“So, decaf with dessert tonight?”
“Even that might be too much.”
“Then maybe some wine will counteract it.”
When we were seated at our table, I had the strangest feeling that I was sitting across from a stranger. I knew we’d been dating for months, but this felt like a first date—the awkward kind of first date where you can’t think of anything to talk about because you don’t know enough about each other to even start a conversation and asking questions to get to know each other feels like an interrogation.
“What’s the new boss like?” he asked me.
I wasn’t sure how to answer, even though it was an obvious topic for discussion, because I was afraid I’d gush. “He seems pretty cool,” I said with what I hoped looked like a casual shrug. “He’s got a lot of ideas about making bookstores interesting, something people will leave their computers to visit.”
“Ah, an old fogy, I take it. None of those newfangled e-books for him.” He laughed, and I fought back my irritation and my urge to jump to Owen’s defense.
“Actually, he’s pretty young—around thirty, I’d say. But he is kind of old-fashioned, in a good way. I like his vision of bookstores, and he’s asked me to help with some advertising and marketing strategy.”
“That should be good for your résumé. Instead of having wasted the past year in a retail job, you can now call it a job within your field.”
I bristled again, but crumbled a roll from the bread basket instead of saying anything. “If I get to do interesting stuff, I may want to stay,” I said. “I’m not crazy about pouring coffee, but if I get to help on the business side of things, it might become a job worth sticking around for. I really seem to have clicked with Owen.”
He choked on the sip of wine he’d just taken, then had a brief coughing fit. “Sorry, that went down the wrong way,” he said.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” But there was an angry, alarmed look to his eyes that I found oddly chilling. Was he jealous of a boss I’d barely mentioned? I’d worked so hard to talk about Owen in a neutral way. Maybe I’d overdone it to the point it looked like I was hiding something.
He barely spoke through the rest of dinner, and his mind seemed to be elsewhere, like he was mentally cooking up some scheme. It was so unlike him that I was worried, but I got the impression that asking him what was wrong wouldn’t go over well. I would have begged off of dessert and said I needed to get home, but he did it before I could. He didn’t even walk me home. He merely gave me a perfunctory kiss at the restaurant door and hurried away, like he was late for a meeting. And to think, I’d given up dinner with Owen for that very unsatisfactory date.
*
Before I even had my apron on the next morning, Florence demanded, “I want to know the whole story.”
“Josh didn’t propose last night. In fact, he got weird and called for the check before I was even done eating and then hurried away like he had to catch the last train home.”
She waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, who cares about Josh. What about spending all afternoon with that cutie-pie boss? I’m sensing a real connection between you two.”
“He’s just using me as a coffee taster, like he thinks that serving so much of it and being willing to admit that what we serve is awful makes me an expert.”
“That’s all, huh?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Didn’t you say he wanted to pick your brain for advertising ideas?”
“Well, yeah, but he hasn’t done so yet, so there’s nothing to tell you.”
“And you two didn’t talk about anything but coffee all afternoon?”
“I did find out what his vision for the store is. He’s kind of a romantic about bookselling.”
“Oooh, you said romantic,” she teased.
“No, he’s just got this idea of the perfect rainy day spent browsing a bookstore, and he wants to give that to people.”
“Oh, a perfect rainy day spent browsing a bookstore? Now, where have I heard that before? It sounds like you two were made for each other.”
I knew I was supposed to bashfully protest, but I paused thoughtfully and said, “It does feel like I’ve known him a lot longer than I have. I guess I just feel comfortable with him.”
“So you won’t be circling any classified ads anytime soon.”
“If I can help relaunch this store, then that gives me something for my résumé, and that will improve my job-hunting odds, so it’s in my best interest to hold off on the job hunt for a while.” I slammed the bakery case shut to emphasize that the conversation was over.
