Fading (5 page)

It’s been three days since my date with Mark and now I’m in a coffee shop, waiting for Ethan, he’s tonight’s date. I’ve learnt that if the date is for coffee and not dinner, it can be cut short if necessary. Yeah, hindsight is a bitch; if I’d have done this with Mark, I could have saved myself a few hours of boredom.

The location isn’t the only thing I’ve changed about this date; I haven’t put as much effort into it. When I was unknowingly set up to have a date with Jason, that evening I spent a lot of time getting ready, I wore a little black dress, spent a lot of time on my hair and makeup and I was nervous as hell. And I did the same exact thing with Mark, only I wore a red dress. So, now I’m taking it as bad luck. It’s like if I invest too much effort and time into it, it’s bound to sink. I’d also look pretty ridiculous in a dress and heels in a coffee shop, so there’s that.

Hopefully, Ethan won’t be put off by my casual style. I’ve borrowed one of Lexi’s ‘homeless chic’ – well, that’s what I call it – looks for the day. My hair is up in a hair claw and I’m pretty sure half of it has fallen out already. I’m wearing one of the red shirts that we had made for her store which has ‘READING IS SEXY’ printed across the chest, paired with black skinny jeans, a leather jacket and some cute as hell red wedges. I also bypassed makeup altogether.

When the door opens and a man walks in, I don’t have any trouble recognising Ethan; he looks exactly like his profile photo. He’s average height – which he didn’t lie about, so an honesty point for him there. His hair is dark and short, styled in a way that makes me think he doesn’t need to mess with it in the mornings or after washing it, he’s good looking, and as he gets closer I notice his eyes are a lot lighter than I originally thought, so light brown they’re almost burnt orange in colour.

I smile when he reaches my table. “Ethan?”

“Yes,” He smiles back and takes the seat on the opposite side. “Lilith, right?”

“Yep, nice to meet you.”

“You too,” He doesn’t look up when the waitress comes to our table until she clears her throat, making us break eye contact.

While Ethan orders his coffee, I consider my next move. The whole getting to know someone isn’t really something I’m good at, it always turns out more like I’m interviewing them.

“So…”

I look back at my date, realising I’d drifted off for a second. “Sorry, I wandered off for a second there. Can I just be honest with you for a second?”

“Well, I hope the honesty thing lasts longer than a second, but sure. Go for it.”

I hide a smile, partly because he looks confused but mostly because I think he’s confused about whether to be insulted that I just basically told him I plan on lying to him or if he should just ditch me now.

“I didn’t mean that after this second is up I’m not going to be honest.” I clarify.

“It’s okay, really. What did you want to say?”

“Okay,” I clear my throat. “It’s just that this whole dating thing isn’t going so well for me, I don’t know if I’m just really bad at it or if it’s just down to bad luck, but to honest, I’m not even sure how it works.  You know, my two best friends set me up on a fake date because they don’t think I’m ready to do it for real, yet. That’s how weird it is. But, in my defence, I’ve only ever been on two dates before – that’s including the fake one, by the way and the other one… well, that was either because I’m not used to sitting down and listening to someone tell me how to build a computer and solve every problem that I may ever come across with it, or if it’s normal to want to be completely wasted when that happens. So… I just, you know, wanted you to know that if I seem weird or this date doesn’t go exactly how you expect it to go, it’s just because I don’t have a freaking clue what I’m doing when it comes to this kind of situation. I’m a dating virgin. Not an actual virgin, but a dating one. As in this only my second date of all time and I’d really rather not spend it drunk because I don’t like hangovers.” I clamp my mouth shut in complete embarrassment when my brain catches up to my mouth. “Or maybe you’d like to spend it drunk?” I offer but relax when I notice that he’s clearly trying to hide a grin and failing at it quite miserably.

“I just have one question. Are questions allowed?” He finally asks after a few minutes of silence, in which time his drink was brought over
and
had time to cool.

“Sure. Ask away.”

“You’re twenty-six, right? So, why have you only been on one date?”

“One date?”

“Well, I’m not including the fake one, which by the way, I’m trying to decide if it was a hilarious attempt at a lame joke or if your friends are just stepping way over the line. And I’m not including this one, yet.”

“Okay, well, I dated a guy for a few years, we were friends first and when it got to be more, it just kind of happened. Then a few years ago, he died and I haven’t been interested in being with anyone else since.”

“How did he die? If you don’t mind asking.”

“Car accident, five years ago.”

“I’m sorry, that must have been hard.”

“It was,” I nod and offer a small smile, I’ll spare him the details of the rest of the tragedy. “It was a long time ago though, one of the reasons I waited so long to date was because I didn’t want to meet someone new while I was still thinking about him.”

“I understand, though we both know that you’ll never stop thinking about him. You may not be completely focused on him now, but he’ll always be in the back of your mind.”

I tilt my head at him, not sure what he’s getting at. “Is that going to be a problem for you?”

“Not at all,” He seems to finally relax and takes his first sip of coffee while pulling a face. “That’s gone cold. Shall we get out of here? If this is your first real date – I’m not including the one that you needed to be drunk to get through, - then we need to make it a
really
good one.”

“Sounds like a plan.” I grin and grab my purse as he pulls me out of the coffee shop.

I check my reflection in the mirror for the third time. Hair – down and loosely curled; check. Make-up – light and flirty, not too much but enough to know I’m wearing some; check. Outfit – grey shirt with pink flowers printed on it, blue jeans and brown boots; cute enough.

Right on time, my doorbell rings. Ethan is here to pick me up for our second date. After we left the coffee shop last week, we walked along the lake and talked for hours, continuing our conversation at a small bar where a local band were playing.

I learnt that we have a lot in common and considering we frequent a lot of the same places on a regular basis, it’s surprising that we’ve never bumped into each other in the past. And the only reason we waited so long to see each other again was because we both had work. But now it’s the weekend and we’re going out. In the day.

Are day dates a bad thing, or a good thing?

Or is it that if a day date turns into an evening date then that means it’s a really good thing?

Why is this whole thing so confusing?

There should be a dating manual or something.

I open the door and smile at Ethan’s casual look, at least I won’t feel under dressed. “Hey,”

“Hi, you look lovely.”

“Thank you.”

“Shall we?” He gestures to the general outside.

“Sure,” I collect my purse and lock the door behind me as I leave. “What’s the plan?”

“You think I have a plan?” He asks amused.

“Don’t you?”

“Not really, I just thought we’d go into town and then hopefully find something to do.”

“Oh.”

“Unless you had something else in mind?” He shrugs and I warm at his easy going nature.

“No, no. Your idea sounds perfect.” I assure him.

“Okay then, do you want to walk or should we drive down?”

I look down at my boots and judge how comfortable they are, mirroring his earlier move, I shrug my shoulders. “I probably have a couple of hours of walking in these, anything more than that and you’re either going to have to carry me or we’ll have to get a golf cart or something,”

He laughs and pulls me into his side with an arm around my shoulders. “That sounds like fun.”

We start the long walk into town. “Which part, the carrying or the golf cart?”

“Either one, but if we get a golf cart, I’m driving.”

“Deal.”

By the time we get into town, we’ve both completely covered the last week; what we did in work, how we spent the evenings, even what our favourite meals were that week. And the funny thing is, when Ethan tells me about his work and updates me on the progress of his latest project, I don’t want to stab myself in the eye with my heel, I just like hearing him talk.

“Lunch?” I ask when we stop outside a small bakery that prepares lunches in front of you and offers an outside patio to eat them.

“Yes, great.”

We both order a panini; mine - ham and cheese, his – chicken and bacon, and take them outside with fresh orange juice.

“It’s such a nice day, we don’t get many of them,” I comment as we dig into our still warm food.

“No, I know,” He agrees and wipes a small blob of mayo off of his top lip with a napkin. “It is a shame, especially since there are so many great places to go on the better days.”

“The lake?”

“Yes!”

I laugh at his enthusiasm. The lake is a local, well, lake, but it has a park and has a group of rowing boats that you can rent and take out on to the water for the day. There’s a picnic area, a few fields for football and other sports and a skating rink. It’s a very popular hangout for people of all ages in our small town. “We used to spend all our summers there.” I comment.

“We?” He tilts his head with his question.

“Oh, sorry. My parents and I. After my mother died, dad refused to go back there, but I like to go, it reminds me of her.”

“You’re mum died?”

Shit.

“Yeah, car accident, five years ago.” When his eyebrows lift, I know he’s made a connection, the wrong one, but a connection all the same. I offer a sad smile in the hopes that he’ll let it drop until a later date.

For the next few minutes we continue to eat in silence, until I think he’s actually going to ask me about it, but instead the silence just continues until we’ve both cleared our plates and stare out at the pond next to the patio, both of our thoughts probably in completely different directions.

“Lilith?”

“Yes?” I turn to him and relax when I see he’s back to carefree and happy.

“Would you like to go to the lake today? I’d love to see your mum’s favourite spot.”

“Yes.” I smile. “Yes, I’d love that.”

“Can you tell me about her?” He asks as he stands and offers me his hand.

“Sure,” I squeeze his hand as we head out towards the other side of town. “My mother… she used to read to me.”

“She used to read to you?”

“Yep, she used to read to me every night and then when I was old enough to read myself, she’d read the same book that I was so we could talk about it when I had finished it. She always finished before I did but she’d pretend that she never. She’s the reason I used to love reading so much. I haven’t read anything other than an email or a report in a long time though.”

“That’s a shame.”

“I know,” I sigh but smile when I do. “She used to pull me into the kitchen all the time too, she was always baking something and used to get me to help her and then eventually, she’d supervise while I did it myself. She was very involved.”

“So you can bake?” He asks with a grin.

“I sure can.”

“Then maybe you can bake something for me sometime.”

“I can do that.”  

“Then it’s a date.”

And in this moment, I’m happier than I have been in years. I don’t have anything to worry about, I’m with a man that I like and could, without even trying, probably fall in love with and that doesn’t scare me as much as I thought it would. Actually, it doesn’t care me at all.

Monday after work, I head to Lexi’s bookstore but when I get there, the door is locked. When simply knocking doesn’t work, I try banging and I even kick it – I’ll never tell Lexi that, it was only a little kick.

Just when I’m about to give up and go home, something slams into the door on the other side.

“Jesus, Lexi! What the fuck are is going on in there? Should I call the police? Are you being robbed?” I pound on the door once more. “Okay, that’s it, I’m calling Matt.” I pull my phone out of my pocket. “He knows how to deal with your crazy arse better than anyone.” I mutter to myself as I listen to the phone ringing in my ear.

“Hello?” Matt’s voice comes through clear when he finally answers.

“Oh great, Matt. Look, I’m at Lexi’s store and…” I trail off when the door opens and two women appear completely breathless and covered in brown stuff. “Uhmmm…”

“What? What about the store?” Matt asks at the same time as one of the women cough and brushes some hair from her face clearing enough of an area for me to recognise her.

“Lex? What the hell happened to you?” I frown and then squint at her. “Is that
dust
?”

“You called Matt?” She asks and takes the phone away from it, covering it completely with the brown stuff and then starts talking into it as she walks back into the store.

“Uh… hi,” The other woman smiles at me – I only know she’s smiling because when she does, I get a flash of white.

“Hey,”

“I’m Jess, I actually work with you, well, I work downstairs, and you introduced me to Lexi.”

“Oh, right. Jess, hi… again. Umm, why are you both covered in that stuff? Is it okay to go in there?”

“Yes,” She laughs and pats herself down, trying, I assume, to clear some of it. “We were in the attic, it’s like a frigging gold mine up there.”

I take that to mean that there are a lot of books in the attic.

“Anyway, I was just leaving so... bye!” She flashes another quick grin and jogs away leaving me slightly confused.

“Lex?” I call out and with more caution than is definitely needed, I step into the store, closing and locking the door behind me – simply because I’m one hundred percent sure that whatever she is doing is completely legit. Knowing Lexi, she’s making a tunnel through the rooftops to get into the coffee shop or something. I laugh quietly to myself at the idea.

“Hey,” She walks out of the office- now clean, and hands me my phone back. “Sorry I kept you outside, we were up in the attic.”

“Yeah, I heard. So, Jess, huh?”

“Jess? Oh right, she’s great, you were right, I
love
her.”

“Thought you might.”

“So? Are we still doing this?” She asked with an eyebrow lifted.

“Of course.” I smile and walk around her to the office where I throw myself down on to the beanbag.

What is it with beanbags? No matter how old you are, they’re hard to resist.

Lexi follows me in and collecting a bottle wine and two paper cups – we’re so classy, - she sits on the floor next to me and smiles evilly as she pours and then passes me a glass. “So… spill it.”

“Date number one; Mark.” I take a healthy sip of the blood coloured liquid. “I wanted to shoot myself before we finished our appetisers”

“Oooohhh,” She visibly winces. “That bad, huh?”

“Ask me what component you need to build a laptop. Oh. Oh. Oh. No. Ask me what the best anti-virus software is at the moment.”

“Uhhhh… no. I’ll pass.”

“So anyway, after an hour or longer – I can’t remember exactly, the whole thing is a blur, I’m trying to block it out. But anyway, after an hour-ish of talking about computer stuff, he mentioned how he knew I was a sure thing.”

“He didn’t!” She’s suitably outraged, which makes me feel a little better about the whole thing.

“He did. He said something about how I had a look in my eye that basically let him know he was going to get laid that night.”

“What look?” She asks as confused as I was earlier when Jess ran away from me.

“Exactly. That’s what I thought. I didn’t even know there
was
a look, let alone that I was capable of giving it.”

“Huh,” She starts at me for so long I start to feel uncomfortable.

“Lex?”

“I know!” She all but screams at me. “You have to give me
the look
.”

“
What
look?” I throw my hands out in exasperation, spilling wine everywhere. “Oops.”

“Don’t worry about it,” She waves her hand at the stain and clicks her fingers in front of my face. “You need to concentrate. Look at me exactly as you looked at him.”

I let my mouth go slack, drop my eyelids to half-mast and let out a rip-roaring snore.

“Okay, okay,” She laughs, slaps my arm and refills my glass. “Forget about the snooze. Tell me about date number two.”

“Date number two? I didn’t go back out with the guy a second time.”

“Noo… tell me about the second guy.”

“Ethan. Oh!” I sit up straighter and smile. “Ethan.”

“That good huh?” She smiles back at me.

“He’s so….. nice.” My nose screws up when I think about it. “No, not nice. He’s great. We’ve been out twice, the first was a coffee date, I was still feeling weird about the date with Mark so when he got there, I just laid it all out for him. I told him I wasn’t having much luck with the whole dating thing, told him I didn’t really know what I was doing. I told him about you and Matt setting me up with Jason and I also told him about Gavin. After that, we went out and spent the next few hours talking. We text and email every day, he calls me every night. We went out over the weekend and spent the day at the lake then we went to see a movie in the night.”

“You told him about Gavin?” She asks but she looks like she’s going to cry which confuses me.

“Yeah, I just wanted to get it out there, if he was going to be bothered by it, I wanted to know right then and there instead of it coming up at a later date. I also kind of just expected him to run after my rant, but he stuck around.”

“So when are you seeing him next?”

“He’s coming over to mine tomorrow night, I’m cooking dinner and we’re going to watch a movie.”

“You’re cooking him dinner?” Now she’s surprised.

“Yeah, what’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, except that’s the universal, ‘we can have sex now’ date.”

“It is?”

“Lilith… why are you smiling?”