“Damn. That’s fine dining. Are you guys hiring?” I ask half-jokingly, leaning a hip against the island.
The corner of his mouth tugs upward into a half smile. “We’re always accepting applications. Think you have what it takes? You’d have to be able to lift and carry about two hundred pounds.”
I make a pfft sound. “Easy enough. I’m stronger than I look from hauling around books my whole life,” I lie.
He gestures to himself. “Okay, let’s see. Try lifting me.”
“Like, actually pick you up from the ground?” I squeak.
“Yup. If you’re as strong as you say, it should be no problem.”
It’s an impossible feat for my weakling body. I know this. Surely he knows it too. But something about Trevor brings out my playful side. Putting a smile on his usually stone-serious face has become one of my favorite tasks. And I’m always up for the challenge. Being the cause of those crinkle lines around his eyes and that deep, bellowing laugh gives me a high like no other.
To his amusement, I make a show of cracking my knuckles and bending my knees to loosen my joints, like a senior citizen warming up for tai chi in the park. He sucks in a sharp breath, bracing himself when I wrap my arms around his torso. While his spicy scent is an energy booster, he’s a solid mass of muscle that’s virtually unmovable. I attempt multiple times, even restrategizing the angle, squatting to lift him from under the bum, to no avail.
On the fifth try, he sets his hands over my shoulders and squeezes gently to stop me. I don’t blame him. I’ve made this awkward. My forearms are folded snug under his ass and my entire front is pressed into his. “All right, Chen. You’re gonna throw your back out.”
“Yup. This isn’t happening,” I say, wincing as I straighten my spine. “In my defense, you’re a giant, probably much larger than the average person who needs rescuing. And what I lack in strength, I’d make up for in bravery on the job.”
He smiles. “I bet you would. Oh, and you have—uh—some flour—” He points in the vague direction of my face before reaching to brush it from my cheek. The gentleness of the swipe and the warmth of his thumb catch me off guard. My breath hitches when his eyes snag mine. They’re a whirl of darkness pierced by flashes of gold, reflecting from the dim light above us, swirling with all the many things he keeps locked away.
Our eye contact breaks when my phone vibrates against the counter, pulling me back to reality, stopping my overactive mind in its tracks. Trevor steps back a few paces, his shoulders dropping in what looks like relief as he pops the container of cupcakes in the microwave for safekeeping (his grandma’s trick to keep them fresh).
Before I have the chance to scold myself for making things weird with my prolonged eye contact, I see Brandon has texted again, preemptively, even without my planned response.
BRANDON: Want to catch up? There’s a cool new mini putt bar downtown I want to try out.
Trevor’s smug-ass smile has me regretting showing him Brandon’s follow-up text in the first place.
“This was a one-off, by the way,” I point out, still in shock over Brandon’s response as we head down the hallway to our respective bedrooms.
“You just can’t handle the fact that I knew something about dating that you didn’t,” he says, pausing in my doorway.
I catch myself staring at the swoop of the bird’s wing partially visible under his collar. I promptly snap my focus back to my phone. Back to Brandon. “Okay, dating guru, what do I say now?”
? chapter ten
LIVE WITH TARAROMANCEQUEEN—THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY
EXCERPT FROM TRANSCRIPT
[Tara sits crisscross applesauce on her bed, cradling a worn mass-market paperback like a newborn baby. The ex-boyfriend link chart is out of focus in the background.]
TARA: Hello, romance book lovers, welcome back to my channel. Today we’re talking about the One That Got Away.
The One That Got Away is potentially one of the most tragic of all tropes. I’m hesitant to call it a romance trope, because more often than not, it ends in death and tears. It’s related to second-chance romance and comes in many forms. It could be two lovers who get split up during war and famine, unable to find each other. Maybe one party disappears behind magical stones, two hundred years into the future, where they belong.
If you close your eyes right now, I bet a face comes to mind. It’s someone you wonder about every so often. Someone you have to stop yourself from drunk texting, perhaps? You often wonder what could have been? Maybe you’re already fully aware that you’re missing this long-lost someone, which prevents you from moving forward in your life.
This is Brandon Wang for me.
Anyway, I’ve gotta finish getting ready. I’m about to meet him for drinks in an hour. If anyone has any advice or favorite One That Got Away books, let me know in the comments!
COMMENTS:
OMG he is HOT. Doesn’t he look like Daniel Dae Kim?
My date advice is to ditch Brandon and date your roommate. This is what we deserve!!
* * *
? ? ?
“CAN I ASK you a question?” I ask.
Trevor shoots me a one-eyed warning glare, evidently and understandably peeved that I’ve barged into his room without notice. When I flick the light switch, he covers his eyes like a vampire who’s deathly allergic to the sun. “Have you ever heard of knocking?”
“I did you a favor. You’re gonna mess up your schedule if you sleep any longer.” He’s been sleeping off his night shift, and I’ve been impatiently waiting for him to wake up for hours.
I’m due to meet Brandon in T-minus forty-five minutes, and I need a pep talk.
“What the hell are you wearing?” he asks through splayed fingers.
Miffed, I run my finger over the high waistband of my wrinkled, wide-leg linen pants. “My date outfit, thank you very much.”
While plotting my ensemble on the subway ride home from work, I had a momentary freak-out and made a pit stop at Gabby’s, Trevor’s hookup and my new friend, to pillage her closet. As it turns out, she owns tons of handmade pieces collected from all over the globe, all of which have some elaborate story. These pants were hand-sewn by a ninety-year-old woman in the Tibetan mountains who has nearly lost her sight.
Trevor rests against the headboard and tilts his head, studying me from every angle like I’m an abstract museum painting. “No.”
I scoff, my hands on my hips. “This is traveler chic. They’re Gabby’s, actually.”
“Why are you wearing Gabby’s clothes for your date?”
“Because . . . she’s a world traveler, just like Brandon.” As the son of diplomat parents, Brandon is well traveled. He speaks five languages. He’s spent winters skiing in the Swiss Alps, summers riding camels through deserts in Morocco. You name it, he’s done it all, three times.
Even though I take after Dad with my “gift of gab,” as Mom likes to call it, what if Brandon dubs me an uncultured swine? What if things take a turn for the horribly awkward, like they did with Segway Jeff? What if he’s nothing like I remember? What if I panic and ask for his hand in marriage?
As the horrifying possibilities besiege me, so does a potential solution. “Metcalfe?”
“Yes?” Trevor asks, slow and tentative, as if dreading my response.
“I really do need to ask you a question.”
* * *
? ? ?
GRANDMA FLO WAS absolutely right. Men get better with age. At least, Brandon Wang certainly has.
His face was etched by the gods. How else can you explain his perfectly proportioned features? The enchanting dark-chocolate eyes I want to stare into longer than appropriate? Or the naturally blemish-and pore-free skin that looks airbrushed in person? If that wasn’t unfair enough, he also has the sun-kissed tan of someone who’s spent many a day experiencing the world. He certainly hasn’t been rotting on the couch scrolling through Netflix’s romance section, pretending he hasn’t already watched every film five times (not that I’d know from personal experience).
We’re seated in a turquoise booth, struggling to hear each other over the fifties tunes blasting over the sound system. He’s practically glowing like in his current profile photo (a flattering shot of his sunburned self, grinning in front of an ornate temple in Thailand).
Brandon leans in like he’s going to tell me a secret. “Can you believe it’s been over ten years since we first met?”
My insides blossom with nostalgia. “God, no. It feels like just yesterday we were pulling all-nighters, hitting up the twenty-four-hour grocery store for those giant tubs of Neapolitan ice cream.”
He mocks a retch. “That stuff was revolting. Especially the strawberry. I can’t believe we ate like that. Nowadays, my body can’t take it.”