“Why? Don’t want me buying you more things?” he smirked teasingly.
“Oh my…” I laughed and shook my head. “No. I think I’m good for today.”
“That’s fair,” he resigned. “But will you at least let me buy you dinner? I grew up in an old-fashioned household, and all those snacks don’t count as a meal as far as I’m concerned.”
I blushed and smiled, nodding. “Dinner sounds perfect.”
“Wanna just walk until we find something that looks good?” he grinned.
I nodded. “That also sounds perfect.”
“How’s this for the nicest thing somebody’s done for you?” he pried, offering me his arm.
“Definitely unmatched,” I told him, accepting it and starting along the stretch with him.
“We’ll see,” he mused. “I’d like to have another chance to one-up myself.”
I smiled at that, leaning my head against his arm as we walked. “I’d like that, too,” I admitted.
****
“How about here? The music sounds nice.” I said as we came across a restaurant that bordered the canal; a series of lanterns on a small wire creating a floating halo effect that only seemed to beckon us that much more.
He smiled and nodded, starting for the door and holding it open, “Here it will be then.”
Accepting the opened door with more grace this time, I nodded my thanks and stpped inside. A band, the source of the music we’d heard outside, was finishing up with the song that had lured us in and, as we were seated, a new one began. The tempo was steady but mood-setting, something I caught myself tapping my finger to almost instantly. I watched them a moment, letting myself decompress from everything the afternoon had shown me so far. I could see Jace looking back at me in my periphery, and the way that his eyes seemed to be tracing my face made me blush and look back at him. His already wide smile extended that much more as our eyes met, and I couldn’t help but smile back. Then, without a word wasted among us—it felt wonderful to just share a moment without the clutter of pointless chatter—he looked down at his menu. Then it was my turn to enjoy the way the light hit his face.
He was really too handsome for his own good.
“Any idea what you might want?” he asked without looking up.
I blushed and shook my head, “N-not yet…” I confessed, realizing I hadn’t even touched my own menu. “I was just taking a moment to enjoy the band.”
He glanced over his shoulder towards the stage and nodded, smiling, “They’re actually pretty good, aren’t they?”
“‘Actually’?” I repeated in a mocking tone. “What? Local bands can’t be good?”
He laughed and shook his head, “Nah. Every band’s ‘local’ for someplace, I suppose. I just meant that, when you’re in a small restaurant in a small town, you sorta take what you can get. A lot of the time it’s easy to just let their music fade into the background, but these guys…” he paused to let them “speak” for themselves. “I’m just saying that we lucked-out tonight.”
“I know I did,” I said, then immediately felt myself blush for it.
“What was that?” he asked, obviously not hearing what I’d said.
I hurried to say “Nothing!” and then made a show of opening my menu. After a moment of genuine scanning—and realizing that, yes, I was still starving—I realized I would be hard-pressed to actually pick something. “There is so much on here that looks good!” I admitted, almost feeling a sense of dread that I couldn’t eat everything. “I’m not sure what to choose!”
He chuckled and nodded, saying, “It does all look good.” Then, grinning up at me, he said, “Why don’t we pick, like, three-or-four of the best-looking entrees and then pick around. That way we don’t have to choose just one thing.”
Once more I found myself wondering if he was a mind-reader. Worrying that he just might be, I forced myself not to think that, being in the presence of a superhuman, I might be in some danger, and nodded.
“That sounds like a good idea.”
****
As it turned out, “three-or-four of the best-looking entrees” turned out to be quite a bit more.
I gaped as the waitress brought three trays full of food for us. She placed the plates down, asking (for the fifth time) if we were waiting for more guests. Jace seemed proud to answer that, no, we would be eating on our own. Then, stealing portions of food from a variety of plates, we spent over an hour just talking.
Just talking!
It was the longest and most wonderful conversation that I’d ever had. And, best of all, I couldn’t even remember half of it afterwards! There was no pressure, no demands, and no sense of the right-or-wrong thing to say. With an effortless flow, the subject of music became the subject of poetry. Poetry (somehow) turned into the subject of vegetables and which ones we couldn’t stand as kids. That, reasonably enough, slipped into childhood antics, which evolved into aspirations of future antics.
And on and on and on we went.
As the hour rolled by, I was surprised to find that, despite all of my justified doubts, we had, in fact, nearly cleaned off every plate in front of us. I blinked, not even realizing that we could eat that much.
“Wow! I wasn’t expecting to eat that much,” I chuckled nervously.
He smirked “Well, you started to flake out a bit halfway through, so I had to pick up the slack.”
I laughed at that and thanked him for not making me feel like a pig.
He laughed back and thanked me for not believing that he was a pig.
As we shared another laugh, the band announced that couples were “not only free encouraged to” use the open space in front of the stage to dance. This announcement motivated a bit of movement from all around, and I watched as a number of couples took to the call. As my eyes finished the journey back to Jace, I realized that he, too, was beginning to stand.
“Want to dance?” he smiled warmly.
“I’m a horrible dancer,” I confessed with a blush, but nodded and took his hand all the same.
“So am I,” he laughed. “So let’s be horrible together.”
I smiled, following him out onto the small area they had designated for dancing and moved my hands to his shoulders. He wrapped his arms around my waist as a slower, piano-driven song began to play and a cover to Frank Sinatra’s Fly Me to the Moon began. I enjoyed the slow melody as Jace began to lead me around the small area we had. I smirked as he led me perfectly and I worked to follow his steps.
“Bad dancer, huh?” I teased.
He shrugged and made a show of looking genuinely shocked. “Maybe I have a good partner,” he defended.
As the song began to speed up, he lifted me, spinning me around, and then setting me back to my feet. I gasped and continued to follow his lead. I hadn’t even realized that the other dancers had begun to give us more room, some even going so far as to stop and watch, but as he led me in a slow spin I came to realize that most of the eyes in the restaurant were on us. I blushed under the attention as Jace leaned his mouth to my ear.
“Don’t worry about them, just focus on me,” he smiled, continuing to lead me.
I nodded, continuing to follow his rhythm, falling under his spell as we continued to dance. As the song reached its end, I was startled into a gasping jump as the entire crowd erupted in applause.
“W-wow,” I blushed. “This is amazing. It’s like something out of a book or a movie.”
Jace only shrugged, not seeming to notice or care about all the attention on us. He only looked back at me.
“All fiction is based in reality,” he said. “At least that’s what my mother said.”
“I guess I just never thought the happy endings could be real,” I confessed.
“Neither did I,” he said, “but I think we’re learning otherwise.”
****
Once more I found myself walking with Jace back to his motorcycle, and once more I found myself not wanting the night to end.
“What ti
me do you have to get to…” Jace sighed and trailed off, shrugging, “Do you mind me calling it ‘work’? I know it’s a touchy subject for you.”
“It is,” I acknowledged, “but I’ve got tonight off. My… uh, friend—partner? Mentor? Roommate? Either way—said she’d handle it.”
He paused at this and looked at me, eyebrow raised quizzically. “So you’ve got the entire night free?”
I nodded, blushing, not sure what to make of his look.
“Well, I’m something of a night person. I’m having too much fun to see the night end just yet, so, if I’m not pushing my luck, how would you like to keep this going? How about we head back into the city? Maybe check out the theater?” he asked, actually sounding uncertain and nervous.
I practically squealed “I’d love that!”
We slipped free from Canal Days and casually strolled back to his bike. The laid-back nature of things contrasting against the usually hectic tone that my nights typically started with. He handed me the helmet and I watched as he straddled the motorcycle. I enjoyed the sight a bit longer, mentally photographing it for me to “admire” later, and then settled in behind him. I moved my arms around his waist, relishing in how quickly the process had come to feel natural and right to me. It all felt right; felt comfortable and, best of all, unpressured. All throughout the night we’d been making contact—me holding his waist or hugging him on the bench, us holding hands as we walked, and the intimate closeness we’d shared during our dance—but he’d never once seemed to want more. I’d caught him staring, and I knew from our prior meeting and the things he’d told me that he was interested in women. And yet, despite this, I hadn’t once found my hand being moved to any part of his body even though he’d had so many chances to do so. He hadn’t made a move to grab me; hadn’t even made any lewd or suggestive comments.
“I’d like to offer you what you’re missing… nice days out. Food. Trips to local events. Maybe even trips to not-so-local events someday. And, you know…”
In that moment he could have said anything. I’d even caught myself wanting him to say those things—more and more I was beginning to want that with him—but, even with the stage set and the opportunity to bring it up, he hadn’t.
Because you’re not just a whore to him, I thought, and that thought urged me to lean further into him as we rode back to the city. And that means you’re not just a whore.
I knew that, at some point, I would have to return to my life. Or, rather, that life. My life as a prostitute. Logically, “at some point” meant tomorrow. Candy covering me for one night was risky enough, and I knew that all sorts of trouble would come crashing down on us if I wasn’t on that corner tomorrow night. And then I’d have to be Mia the whore; not this carefree Mia that I had almost forgotten all about; this carefree Mia whom Jace had managed to coax out in only a few short hours. I held on tighter, wanting to hold onto the moment and make it an eternity I could visit anytime I wanted—something I could return to whenever I needed it—and worked to completely forget about that other life. I told myself that I would never leave this bike, never not be holding this man who seemed to have it all figured out. Like the way he handled the machine that carried us through the night, he seemed to take life itself by the throttle and turn it however he pleased. I wanted nothing more than to stay on that motorcycle with that man forever, but…
But…
“Mia?”
“Huh?”
“We’re here,” Jace said.
And that was when I realized it: but the motorcycle had stopped, and the man had gotten up.
Nothing was forever.
Blinking, I glanced up to see Jace’s worried gaze looking down at me. I chewed my lip, wanting to find some excuse that wouldn’t lead to me having to admit what I truly had been thinking. Not that I could even properly express exactly what I had been thinking. Either way, I’d definitely made an impression that Jace had noticed.
“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling my face tighten in embarrassment. “I got distracted.”
Jace nodded, looking embarrassed, too, but not for me. “It’s fine,” he told me. “Riding has a way of distracting me, too.”
“Oh?” I asked, relieved to know I wasn’t alone in that. “Were you distracted this time, too?”
“A little,” he admitted, and then he did something strange. He looked away from me and up the street that we were parked on the shoulder of; out towards the streetlight that now glowed red in our direction. He neither seemed to be looking at the light nor anything beyond it; he seemed to be looking at the intersection right below it, as if expecting to see something there. Then, without looking away, he said, “but not as much as I usually am.”
“Oh…” I said, not sure what to make of that. “Why do you think that is?”
“Because of you,” he said, finally looking back at me and giving me a smile that was more relieved than joyful. “And I don’t think that; I know.”
I smiled back at that. The entire night I’d been seeing him handling everything like a man who just seemed to ooze perfection and grace, and I felt like I had just gotten a glimpse of something as broken and uncertain as I’d been feeling. Somehow this made it all seem so much better; so much more perfect. Knowing that he had to work for all of this made it feel even more magical than something coming to someone who got it all their way naturally.
“So…” he pressed, hurrying to change the subject, “You have any opinion on what we should see?” he nodded towards the theater’s front board. “Looks like we’re just in time to catch either a comedy, a horror, or the newest superhero movie.”
I giggled and smirked. “Funny enough, those happen to be my three favorite genres. What would you like?”
“How about superhero?” he suggested. “The comedy I’ve already seen, and horror gives me nightmares.”
“Superhero it is,” I said, following him inside and raising my eyebrow at him. “But why did you suggest the horror if it would’ve scared you?”
He shrugged. “I figured a girl who reads vampire books would like horror.”
“And, what, you would just suffer through it for me if that’s what I’d chosen?” I teased.
He shrugged again and, without missing a beat, said, “I’ve got a nightlight if the jitters get too bad.”
I was laughing too hard to even speak as we stepped up to the ticket booth.
Finally calming down just as we stepped up to the clerk, I frowned as he pulled out his wallet to pay for both tickets.
“I can grab these…”
“Don’t worry,” he smiled. “You can get the snacks.”
I looked up and then smirked, “Still hungry after all that?”
“Are you not?”
I looked down, not wanting to admit that I was actually still hungry after all that. Having acknowledged my silence as an agreement to letting him buy the tickets, Jace finalized the purchase and led me inside. We snagged a large tub of popcorn and large soda along with a box of chocolates. I explained to him as I paid—making a mental inventory of what I was spending to be certain to earn it back as soon as I could—that I liked to combine the chocolates with the popcorn. He looked at me like I was crazy, but I assured him that he’d be a believer before the opening credits had a chance to start.
Sure enough, once we were in our seats, settled in, and I’d had a chance to work my magical concoction into being, I had him hooked.
“Opening credits nothing!” I joked with a laugh, “You didn’t even last past the first trailer.”
We sat there, watching the previews and after finished the snacks, Jace had wrapped his arm around my shoulder. I enjoyed the feel of him against me and leaned against him, watching the screen. While the movie played, I tried to ignore the feel of Jace, tried to ignore watching him verse the movie. I didn’t want to admit just how much of an effect he had on me, but I also didn’t want to lose this feeling.
The feeling of freedom.
When the movie had finished
, we took the long route back to Jace’s bike, neither one of us wanting to part, it seemed. It was a little past eleven and I knew that Candy would’ve only been two hours into her shift. If the night ended now, I’d either have to sit alone at the apartment until she came back or join her for the remainder of the night.
The idea of being alone in that apartment gave me the creeps…
But the idea of finishing this night on that corner with other men using me for their pleasure was…
I shuddered.
It seemed sacrilegious.
There was no other word for it.
But there were only so many places that Jace could take me at this time of night, and I was tired of forcing him to spend money on me when what I really wanted was…
“Can we go to your place?” I blurted.
He glanced over, looking both surprised and relieved at the same time. “You want to come over?” he asked. “I… I mean, there’s not really much to do there.”
“I don’t care,” I admitted, suddenly knowing that if I wasn’t open with him, totally honest in that moment, then the other two options might become a likely reality. “I don’t care what we do, so long as I get to be with you.”
He stared at me, the surprise-relief combination growing stronger. “Really?”
“Really.”
“I don’t want you to feel obligated to do anything you don’t want to,” he said, seeming to resent himself for saying it even as he did.
“I don’t,” I assured him, taking his hand. “Please, Jace. I really don’t want this night to end. Even if we wind up falling asleep or just watching TV all night, I just want to finish off this night with you before I have to…”
I looked down, unable to finish.
Jace watched me, reading me, and nodded. “Yeah. Okay. We can… um, I mean, hell, either of those sounds great, actually.”
I smiled, my shoulders sagging in relief. “That sounds perfect.”
“I’ll be honest,” he started, handing me the helmet, “I’m glad you asked. I wasn’t ready for the night to end, either.”
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