by J. S. Cooper
I glared at him. "Yes, that's what I just said, right?"
"Why didn't you want me to know?"
"Maybe because it's none of your business … and maybe because you'd tell my brother."
"Uh, why would I tell Derrick?"
"Because he's your best friend, and you always tell him everything that I do. And I really don't need him knowing because I know if he knows, then he'll call my mom and dad, and then my mom and dad will call me, and they'll ask me am I sure that it's safe to go speed dating. Who are the guys at the speed-dating event? Are they murderers? Are they kidnappers? Are they rapists? And I'll have to say, 'I don't know, Mom. I don't know, Dad, because I've never met them before because if I'd met them before, we wouldn't be at a speed-dating event. We'd be on a regular date.'"
"Whoa there, Tiger. You need to slow down. It's fine. I'm not going to tell Derrick anything."
"Okay, well, I just remembered when we were kids, whenever you found out something about me, you would always go and tell Derrick and he would always tell my parents."
"I did not."
"Um, you don't remember every single time that I had a date or was going to go to a party, you would tell Derrick and then he'd tell my parents, and then I'd get in trouble, and I couldn't go to the party or make my date?"
He shook his head. "Nope, doesn't ring a bell."
"Of course it wouldn't ring a bell you because your mouth is so big. You most probably were always talking about everyone's business to everyone."
"Ha ha, Olivia. We're older now. You don't have to worry what your parents are going to say, right?"
"No, I don't worry about what my parents say, but I really don't need them in my business."
"Okay, okay. I get it." He then looked down at the dress in my hand. "Hold it up. Let me see it better."
A little reluctantly, I held it up and pressed it against my body so he could see what it would look like on me.
He studied the dress. "It’s really beautiful but pretty sexy. Are you sure you want to wear something like that to a speed dating event?"
I frowned at his comment, "Why wouldn't I want to wear this to a speed dating event?"
"I'm just saying you don't want to give off the wrong vibe."
"What do you mean, give off the wrong vibe? What vibe does this dress give off?"
"Well, it kind of says that you're looking for a good time."
"What about this dress says I'm looking for a good time?"
"It looks like it's going to be really tight on you." He looked my body up and down, and I shivered slightly.
"It's not tight. Trust me. If I wanted to wear a tight dress, I have much tighter dresses and much sluttier dresses that I could wear than this."
"Mm, that sounds interesting." He licked his lips. "Care to show me?"
"No, I don't think so. I'm not going to be showing you anything. And are you done in the shower because I need to go in myself and get ready."
He nodded slowly and smiled. "Yes, I'm ready, Olivia. Go and get ready for your speed-dating event. Where is it going to be, exactly?"
"Uh, why do you need to know that?"
"I don't need to know that. I’d just like to know. But okay, fine. That's okay. You don’t have to tell me, okay?"
I smirked. "You just said "okay" three times."
"How okay do you really think it is?" He chuckled. “Is it really okay, just okay, or kinda okay?”
"Tyler, why are you talking in circles?"
"Olivia, why are you talking in circles?"
"You’re so annoying. I'm going in the shower now. I'll see you later."
And with that, I stomped into the bathroom. Tyler was really beginning to get on my nerves. The sad part was that I was beginning to enjoy our childish banter.
"I'll be sitting right here on the couch watching TV waiting for you to come out!" he called after me.
"Okay!"
I shut the bathroom door behind me, unable to keep from smiling to myself.
"Hey there, Olivia. There you are!" Birdy ran up to me, her long blonde hair flying behind her as she came down the street. “I was so worried you wouldn’t make it.”
"Hey, Birdy. I'm here. You didn't have to worry," I replied, a little distracted. I was feeling slightly nervous about the event we were going to go into.
"I wasn't sure if you were going to show up," she said with a small smile, "now that your brother and his hot friend are in town."
"I told you I'd come, so I'm here."
"So, how's it going with the hot friend?"
"Oh, do not get me started. He's such an asshole. There's nothing hot about him."
"Really? From what I saw, he's really, really good-looking."
"I wouldn't say he's really, really good-looking. He's just okay." And then I smiled to myself. He was a lot more than “just okay.”
"Well, how would you describe him, then?" Birdy asked.
"I don't know. About 6'3", golden blond hair, blue eyes, tanned skin, white teeth, really fit body, six-pack …"
"Yeah, you really don't know anything about him, do you?" She laughed.
"Ha ha, Birdy. Come on. Let's go inside and get this thing over with."
When we walked into the bar, I noticed a lot of women, but I was dismayed to see that there weren’t very many men. I had a bad feeling that this wasn't going to be the speed-dating event that changed my dating life.
A lady walked to the middle of the room and clapped her hands for attention. "Hey, guys, if you're here for the speed dating event, please come listen up! We'll be starting in about 10 minutes. If you want, you can go and get a drink from the bar. I'm going to have the ladies come to the left when they've got their drink and then gentlemen who are here for the speed dating event, you can go to the right. If there are any gentlemen here that are just at the bar and haven't signed up for the speed-dating event, it’s not too late to sign up. We still have some spots available for men, and it's only $20 for the night."
I looked at Birdy and she looked at me, and we gave each other dry smiles. It wasn't a good sign that they were trying to sign up more men. But it was just for fun. We'd see what happened.
We walked over to the bar and Birdy offered to buy me a drink. "What do you want, girl? Sex on the beach?"
"No, maybe a rum and Coke."
"You always get rum and cokes. They don't do anything to you."
"What do you mean they don't do anything to me?"
"They don't get you drunk. We need to get you drunk and loosened up so you can have a good night. You seem awfully tense."
"I'm not tense. I'm going to have fun."
"I know you want to have fun, but you don't seem like you're going to. Ever since what's-his-name Tyler's been in town, you've been kind of anxious."
"Uh, I wouldn't say that but fine. Get me a margarita."
"Okay, then. And what about shots first?"
"Um, if you want to do shots, sure."
"Yeah, let's do some shots. Let's get this party started tonight!"
"Okay, Birdy, but we don't want things to go too crazy. We're just here to meet a nice guy. We're not here to have sex in the back with some rando."
"Ha ha, Olivia. I'm not the sort of girl that would have sex in the back. If I'm going to have sex with one of these guys tonight, it's going to be in the penthouse suite in some swanky hotel in Union Square. Hey!" She waved cheerfully at the bartender, and I suspected that she'd already had a few drinks.
So, Birdy was already off the chain, and I had a feeling that the more drinks she had, the crazier this evening was going to get. I didn't want to let her know that the reason I didn't want to get drunk had nothing to do with the guys at the bar. It had to do with the guy back in the apartment, Tyler. I was afraid that if I got too drunk, my walls would come down and Tyler and I might do something that we'd regret in the morning.
"Okay, here's your drink, girl." Birdy passed me a shot and we downed them quickly. She then handed me my margarita and I took a s
ip. It was strong. That was a lot of tequila, and it was going to go right to my head.
"Okay, ladies. Okay, come, come, come!” The lady who was organizing the speed-dating event called everyone. “Now, you see all the tables over there? All you ladies take a seat on one side. You’ll see the side you’re meant to sit at because there’s a rose. That means there’s a rose for every lady. Sorry, guys, no roses for you tonight except the women that you might make yours.” She giggled, and I rolled my eyes.
Birdy looked over at me and grinned. "Tonight is going to be one fun night," she said.
I nodded politely. I wasn't exactly in agreement with her.
I walked over to the side of the room and took a seat at one of the tables in the middle. Birdy sat on the table to my left and smoothed down her dress, and we waited for the lady to continue speaking.
"Okay, guys, now you can see there are 15 ladies here, and there are only 8 guys. That is a little bit of a problem because we really wanted one guy for one girl during each of these dates. Well, ha ha, mini-dates are what we call them. Well, because we don't have enough guys here, some of the girls are going to have to be by themselves for a little bit. That's okay, girls, because you can write down questions that you have for the guys when they come and talk to you. And what we're going to do is—Oh, wait! Hold on! Hold on, everyone. I'm getting a text message here. It looks like one of my coworkers has been able to find some more guys. Yay, thank you, everyone. Okay, so we're actually going to hold on for a couple of minutes, and some more guys will be coming. We'll actually be able to do one-on-one dates, so it will work out perfectly. Thank you."
She stopped talking and walked away, and I looked over to Birdy. "Birdy, this sounds like it's going to be a hot mess. Where did they just get these new guys from?"
Birdy shrugged, "I don't know. Google? Twitter? Uber? You know there are so many software engineers here in the city. They're dying for girls like us."
"I don't think they're dying for girls like us, Birdy, and I'm sure not dying for them, either. I do not want to date a software engineer."
"Well, then you're living in the wrong city, girlfriend," she laughed and sat back in her chair.
I wondered if she was right. I really didn't think that San Francisco was the right city for me when it came to dating. Too many men were software engineers who didn't know how to communicate. They didn't know how to dance. They didn't know how to just go out and have fun. I missed that about Florida. I missed going to the club on a Friday night and then to the beach on a Saturday. I missed going to museums and bookstores and talking about films and astrology. Just all the little things that made me tick. Guys here only wanted to talk about computers or startups or how much money they got when they sold their last IPO. That meant nothing to me.
I thought about Tyler and my brother back in Florida and how my life would be different if I was there and hanging out with them.
Then I had to admit that I was really only thinking about Tyler. What would it be like to live in the same city as him? We could hang out together on a weekly basis. Maybe go to dinners. Maybe at restaurants. Maybe at home. Maybe we'd have more of a one-on-one relationship.
That scared me because I could still remember the young girl who had fallen in love with him thinking that he would be her true love. I didn't want to be that girl anymore. I needed to move on with my life, to meet someone and love someone who could love me back, who didn't just care about sleeping around with as many women as possible. I needed to meet a man who could marry me and have kids with me and wanted a family.
I knew from Derrick that Tyler didn't want that. He just played the field. He didn't settle down with any girl. All he seemed to want was sex, sex, and sex. And while that might be enough for him, it wouldn't be enough for me.
I felt a hint of jealousy as I thought about him. Why hadn't he ever been interested in me? Why hadn't he wanted me? Why hadn't he touched me on the side of the face and looked me in the eyes and said, "Olivia, you're the one I've been dreaming about all my life. Make me the happiest man in the world. Be my girlfriend"?
I half-laughed at myself as I thought about those thoughts in my head. Did I really want Tyler to be in my life in that way? Honestly, I didn't know the answer to that. Maybe I did and maybe I didn't. I was attracted to him, that was for sure. And I did have fun with him. We had banter that I've never had with anyone else, maybe because we’d grown up together.
His family and my family were friends. His parents were the most amazing people I knew outside of my family. And it didn't matter that I was black and that he was white because at the end of the day we came from the same world. I'd never looked at him as a white man, and I don't think he'd ever looked at me as a black woman. I just looked at him as Tyler, my brother's best friend, my tormenter, my first crush, and I think he just looked at me as Olivia, his best friend's little sister, the annoying little brat who would tell on him when he did something bad. And that was really cool. That was really special. That was something that you didn't find every day.
"Oh, my gosh, Olivia," I muttered under my breath, "Stop thinking about Tyler."
I needed to focus on tonight. I looked around at the guys who were waiting for the dates, and I determined that I was going to find at least one of them attractive and go on a date. I had to. I needed to go on a date with someone new to get my mind off of Tyler. And hopefully, by opening myself up to someone new, I’d find the love of my life.
Chapter 10
Tyler
* * *
"Tyler, man. What are you doing?"
"I'm just here, hanging out at Olivia's place."
"Why don't you come and get a drink with me and Tiffany?" Derrick's voice boomed down the phone and I could hear the sound of laughter in the background.
"No, it's okay. I'm comfortable here. I'm just on the couch watching TV."
"Come on, man. You cannot sit in my sister's apartment tonight by yourself while she goes out speed dating. Come on. Do you want to be a loser?"
"No, I don't want to be a loser, but I also don't want to be the third wheel with you and Tiffany."
"Tyler, come on. Let's have some fun. I've barely seen you at all in the last two years."
"I've been busy with work," I said quickly, not wanting him to question me too much.
"I know. But there was a period of like nine months that I didn't see you at all. You need to quit that job or something, it's coming between you and your life."
"It's not coming between me and my life. It is my life. That's how I make money."
"How much money do you need? What's the point of having a lot of money if you have no life?"
"Well, I have a life, and that's really all there is to it. Okay, I got to go Derrick." I hung up quickly and sat back on the couch, sweat beading on my forehead.
Our conversation had hit a nerve. Derrick didn't know my secret and a part of me was ashamed that I’d kept it from him. How could I have not told my best friend? How could I have let him think that my being so busy these last two years had been all about work? I knew that if I told him he'd be upset and worried. And I didn't want that for my friend. I was better now, so did it really matter that I hadn’t told him?
I felt conflicted, so I jumped up off of the couch and looked out of the window. I could hear the sound of sirens and cars going past, people were talking as they walked down the street. Derrick was right. I shouldn't just sit in Olivia's apartment, waiting for her to come home and wondering what was happening at the speed-dating event. I couldn’t spend the evening wondering if she was going to meet someone. I needed to be proactive. If I wanted Olivia to be my girl, I needed to make sure that she knew it. An idea came to my head and I grabbed my phone quickly. I searched Google for speed dating events in San Francisco, and four popped up. I was going to find each and every one of these events and see which one Olivia was attending. I had to make sure that she didn't go home with another man. Her friend Birdy seemed like a bad influence and I didn’t t
rust her to stop Olivia from making bad decisions.
Of course, Olivia would kill me if she knew what I was planning, but I didn't care. Sometimes you had to fight dirty when it came to love, and I was fast realizing that Olivia was in my heart and that I wanted a real future with her.
I hurried to the bathroom and brushed my hair and put on some cologne. I studied my reflection and wondered if I should change. I was wearing a gray t-shirt and jeans. I didn't look bad, but I wanted to make more of an impression. I pulled off my t-shirt really quickly and paused as I realized how much definition I’d lost in my chest. I was looking even gaunter than I thought. I’d have to pick it up at the gym.
Olivia hadn’t noticed just how skinny I’d gotten, thank God. I turned around and walked over to my bag and pulled out a crisp white shirt and put it on, and then I walked back to the bathroom to look at my reflection in the mirror. Okay, the jeans didn’t look so bad with the white shirt, now. This would do. I looked good, I looked hot. I looked like someone Olivia couldn’t say no to.
I left quickly, grabbing the keys off of the side of the table before I left. Olivia would kill me if I walked out without the spare pair of keys and had no way to get back in. In the elevator, I checked the different addresses in Google Maps and decided to go to the speed-dating event that was closest. That would be smart for Olivia to do. I mean, why wouldn't she go to the speed-dating event that was close to her house? But then I remembered she was going with her friend Birdy, and I had no idea where Birdy lived. If Birdy had chosen the venue, then it could very easily be one that was farthest away.
I hurried to the first venue, which was an old pub that sat on the corner of a dirty looking street. As soon as I walked in, I knew that this was not going to be the location that Olivia and Birdy were at. It was loud and noisy, and it looked like there were a lot of frat guys. Not Olivia's scene at all. I gave a quick survey of the room just to make sure she wasn't there and then headed out. I looked at Google Maps again and saw that the next venue was about a 10-minute walk away and was about to start.
