I stopped my perusing to look at her. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you made those dating rules yourself. And while most of them are good…they’re not the Ten Commandments. The only one enforcing them is you, you know.”
“You know, you and Dad were the ones who drilled a bunch of those rules—”
“Honey, that was in high school. You’re twenty-three now. Grown up enough to start basing your choices on maturity. In fact, what if…” She frowned thoughtfully at my desk.
I paused and turned around. “Uh-oh. I know that tone. What if what?”
“What if,” she said slowly, “instead of getting rid of all your rules, you…what if you amended some?”
“Amended?”
She nodded. “Let’s look at these and see how many you really need.” She went over and dug the planner out from where I had most recently tried to hide it to prevent talks just like these.
“Mom—”
“‘Christian man who attends a similar church to mine.’” She nodded. “Definitely a good rule. Let’s see what else we can keep. ‘Great with kids.’ ‘Values my education degree.’ ‘Has a stable job.’ ‘Has a retirement account in place before the age of thirty.’ See, these are all fine, but…oh, Jessie.” She held it up and frowned at me. “‘Hates the local football team.’ Really? You live in Arkansas, girl. Odds are no one here hates them as much as you do. If you want this in a man, you’d better move to Alabama.”
I rolled my eyes, but she had a point. Even the military guys here liked the the local college team. “Fine. We can scratch that one off.”
“‘Must make the first move.’ ‘Doesn’t have a beard.’” She closed her eyes briefly and shook her head. “Whatever.”
“Mom.” I sighed. “I have to go in like three minutes. What’s your point?”
“I just think,” she picked up a pen and pointed to the first line, “that this one…well, maybe you should rethink it.”
I pretended to study the pile of clothes already on my bed. But inside, I was panicking. Could I rethink that one? Did I want to? Because if I did, everything would change.
I grabbed one of the blouses I’d discarded and held it up again. It was white with little red and green cherries all over it, puffy at the top with a waist made with smocking that went all the way around. It was flirty but conservatively so, which was the vibe I wanted. At least, I hoped it was. This wasn’t a date, but I didn’t want to embarrass myself or Derrick by looking like a kindergarten teacher at his picnic.
“Those are cute together.” My mom nodded at the shirt and dark jeans I’d paired it with. Then she cracked a smile. “Derrick should like it.”
“I need to get dressed. Maybe we can talk about this later?”
“What about the rule?”
I huffed. “Fine. I’ll think about it. Happy?”
“Yes.” My mom snickered as she closed the door behind her. “Enjoy your date.”
“Not a date!” I called after her. But I didn’t have time to sit and stew. Throwing the blouse and jeans on, I ran to the bathroom and did the best makeup job I could before the doorbell rang. My mom answered, and I could hear a familiar voice answer.
Wow. Derrick was here. Not just in his truck, but on my front porch. He never rang when he came to pick me up. He just texted me that he was in the front drive, which was fine, as I’d always assumed it was because he didn’t want to leave Jade in the car. My heart thumped a little unevenly. Why change things up now?
“Jessie, he’s here,” my mom called from down the hall.
“Coming.” I snapped the lid back on my lip gloss, gave my face and hair a once over in the mirror, then took a deep breath as I grabbed my purse.
My stupid heart tripped on itself again as I reached the entry. I hadn’t seen him in his full uniform since our fateful introduction, just the light brown shirts Jade called, “sand”. He was fit without the uniform, keeping a tall, lean build with just enough muscles to fill his t-shirts out nicely and make women do a double-take (though I suspected he would have liked to bulk up more, judging by all the protein shakes I found lying around the house). But now I could see that his boots added several inches to his height, and the way he carried himself was different, like he was all about business. The snarky boyishness that was usually in the corner of his grin and the cocky tilt of his head were gone. And for the first time since meeting him, as he turned to look at me and his blue eyes met mine, I realized that he looked not like Jade’s annoying big brother…but like a man.
He watched me with a strange expression as he filled the doorway in his camouflage pants and jacket, and I had to take extra care to avert my eyes so he wouldn’t catch me gawking. Then I’d never hear the end of it.
“Ready to go?” he asked, holding open the door. “Jade’s in the car, and I’ve got the AC running.”
“Yep.” I kissed my mom on the cheek and ignored her smug look as I made my way out to the truck. My door was already open, and Jade was in the back, oblivious to the world as she read what looked like a new book on geodes.
Derrick closed my door then got in and revved the truck up.
