and for the last week of that, we’d spoken daily, for hours a day. We texted nonstop when we weren’t talking. I liked him so much it was ridiculous. I think I knew him better in a week than I’d known Brandon in six months—Jason was a lot less shy. But I couldn’t bring myself to agree to a real date. Not until we met in person.
“I just don’t want things to be weird,” I said, turning and sliding down to the floor with my back against the dishwasher. I closed my eyes and put a finger on my spasming eyelid.
“Why would they be weird?”
Because you’ve never seen me before? Because we’ve talked constantly for the last week and you’ve never even been in the same room with me?
I didn’t answer.
The long sound of a zipper closing on luggage came through the line. “Put Tucker on the phone,” he said.
“What?”
“Tucker, put him on the phone.”
“Like, put the phone up to his ear?”
“Yes.”
I got up and found Tucker sleeping on the sofa. “Should I leave you two alone for this?”
“Yeah, this is just between us guys.”
“Okay, here goes.” I held the phone to Tucker’s ear. He immediately perked up at the sound of Jason’s voice. He cocked his head and listened and then bolted off the sofa and tore around the living room, barking.
I put the phone back to my ear, laughing. “What did you say to him?”
“I asked him to show you how excited I am to meet you. Actually, I told him there’s a squirrel outside, but I think he still illustrated my point.”
I smiled into the receiver. Then I moved the phone away from my mouth and swallowed. “I made you something.”
“You did? What is it?”
“Just something. I’m going to send it to you now. I hope you like it.”
I attached a link to a text and held my finger over the little arrow that would put it into the universe. I took a nervous breath and sent it through.
No getting it back now. It was done.
“I’m going to go to bed early,” I said. “Have a safe flight, okay? I guess I’ll see you tomorrow…”
Chapter 10
Jason
? Soul Meets Body | Death Cab for Cutie
Sloan sent me a link to a YouTube video. I sat on the edge of my bed and watched it, maximizing the screen.
Someone held up a piece of paper in front of the camera that read, My vacation with Sloan. Then it began to show clips of Tucker. Tucker on hikes, Tucker swimming in a swimming pool. Tucker at Starbucks licking whipped cream out of a paper cup, and him at PetSmart with a blue plush doll in his mouth. Then he was in a bathtub getting a bath with his hair spiked into a Mohawk. Tucker chasing a green tennis ball on the grass and playing with other dogs at a dog park.
If I hadn’t already liked Sloan, this would have done it. Tucker was my currency. It might as well have been me she was spoiling, it had the same effect.
I smiled down at my screen as I watched a clip of Tucker on his back, getting a belly rub. Then the frame changed, and he sat on a couch next to a woman. I bolted to attention and pulled the phone closer.
The woman smiled at him, and he licked her face. I could see the tattoos on her arm. She looked directly at the camera and reached up off-screen, and the video ended.
My heart thudded against my rib cage. This was Sloan. This was the woman I’d been talking to.
And she was fucking beautiful.
I played the video back. Then I played it back again. I paused it and took screenshots of her so I could look at them. I zoomed in and studied her. She had one of those broad smiles that radiated. Full lips, large brown doe eyes, long golden-blond hair. Jesus, she was gorgeous.
I was still watching the video when I got into my Uber. I called her.
Voicemail.
* * *
I texted Sloan last night, telling her how beautiful I thought she was, but all I got was a smiley face and didn’t know how to interpret that. I think the stress of our meeting each other was getting to her.
It was getting to me too.
Even before I’d seen what she looked like, I’d liked her more than anyone else I’d met in a very long time. I went to sleep and woke up thinking about her. I fucking dreamed