Passionate Kisses 2 Boxed Set: Love in Bloom

by Magda Alexander

  “He’s a sweet kid.”

  There’s nothing I can do to get out of this conversation other than walk away. I need to get him out of the house before I start to blush.

  “Thanks for coming by so quickly. Just email me your quotes whenever you’re ready.”

  By the time I’ve reached the door, he’s caught up to me.

  “What game is that?”

  He’s staring at the TV that has the intro screen for the game on display in all its fifty-inch glory. It’s my little secret. I don’t tell my friends I play video games. It would dash their image of me as the sophisticated academic. But he’s looking right at it. What am I supposed to say?

  “It looks old,” he says. “I thought I knew every computer game out there but this is new to me.”

  “It’s Caesar III. It’s from the nineties and I’ve wanted to play it forever but couldn’t find it for my Mac. I figured it out last night, finally.” Oh, what the hell. He wasn’t going to judge me. “I’m going to play it now.”

  “Can I watch?”

  “You want to watch me play a video game?”

  “Why not? Don’t you watch your friends when they play?”

  “My friends don’t play video games. They’re-”

  “They’re not geeks.”

  “I wasn’t going to say that.”

  “Hey, I’m cool with being a geek. Now a nerd, that’s an entirely other thing.”

  “There’s a difference between nerds and geeks?” Clearly. Because this guy didn’t look like a nerd.

  “I think so.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, social skills, for starters. Geeks have friends. Girl friends. We’re social. We don’t hide out in our house and play by ourselves.”

  “Are you calling me a nerd?”

  “I’d never call a woman like you a nerd. Besides, I get the feeling that you’re a closet geek, you just don’t know it yet.”

  Those were fighting words. And yet, instead of getting mad, I’m inviting him in to watch me play. My brain is messed up.

  Monday.

  Alright. There’s something insane happening. I haven’t talked to Ingrid about it because, well, I don’t think she’d understand. It’s hard to explain anyhow. It’s Evan. I’ve never in my life met a guy like this. I think he’s attracted to me. He sure as hell made no attempt to be subtle when he complimented the dress I wore when we walked down to pick up some Indian food for supper Saturday evening. And he was quick to point out that he liked my hair down better than up yesterday when he came over to drop off some other games he thought I might like. And then he stayed until nearly ten when I said I needed to get to bed because I had to work in the morning.

  Still, he didn’t make any move to hint that he’d like to stay. There was no sexual banter about going to bed. No almost kiss before he left the house. He’s not behaving the way any of my guy friends do. And he’s not acting like a guy who wants to sleep with me. I can’t figure it out.

  All I know for certain is that I’ve had more fun in the past two days than I’ve had in a long, long time. Real fun. Not the sort where you reluctantly go along with someone’s idea of a great afternoon and then later admit that it was a good day. This was actual fun. As in we did things I wanted to do, and talked about things I found interesting. And the odd thing is, I think it was the same for him.

  What’s not the same, I think, is that I feel as if I’ve met someone special. I know, I know. Two days. No kissing. I get it. But I can’t help it. This is why I can’t talk to anyone about it. Because it seems ridiculous. I know it’s probably because he’s cute, and smart, and nice and clearly has no interest in me as anything beyond a friend that I’ve deluded myself into this train of thought. But there it is.

  You know what it’s like? It’s like this crush I had on Chris Power back in grade eight. Chris used to come over and we’d play Scrabble or Super Mario Brothers or just do our homework together. And then one day, Chris called and asked if he could come over. He had something important he wanted to talk to me about. I remember putting on the shell ring he’d bought for me when both of our families were on vacation in Florida and we’d met up at Disneyworld for the day. And what did Chris have to say that was so important?

  “Hey, Jill. Do you think Ingrid would go to a movie with me? I’ve liked her ever since that party you had here last weekend.”

  Yup. Not only was that the end of me and Chris, it was almost the end of me and Ingrid. Who thankfully realized that dating Chris Power wasn’t as important to her as the friendship we’d had since we met in violin lessons when we were four.

  Something like that is bound to happen with Evan. It’s inevitable. I’m not flirting with him because I like hanging out with him too much to use my normal tricks. And he’s not flirting with me because, well, because he’s not.

  Now it’s Monday and he’s supposed to call me with quotes on the house, and I’m checking my phone and my email obsessively.

  There’s something wrong with me.

  Tuesday.

  Evan’s great-aunt died and he’s gone around the bay for the funeral. That’s why I didn’t hear from him yesterday, other than an email with the quotes and a quick note to apologize for not calling me. Spotty cell service and a five-hour drive kinda made sure that wasn’t going to happen.

  I did what any normal, new friend would do. I texted him a smiley face (yea, this from the girl who abhors emoticons) and said:

  -Text me anytime you need a smile.-

  Turns out there’s one area of the church where Great-Aunt Audrey is waking that has two bars of service. Those two bars are why I was up most of the night texting with him. He’s from some small little place where wakes are a serious business. Seems people sit with the body during the whole thing, and last night he and his brothers were keeping his mother company.

  So here’s what I know about him based on those texts. He only drinks tea, not coffee. And he only drinks Red Rose, not Tetley. Something about toxins or something. The church only stocks Tetley tea bags, so he was forced to suffer. His mother’s rosary beads click louder than his Aunt Lorraine’s. Apparently, he and his brothers made a game out of it. His ex-girlfriend’s husband is his first cousin and is terrible at cribbage. If a nun catches you playing cribbage in church, she will take your cards and your crib board and stare at you as if you’re the Devil for the rest of the night. His brothers (he’s the seventh son of a seventh son, and I think that’s supposed to mean something to me) teased him all night about our texting. He has no problem taking a picture of a body in a casket and sending it to a woman who admitted she’s never seen a corpse before, and then telling her ghost stories until four in the morning.

  I am going to marry Evan Sharp. I’m just putting it out there so that should it ever happen, you can tell people, she said it would happen. Here are some other text gems from him.

  -You shouldn’t answer my texts. You’re just encouraging me.-

  What, you ask, was I encouraging?

  -That’s more than I’m going to say in a text.-

  Argh. Men. Anyway, other text gems.

  -Eddie has a picture of you on his phone. I’d watch out for him, by the way. He showed it to my brother Andrew. He said you reminded him of Anne Hathaway. I think you’re more like Zooey Deschanel.-

  Either is good, right? I’m cool with either of those. But I happen to know that he thinks Zooey is a geek’s wet dream. His words. Not mine.

  And then there was this one that just came in on my phone, maybe thirty seconds ago.

  -Hope you slept well. Thanks for keeping me company last night. Miss your voice.-

  What? He misses my voice? Why is he more flirtatious via text than in person? Gah. This man is screwing with my head.

  Still, I should text him back.

  -Thanks for my first sleep-deprived teaching session of my career. You’re the first man to wear me out from texting.-

  You know what I hate? That I’m now sitting here wai
ting for the ping of the phone. When I know full well that if he moves an inch in one direction or another, he could lose what tenuous connection he has with the modern world.

  Ping!

  -Heh.-

  What? Is that it?

  Ping!

  -Glad to know I was your first.-

  I’m blushing over a totally innocent text. God, when is he coming back to town?

  Thursday.

  Four hundred and thirty-six text messages. That’s the total messages sent between us this week. Not even a week. Since Monday. It was a week ago today I first spotted Evan on campus, and tonight he’s coming over for supper to explain the various quotes he sent me. Is it terrible I’m thinking more about which option will keep him around the house than I am about cost or efficiency?

  I’ve also talked to him for a total of eighty-eight minutes. Cell phones are awesome tools for those of us obsessed with quantifiable data.

  Supper is a meal fit for a man who has spent most of the week eating turkey, ham, roast, and potatoes (in all their forms: baked, boiled, scalloped, mashed, deep fried and salad). Any moment now, Evan will show up bearing a Chinese feast for two. I haven’t changed out of my teaching tweeds because I think he might have a little hot for teacher thing going on. Although I’ve made some minor adjustments.

  My blouse is unbuttoned a little more than usual, and I’m wearing my big boob bra, which normally only gets pulled out for low cut dresses. I also tend to wear short heels, or flats. Right now I’m wearing the only pair of stilettos I own. I’ve also changed into stockings with a noticeable seam up the back, trailing up to the ruffle of my pencil skirt. It’s about as sexy as tweed can get.

  This is the test, my friends. It’s one thing to flirt with me for days on the phone. As my friend Nick said to me the one time he’d seen me wearing this outfit (minus the breast enhancing bra and slutty nylons), “Christ, Jill. If I’d had profs who looked like you, I wouldn’t have dropped out of MUN.” (Don’t feel bad for him. He studied real estate and now makes a fortune selling up-modelled old St. John’s houses to people like me.)

  I have to confess, I’ve also done my best to get a Zooey Deschanel hairstyle on the go. Yes. I am pulling out all the stops. When Evan leaves here tonight, I am going to know one way or the other if this is platonic flirting, or substantive flirting.

  “Careful, something’s leaking,” he says as I take a bag from him when I answer the door. “Smells like almond guy ding.”

  I wait a second until he’s in the hallway and I figure I have his full attention before slowly walking down the hall. The click of my shoes down the hardwood sounds ridiculous to me. What am I doing?

  Before I disappear into the kitchen, I take a quick look behind me. He’s still standing in the doorway. I know he’s watching.

  “Are you coming?”

  I know! I know. Over the top, maybe. I sound stupid to my own ears. But there’s a new look on his face. One I haven’t seen yet. Fierce and masculine. This man might think he’s a geek, but he’s alone in that assessment.

  In my mind, he enters the kitchen, slides his arms around me, and says, “Enough of this playing around. Supper can wait.” The reality is, he walks in, sets a bag on the table and pulls out a wrapped gift.

  “I got a surprise for you.”

  This version works too. Until he holds it out of my reach. “After supper. I’m starving.”

  No point begging. I have bigger plans. “You unpack the food. I’ll grab the plates.”

  This skirt has a secret. If I stretch real high, it lifts a little. Which is why I’m getting the fancy plates that hang out on the top shelf. I just hope he’s looking and not already face and eyes into the pork low mein.

  “Let me get that,” he says before I get a chance to work it.

  I’d be upset except I think he just tried to look down my shirt while I moved out of the way.

  Supper is a pretty tame affair. Mainly talking about what he proposes to do to the house. It sounds like a lot of work. Taking off the clapboard, putting on a new layer of insulation, and replacing the oil furnace with a heat pump. And that’s just the first option. There are so many extras. He can build me a solar heating unit out of soft drink cans, even replace my single pane glass windows with double or triple panes without destroying my wooden windows. Hell, he can line my roof with solar panels and cut my electrical bill. I want him to do it all. Preferably with little clothing on. I think construction work and nakedness might be a safety hazard. But I also have to pay attention to money. Damn money.

  Part of making a point about following your heart in career choices to your financially settled and money-obsessed parents is maintaining a willingness to live a lifestyle different from how you grew up.

  “Can we start with the first option and then see how it goes? I’d love to do all the other things, but I’m not sure if I can afford it all right now.”

  “Sure we can. And if you start saving all your cans instead of recycling them, it won’t cost much for the can solar set-up. I’ll ask the guys tonight to start saving some for you.”

  “Oh. What’s up tonight?” Please let that have sounded casual. Just because my head is screaming: What? You’re not staying?

  “Dungeons & Dragons.”

  You know when your face reacts before you have a chance to get your shit together? That’s what’s happening right now. I think my eyes might have even bulged. I want to sound cool, but I can’t help myself.

  “Adults play D&D?”

  “Plenty of us do. What do you think happens to the kids who played it in their parents’ basements when they grow up?”

  “They grow up?” My cousin played that game when he was a teenager. He and a group of his nerdy friends all hanging around a table rolling dice and talking about orcs and not letting girls play. Nerds. Geeks. Whatever. I wondered now if he still played.

  “And how is it any different than still playing video games?”

  “It’s totally different.”

  “It’s not. It’s way more social than hanging out home alone with just a TV and console. I’m hanging out with people, talking, eating, drinking and having fun.”

  What’s curious in this discussion is that he’s not getting angry or embarrassed. He seems to have no problem with admitting that he does this.

  “How does it work?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your game. How does it work?”

  I don’t know if I’m asking because I want to know, or if I’m just trying to keep him here a bit longer. One thing is certain. It’s clear that he’s not interested in me that way. If going and playing a geek game with his geek friends seems better than hanging out with a woman who’d done her damnedest to look as sexy as she can, then I’ve already lost this battle.

  He might look like God’s gift to women, but clearly there’s a very good reason why he’s single.

  What if he’s gay? Maybe Dungeons & Dragons is code for an all-male orgy.

  I don’t think so, though, because he’s talking about characters and dice and encounters, and I’m not even following half of it.

  “You could come watch us play sometime, if you like. Maybe I could get our DM to make up an NPC for you to play.”

  I don’t know what he’s talking about. And I’m not sure I want to.

  Shaking my head, I politely bow out.

  “Do you have to leave right away?”

  He looks at the clock on my stove. It’s just after eight.

  “Shortly. We don’t start till nine. We play at my friend Sam’s. His wife just had twins so he’s basically housebound in the evening. So we wait till the babies are in bed and then play.”

  “And his wife doesn’t mind?”

  “Mind? She’s our DM.”

  The look I give him must show my confusion.

  “Dungeon Master. That’s the person who runs the game. She’s basically the controller of our universe.”

  “How can she do that with twins?”
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  “She’s done this so long, she could do it with her eyes closed. Hey, you might know her. She works at the university library. Does something with archives.”

  The pieces are falling together. Archivist. Twins. And what he’s leaving out is tall, blonde and gorgeous.

  “Melanie Fitzgerald plays this?”

  “Ooops. Have I let her secret out? Maybe she keeps it hidden, the same way you don’t tell your friends about your video games. You women and your secrets. Guys don’t hide their hobbies. I couldn’t care less who knows what games I play. Or shows I watch.”

  “Yea, well, when you look like you do, you can get away with it. No one would think you were a geek, and if anything, you just make nerd pursuits look cool.”

  Dear mouth. Please stop speaking before the brain has given you clearance to communicate.

  “I’m flattered. You wouldn’t say that if you saw my high school pictures. Unlike yours, I’m certain.”

  “That depends on the grade. I did have a very brief goth flirtation.”

  “Goth can be hot.”

  Sweet Caesar. I’m getting hot, that’s for sure.

  “I’d like to see those pictures.”

  “I think my mother burned them. Or maybe had them Photoshopped.”

  He’s handing me the present he brought. “Doesn’t matter, really. Seeing you in person is better than any picture.”

  My breath catches in my throat. He’s so close right now, his hand holding the gift out to me.

  Now that I see it up close, I realize what I thought was brightly coloured gift wrap is actually a silk scarf. It’s a beautiful blend of ivory, yellow, pink and red.

  “This is beautiful,” I say as I slowly untie it. The gift is a board game. Ticket to Ride. A game I’d talked about wanting to play during one of our texts. I’d confessed to playing the iPad version and he’d convinced me the real game was better.

  “I bought the scarf new, because the game is used. So many of my friends have it that I won’t miss my own copy.”

  It looks pristine. Is this guy for real? Sure, the mixed signals are a bit hard to deal with, but he certainly knows how to impress.

  “Thanks a lot. Maybe we can play it sometime.”