I watched for a her a minute, studying the way she tucked her hair behind her ears, reached for her water glass, straightened her silverware, checked her phone. All without making eye contact. Finally, I asked, "Do you punish yourself? For breaking your engagement?"
"I don't think so, no," Stella replied, all warmth absent from her tone. She speared me with a quick glance before focusing on the salsas. "Why do you ask? Are we donating his organs? I mean, I'm not his biggest fan but I don't want him dead."
"Right, right," I conceded. "It's just that, sometimes, you mention consequences or knowing better, and how you're well versed in both. Makes me wonder whether you're referring to your ex-fiancé or"—she turned her attention away from the bowls, hitting me with a cool stare—"or just being cryptic. Because that's fun too. There's a guy I work with—"
"The miserable one?"
"Yes, that one," I said, laughing. "Sebastian Stremmel. He's cryptic as hell. I actually believe he was meant to live in a different era. He's dark and tortured, like Dracula. Heathcliff on the moors. Poe and the damn raven. Sherlock Holmes and all his shenanigans. He belongs in a period of time where it's acceptable to turn your collar up and wander along the river at night."
"I feel like that could be any time period. We could do that right now and no one would find us suspect," Stella replied. "But I do know a few players like that. They aren't the media darlings who give good face on gameday but they show up, put in the time, make the plays."
"That's Stremmel for you," I conceded. "He would've dug graves during the plague and then robbed them during the Enlightenment. I still think he's stuck in the wrong era."
"You also think I still punish myself for the mistakes of my childhood," she added, her words cloyingly sweet. "That's what I call it, by the way. Childhood. Or baby adulthood."
The server arrived then and we stopped talking to rearrange the table to accommodate the entrees we'd selected for sharing. When we were alone again and Stella was finished humming her excitement over every plate, I asked, "Do you? Do you feel like you deserve to be punished?"
She scooped an enchilada onto her plate. "Yeah, I deserved to be punished," she said, her gaze focused on her food. "Punished for letting myself accept proposals and agree to weddings—not just once buttwice—all while knowing those were the wrong choices for me. Yeah, Cal, I blamed myself. But that was a long time ago and I don't do it anymore." She seesawed her fork between her fingers. "There was a time when I thought my penance was dating men only to see them leave me and meet their wives. But that confirmed for me that I didn't want to be in the dating-to-find-the-one game."
"For what it's worth, I agree with you," I said. "Dating is…it's fucking awful. I mean,awful. Fix-ups and apps and hell, all of it."
"And you've been in a war," she added. "You've been shot."
"That's what I'm saying. Dating is still worse than war and gunshot wounds. That's why I don't do it."
Stella tossed an unconvinced glance in my direction. Her lips parted to say something but she thought better of it, shoving a forkful of rice in her mouth. Half of it didn't reach the destination and ended up raining down the front of her dress. She brushed it away with an eyeroll. Then, her hand shielding her mouth, she said, "Are you sure about that, Cal?"
I grinned, nodding. "I'm sure."
And I was sure. I wasn't dating to find the one. I'd already found her. She was sitting across the table from me, a clump of rice stuck to her sleeve.
"This is good," I remarked, tapping my knife against the plate of chile rellenos between us. "You were right. About the flavor."
"I know what's good and I know where to find it," she replied.
I murmured in agreement while she listed a handful of hot new eateries co-owned by athletes. It was part of an investment diversification strategy popularized by some wealth managers on the West Coast. Athletes with restaurants made for good press, she insisted. It was more interesting than serving as spokespeople for sports drinks or watches or laundry detergent.
But then the conversation wasn't about athletes and their income streams anymore.
Stella put her fork down, leveled me with a serious stare. "I meant what I said a few weeks ago. I'm not broken, not wounded. It's in the past. I had a bad experience when I was twenty.Twenty. I'm almost thirty-six. Soon enough, that bad experience will be more than a half a lifetime away." She shook her head. "It's not wrong for me to want things this way. Plenty of men do and for no other reason than enjoying their freedom. No one asks them if they're punishing themselves for anything."
"You're right about that," I said. "About the double standard."
She peered at me, her lips drawn tight in a line and her brows pinched. "Okay—"
"I shouldn't have brought it up again," I interrupted. "I don't mean to dredge up ancient history."
Stella reared back, holding up both hands while exaggerated shock played on her face. "Wait a second there. What—or who—are you calling ancient?"
"Stop it. You don't look a day over twenty-eight and you know it," I replied with a shake of my head.
With her fork in hand, she pointed at me, saying, "Good save." Then, "I want your ancient history."
"What?" I asked, glancing around as if I'd understand her meaning by glaring at other diners. I did not.
"You know everything about me."
Not hardly. I didn't know where she lived, I didn't know her ex-fiancé's name so that I could hate every guy with that name on principle, I didn't know what she looked like first thing in the morning, before the ponytail and leggings and lime green sneaks. I didn't know whether she watched reruns of 90s-era sitcoms before falling asleep, I didn't know whether she was a neat freak in the bathroom, and I didn't know what she wanted from this one, glorious life.
