I sighed and was about to go change into pajamas and start my Old Lady Evening at the late hour of one o’clock in the afternoon when my phone made pinged a notification. I looked down to see that I had a text message from a number I didn’t recognize, and I opened it. It was from Matt. He was asking if he could call me.
I typed back that he could and wondered what was up. Maybe someone called out and they needed me to come in after all. I waited for just a few seconds, entering his name into my phone during that time, until the phone rang. I answered it on the first ring.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Chloe,” Matt said. “Do you have tonight off?”
“Yeah,” I said, “but I’m not married to it. If you need me to come in, that’s fine. Just give me about fifteen minutes and I’ll head down there.”
“Oh, no,” he said, sounding like he was holding back a laugh. “Not the bar. I was actually calling to see if you wanted to come to my place and watch some movies and grab dinner. I have the night off, too.”
“Oh.” I knew there was probably more surprise in my voice than was cool, and I hurried to follow it up lest he think I was put off by his invitation. “Yeah, that would be great,” I laughed. “I don’t know anyone here, and I was just going to watch TV and do a whole lot of nothing as it was. It would be better with company.”
“Awesome,” he said, sounding happy. “Come on over whenever you like. I’ll be hanging around. If there’s something you want to eat, text me.”
“Okay. See you in a little while,” I said.
I hung up and stared at the phone. Was that real? Did that actually happen?
The first thought I had was that I had nothing to wear. The only clothes I’d packed were lounging clothes and a handful of things I thought might work as workout clothes or pajamas. Nothing cute. I needed to find something cute, and I needed to find it fast. I opened the contacts in my phone and hit the button for one of the three numbers saved.
“Hello?” Hannah said on the other end. I could hear a baby crying in the background.
“Hey, is it a bad time?” I asked.
“Oh, no, it’s fine,” Hannah said. “Claire’s just being fussy before her nap. What’s up?”
“Well, I need to go somewhere to get some cute clothes, and I have no idea what shops are good. Can you come with me?”
“Sure,” Hannah said. “Let me get this baby down for a nap. The babysitter will be here in about ten minutes, and I can meet you at your place.”
I hung up and went to get dressed, throwing on some of the clothes and frowning at myself in the mirror. When Hannah showed up, we rolled out, getting into her car and heading into the shopping district a couple of blocks north.
About two hours and a half dozen shops later, we had a few bags and a couple of coffees and were getting back into her car to take me back to the apartment.
“So, they haven’t even tried to contact you since you got here?” Hannah asked. “I mean, I know they can’t call you on a number they don’t have, but it’s not like a secret you’d probably come here. A normal parent would ask his brother to get in contact with me to check on you. You’d think.”
“Yeah, you’d think,” I said. “But I don’t really want to think about them today.”
“Right,” Hannah said. “I know how you feel. But we both got out. That’s what’s important. We got out and have good lives away from all that crap. I just hope you know how proud I am of you.”
“Thanks, cuz,” I said. “I’m proud of you, too. If it weren’t for you, I don’t know if I would have had the guts.”
We both smiled, and she clenched my hand for a moment before starting the car.
“Well, enough of the mushy,” she said. “You need to get ready, and then you need to text me when you get home. Even if that’s tomorrow morning.”
I was standing in the lobby when Matt came through the front door. My new outfit was really nice and extremely comfortable. I thought I looked cute in the tight blouse, and the jeans were the kind dancers wore. They stretched like crazy but still had functional pockets. Plus, they made my butt look good, so all around, I counted that as a win.
Matt looked like he was ready for a day of hanging out more than a date, and I was glad I hadn’t gone for the dress with the low neckline. Relaxing a little now that I figured the pressure was off, I greeted him and he grinned, opening the door for me and heading out toward his place on foot.
By the time we got there, Matt looked at the clock and muttered a curse.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I just remembered I sat the food on the counter in the kitchen rather than putting it in the fridge,” he said. “The tiramisu is probably a little melted.”
“Tiramisu?” I asked.
“I’ll be honest,” he said as he got the door open and guided me inside, “I will eat tiramisu over cake or ice cream any day of the week.” He walked immediately into the kitchen and pulled some containers out of a paper bag on his counter. “Nope, still cold. We got lucky,” he said.
Sticking the dessert in the fridge,
