Page 41 of Experiments in Offline Dating

Don’t even try to convince me.”

He couldn’t possibly be implying that he—volcano incarnate—was supposed to join us across Ireland . . . for THREE WHOLE WEEKS!

“Convince you? Of what? For you to invite yourself on my all-Ireland date-athon with Jackie? Why the hell would I want you there?”

He didn’t seem to be hearing me. “In case I wasn’t clear enough before, I’d be perfectly happy never seeing you again. And yet you keep popping up like an itchy rash. And this is two times now. Two times too many!”

“Okay. First of all, you should probably see a doctor, it sounds like you have a fungal problem. Secondly, let’s back up just a minute. I happen to be staying in your village—population twelve. We were statistically fated to awkwardly bump into each other at least once or twice. It’s not like you caught me climbing your trellis with a pair of binoculars.”

“This is every bit as chilling.”

“Oh, come on. Don’t overdo it.”

He leaned in. “I’m underdoing it. Did you two plan this together, you weasels?”

“Plan this? As in plan to see you again? Why would I want to see you again? Get over yourself! Okay, sure, so you’re not completely hideous to look at, but you act like you have a wasps’ nest crammed up your backside and you’re charging rent.”

“If I act like that every time I see you, that’s because you’re the wasp up my arse, you wagon! I think you’re the rudest person I’ve ever met. You told me, on our first meeting, that I was a sheep fucker and my dick needed vitamins.”

“I thought we were flirting! I’ve already explained this and apologized, but you can’t get over it. That makes you the asshole here, not me!”

His eyes went wide as if he’d never heard anything stupider in all his life, and in the sun, I noticed that his eyes were green, actually—a dark green with little gold flecks that glittered with loathing.

“How in the bleeding hell could you have thought—All right. You know what? I’m not doing this. We’re done here. Go back to the cottage, this is officially over. I’m calling the trip off.”

He dug around in his pocket, pulled out a phone, and dialed.

“What the hell is this?” he shouted down the phone. “What was your plan here, eh? Well, you can forget about it. No. No, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t care what favors I owe you, you old bastard. You can find somebody else to take her.”

“Is that Jackie? Where is he?” He was at least an hour late now.

“No. I won’t.” A pause. “You take her, then.” I frowned, suddenly uneasy. “You told me she was a sweet old lady, not . . . her, of all people! Yes, you did! You implied it. I can’t even believe you! You’ve gone too far this time, old man . . .” What was that? Is he speaking Irish? And then he flipped right back to English. “No. You can feck right off, you troublemaking wee hellion! I’ll throttle you for this!”

“Hey! Cool it! Don’t talk to Jackie like that.”

He spun around in the gravel to glare at me, and his face stopped me in my tracks. His voice was a low growl, almost a whisper. “Oh, I’ll talk to him however I goddamn please, and thank you to keep your nose out of it.” Then he went back to his phone call. “No. She doesn’t want it either. She thinks you’re taking her!” He sighed. “No. It’s a no!” He paced a bit more and listened. “Ugh. Fine. Here.” He took a big step toward me, and I stepped back in case he should have a shank, but he only held the phone out. “He wants to talk to you.”

“Yeah, okay.” I took the phone from his big angry paw. “It might be nice to talk to someone who doesn’t act like they started their morning with a Tabasco enema.”

“Oh, I’m sure he’ll be all charm and smiles for ye.”

I turned my back on him. “Hey, Jackie? You okay? What’s going on?”

“Well, hulloo, Maya.” He crooned this, as if it were just the loveliest coincidence to hear my voice. It was nice to hear his voice too. His sugar-sweet Irish lilt settled my trepidation right down.

“Jackie. Where are you?”

“Oh, well, not to worry, but I just got held up here with some things. There’s been a little change of plan. Nothing to worry over.”

“What do you mean, a little change of plan?”

Alarm bells. I had been hoping, with every ounce of hope that I could scrape from the very pit of my soul, that this maladjusted Minotaur was somehow mistaken. That certainly no one did—or ever could—expect me to travel with him. It would be like locking myself in a portapotty with a cocaine bear.

“Well, there’s so much going on here with the festival and all, and I just can’t wriggle free, as much as I’ve tried. So Tadhg is going to take you on your little trip instead. Won’t that be nice?”

“What? No, Jackie. That would not be nice! That’s not what we planned. I want to travel with you.”

“I’m sorry, Maya. I would love that, I really would. But I’m just too tied up here.”