reception venue to ask all of those super-scintillating questions I’ve always wanted to know.
Nothing for me to do but stare at him, smell him and ask him questions.
Sure, the smelling thing might be high on the creepy scale but it’s not like I’m going to lean over and sniff him. It’s just like a side benefit. His cologne is delicious, sue me.
Anyway. This is my chance. Surely I have questions I could ask him.
I’m drawing a blank but there’s gotta be something. Like…
“Do you post yourself on Instagram?” I blurt the question out of nowhere, excited to ask it. I’ve always wanted to know. Does he sit behind his desk scrolling through his phone looking for a photo to post and something witty to say?
Seems unlikely.
But does he take the photos himself and email them to a public relations person? Or is someone else doing all of it? These questions plague me. A lot of the photos are fairly generic, like from public events, so clearly someone else takes those. But there’s a bunch of photos of Duke on there too so surely he takes those?
“Instagram.” He repeats the word back to me as if it’s foreign. Or maybe he’s just caught off guard with my random outbursts of scintillating conversation. He glances at me briefly. He can side-eye me forever if he wants. I’m into it.
“Do you even know that you have an Instagram?” I press. Hmm, this is kind of disappointing.
“I’m aware I have an Instagram, yes.”
“It wasn’t a trick question,” I clarify. Just in case he’s confused about why I’m asking. “I’ve just always wondered. Like a curious kitten.” Sure. That’s better.
“Right.” He doesn’t take his eyes off the road this time, not even for a side-eye glance. “Do you like getting updates about the state via social media apps?”
State updates. Sure, that’s what I’m following him for. Also, he just asked that like he was data-collecting the habits of the average voter and is completely clueless that anyone would look because he’s sexy. I sorta hum in what I hope is a noncommittal reply while I think of something else to ask him. Why is this so hard? I have so many questions! This is my big chance to ask them and I’m choking. If I knew any bad baseball analogies, I’d mentally think them right now.
“One second,” I murmur, then use my phone to do a search on ‘questions to ask your crush.’ The pressure to come up with a question is making me panic so I click on the first article that comes up. “Okay! Who is your celebrity crush?”
Ugh. What a dumb question. Why in the hell would I want to know who his celebrity crush is? I don’t. Like I need that idea rubbed in my face. “Never mind,” I say quickly before he has a chance to answer. “Skip that,” I add, as I scroll through the rest of this list. ‘What was your first impression of me?’ is another question. As if I’m going to ask that. ‘What’s your love language?’ is another.
This article is the worst.
“Are we”—he pauses as if he’s searching his memory for something he missed—“doing an interview?”
“No! Ugh, forget it.” I close my phone in defeat. I cannot find good questions while under this kind of pressure. “Do you want to talk about sports or something?”
“Do you want to talk about sports?”
“Not particularly, no. But I wouldn’t mind listening to you talk about them.”
That earns me another side-eye.
If there’s a prize for being great at flirting, I am never winning it. Like not even a participation trophy, or a sad ribbon.
Whatever. He got set up by his mom so he’s not getting an award either.
“What did you do today?” I ask, fidgeting with the car vents before I relax into my seat. I wish I’d put a snack into my clutch. I’m starving and since there’s no need to be a delicate lady on this pseudo-date, I could really go for a handful of jelly beans right now or a little snack pack of trail mix.
“I spent the day researching having my mother involuntarily committed to a mental institution. And you?”
“Oh, I saw your mom earlier today!” The memory makes me smile. “She stopped in to—” I pause. I’m not going to humiliate myself by repeating that she stopped in to verify I was going to show up tonight and I surely don’t want to get her into more trouble with Warren by repeating her lie