The table goes quiet, and Danielle glares at him, gearing herself up for a fight. She opens her mouth to say something when Matt interrupts in the nick of time: “Pass the meatballs, please?”
I look up at him and smile coyly. He just successfully stopped World War III from starting here, in my mother’s dining room, by reminding them that we have company. We all hate it when my brother pulls the doctor card—especiallyDanielle, and especially when it concerns him going against her maternal instincts.
“Will you join us?” I ask Matt as casually as possible, changing the topic to a much more important one. “At the pumpkin patch, I mean?”
He smiles crookedly at me and places the plate with the meatballs back on the table. “Yeah, if you’ll have me. I was planning on going back to the city after lunch, but I can stay a while. Never been to a pumpkin patch before.” He shrugs.
“I think you’ll love it,” I whisper so no one can hear, impressed with my forwardness. I’m not usually like this.
I bite my lip and look away from him. His smile is like the sun; I can’t look at it for too long because it starts to hurt.
Is this flirting? Are we actually flirting right now? Just the thought of having something with Matt blows my mind. I mean, is that even possible? When I was a senior in high school, it seemed so farfetched that my brother’s best friend would even pay attention to me for one second. And I was right—he didn’t even remember meeting me. But I am a grown woman now, and Matt is all man.
I definitely felt a spark there. Did he feel it too?
I’veneverfelt this before.
“I’m sure I will if you’re there,” he leans into me and whispers. His breath on my ear sends shivers down my spine, causes my skin to blush, and I panic. There is no way no one at the table just noticed that. I raise my head and look around to the others, but they’re too wrapped up in their own world to notice what just happened. Mom is spooning more meatballs onto Vinny’s plate while he feeds Leo, and Danielle is trying to get a fussy Clara to eat her applesauce.
Well, then.
I smile up at Matt, wondering how the hell I got so lucky that Jeremy broke up with me right before my fall break. Ineverfelt this type of spark or energy with him.
What even is this?
ITHINKI’m in trouble.
No. IknowI’m in trouble.
Vinny’s sister is…amazing. Pretty fucking amazing, actually. She’s smart, well-read, and quick-witted. I think a normal girl would have been mortified, but she handled the whole covered-in-vomit thing amazingly well, cracking jokes instead of freaking out. Normally, I find self-deprecating humor to be annoying, but on her, it’s…adorable? Plus, she’s beautiful, which really does nothing to help my case.
It’s funny. I usually go for the tall, stick-thin girls—a habit from college, I think—but Liza is different. She’s petite, curvy in all the right places, and has big, dark, unruly hair that makes me want to lean in and stick my face in it and smell the back of her neck.
I’m freaking myself out here. This is not stuff I should be thinking about.
If Vinny found out I was thinking about his little sister in this way, he’d kill me. The guylivesby the bro code, and I bet youThou shalt not date another bro’s sisteris up there in the top ten most important rules of the whole book.
I could tell from the minute she sat down next to me at lunch that we had something, though. Not to sound like a girl, but we clicked the second I turned to look at her at the lunch table—maybe even before that, when we made eye contact before she ended up covered in vomit.
I was dying to get to know her better but was scared it would be too obvious if I focused only on her, so I did everything I could to get information on her as casually as possible.
First thing I had to find out was whether or not she’s single, which, luckily, she is. Unfortunately, it seems like she literally just broke up with someone, and while Vinny said she was still getting over it, Danielle made it clear that Liza never loved him.
I can definitely work with that.
Second thing I had to make sure was whether she’d be interested in me, which had me worried. I know I’m a nice-looking guy, but looks aren’t everything—personality is more important—which is why I panicked a little at first when she said that we had met before. It was the second time today that Old Me had screwed things up for Present Me, and it was getting annoying.
I wanted to kick myself for not remembering her, but more so for her having met me when I was a complete ass more than anything else.
You could say that I wasn’t the sweetest guy in med school. The stress from school really got to me, which meant that whenever I wasn’t studying, I was drinking and sleeping around. It was the only way I knew how to deal with the pressure. I knew once she said that we had already met that it was going to be tough to convince her that I wasn’t that guy anymore. Nowadays, I try to balance the stress and anxiety in a healthier way through a mix of yoga, meditation, and cycling.
Hopefully, she’ll understand that we all make mistakes and go through phases we regret. I mean, we all have to grow up eventually, right? Not to sound like Vinny here, but I’m a doctor now. I’m responsible. People’s lives literally depend on me. It’s a lot of pressure, but it should work in my favor, right?
I know it’s not cool since it goes against the rules, but the second they mentioned the trip to the pumpkin patch, I immediately canceled all of my plans for the rest of the day to make sure I got to spend more time with her. For a minute there, though, she almost didn’t make it, claiming she wanted to stay and help Catterina, her mother, to clean up after lunch.
Luckily, her sister-in-law all but pushed her into their SUV and said she would stay and help with the clean-up. I honestly could have kissed Danielle then, but I’m pretty sureThou shalt not kiss another bro’s wifeis also up there next to the sister rule and would not have turned out so great for me.
I’m a little embarrassed about how nervous I feel at the thought of spending the rest of the afternoon with her. I mean, I’ve done this a million times, right? She’s just another girl. I’m just super disappointed that I didn’t get to sit next to her on the car ride over.
