mouth. They are a guaranteed tastegasm.”
I laugh, reading the note one more time, staring at the curves in her handwriting, the deliberate neatness of it. She writes like I bet she builds cabinets—determined, orderly, and organized, but with a little bit of flair and panache.
Flair? Panache?
What the bloody hell?
What am I now? A crime scene investigator? A handwriting analyst?
I blink the thoughts away, take the offending vegetables inside, and then serve them to Ethan at dinnertime.
He surveys them skeptically, but he’s more daring with this food group than I am, so he takes a bite and murmurs, “These are strangely . . . sort of kind of good.”
That is as big a seal of approval as one can get, especially coming from the tween.
I try them next, considering the flavors as I chew. They’re subtle but tasty too.
Melt in my mouth? No.
But they are strangely sort of kind of good.
“You are correct,” I say. “Shall I serve you these every night?”
“Hmm. Maybe not every night. Unless we can have dessert too.”
“Brilliant idea. How about we bake brownies?”
His answer is a resounding yes.
After we finish dinner and clean up, we mix the batter, him dropping a dollop of the chocolate mixture onto my nose and me doing the same to him. Naturally, that requires a photo, so I snag my mobile, snap a shot, then send it to Aunt Jane.
Her reply is swift.
* * *
Aunt Jane: Send some of those brownies straightaway! Also, give that boy a kiss from me.
* * *
Liam: Brownies in the mail as we speak. Kisses commencing in 3, 2, 1 . . .
* * *
I set the phone down.
“Want to know the only thing better than baking brownies in August?” I ask Ethan.
“Sure. Tell me.”
“Swimming while they cook.”
“That’s dope,” he declares.
Once we put the batter in the oven, we’re the dopest as we race each other out to the pool. He cannonballs, then splashes me as I jackknife in. “You’re the rotten egg,” he shouts.
