Maybe she should go back and tell Sam not to shower away the grease before their date. At least if he didn’t, they’d be on more equal footing. Mentally rifling through her suitcase, Stella decided she was going to be wearing her boring gray slacks and a Maine Red Claws T-shirt from the baseball game she and Jace attended last winter.
When Stella walked into The Roast, still deep in thought, Vivienne greeted her by name. “Stella Pierce. I am honored to receive your patronage again. Is this your last stop before you’re on your way out of town?”
“Actually, no. Sam just told me it’s going to be another day on the car.”
Vivienne frowned slightly before offering a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry. Sam is usually able to take care of people pretty quickly. Your car must be a real mess for it to be taking this long. How about an almond croissant on the house to make up for it?”
Stella tried to refuse, but Vivienne wouldn’t hear of it. “These are going to be stale in a few hours, anyway, and if you don’t eat them, I will.”
“Then it sounds like I’ll be doing you a favor.” Stella eagerly grabbed the croissant, warm from its quick trip through the microwave, and nibbled on the flaky, buttery end while Vivienne made her brown sugar honey latte. “Sam is trying to make amends with me, too. He agreed to show me around town tonight.”
She resisted mentioning it as a date, but the way Vivienne’s head snapped to attention and her eyes went wide told Stella she had caught on anyway. Vivienne froze, the steamed cup of milk in her hand, poised in a half pour over the cup of espresso. “Sam is taking you out?”
“He said I needed to visit the beach and try a cannoli from a restaurant around here.”
Vivienne whistled under her breath and deftly poured the steamed milk into the mug, making a curved leaf on the surface. “Well, isn’t that special? Either he feels really bad about the delay, or he really likes you. Probably both, knowing him.”
“I asked him out,” Stella said quickly. Her face felt warm. It could be from the coffee steam, but she suspected the heat had more of an internal source. “He was just being nice.”
“Niceness has never made him agree to a date before.” Vivienne slid her latte across the counter. “Believe me, plenty of women around here have tried. Locals, tourists. Sam has turned them all down. This is a monumental day.”
A few minutes ago, Stella had been nervous Sam would refuse her. Now, she was nervous that he said yes.
What did it mean?
This was just a friendly date, right? A way to pass the time and have something fun to tell Brenda about. Brenda. Maybe Stella should call Brenda. She would know what to do in this situation.
“Okay, whoa.” Stella looked up and Vivienne was standing right in front of her, face lowered to look in her eyes. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. You have nothing to be nervous about, okay? Sam is a nice guy.”
Stella knew that. Sam being a nice guy was the reason she’d asked him out in the first place. Her problem now was whether she was nice. She smiled and ducked outside to make a quick phone call.
“Of course, you’re nice!” Brenda shouted into the phone a minute later. Stella’s friend then lowered her voice suddenly. “Everyone in the office is looking at me now. But yes, you are nice. Obviously. Why would you think you aren’t?”
Stella relayed the previous day’s events to Brenda in as concise a manner as possible. She was sitting on a bench in front of a nail salon right down the street from the coffee shop, eating her croissant and getting powdered sugar all over her blue button-down shirt.
“He is a grown man, and you are a grown woman,” Brenda said. “You are both capable of making your own decisions, so you don’t have any business worrying about his decisions. You decided to ask him out, he decided to say yes, and now you are going on a date. The only decision you need to worry about is what you’re going to wear.”
On some level, Stella knew Brenda was right, but she also wondered if this was wise. Life made more sense when she woke up, went to work, and came home again. No fuss, no drama. She liked her routine and the safety that came with always knowing what to expect. Now, ever since leaving home on Friday, Stella had no idea what was waiting for her around the proverbial corner. And she couldn’t prepare for what she didn’t know.
“I’d sympathize with you for the breakdown and repair costs, but I’d be lying. I’m not sorry at all.”
“Brenda!” Stella had waited so long to tell Brenda about the car trouble because she didn’t want her friend to feel bad. The only reason Stella had broken down on the side of the road was because Brenda came over and pushed her out of her house in the first place. She’d expected Brenda to feel bad and wanted to spare her friend from that. Until now, that is. Now she wanted to hear a little bit of remorse.
But Brenda wasn’t having it. “I’m sorry, but I’m being honest. I’m glad you’ve had a wild few days. That was the whole point! Now, you are going on a date with your mechanic. Do you realize you are living out the plot of a romance novel I read last summer? It was called Beauty and the Wrench.”
Stella and Sam’s meeting did sound slightly cinematic, but only from the outside. In the moment, there was nothing romantic about how sweaty she was from sitting on the
