But of course, he’s just talking about my personality. Nothing serious. It would be too fast if we both dropped that word at this early stage of dating anyway.
“I’ve never met anyone I enjoy talking to as much as you. I mean that.” Nat gives my hand a squeeze. “Being with you, even if we’re not speaking, just being in the same room, it gives me so much energy. And I hope I do the same for you.”
“You do,” I whisper.
Guilt tugs on the edge of my gut. I’m, technically, lying to Nat about how early my feelings began and it’s starting to gnaw at me.
Deciding to give him a little more of the truth, I admit, “Long before we started dating, I liked being around you. Even if I couldn’t have you as a boyfriend, I would want you as a friend.”
Nat scrunches his nose. “I worked so hard to date you and you’re still trying to friend-zone me?”
Laughter pours from my lips. “No, I just mean that you make me feel comfortable. Like I can be myself around you. I don’t have to conform to being a ‘feminine woman’—whatever that is. I don’t have to keep my thoughts to myself…”
“Please don’t. Your thoughts are sexy and must be shared.”
I snort. “…you think I look good in a tank top…”
Nat groans and throws his head back. “The tank tops. The tank tops are incredibly sexy too.”
“… and you find my rambling funny?—”
“It’s comedy gold. And also…”
“Sexy?” I fill in.
“Exactly.”
“Which is absolutely ridiculous. I’ve been told, on several occasions, that I amnotfunny and that I talk too much. But the fact that you like it proves there’s someone for everyone.”
To add an even happier layer, it just so happens that the man who ‘gets’ me is also the man I’ve been pining after for years.
Some secret dreams do come true.
“What’ll you have, Riles?” Nat asks, breaking me from my daze. We’re at the fast-food chain drive thru.
I decide to try a new flavor and, when I actually take a sip of my drink, I realize that what I ordered is disgustingly bitter.
Nat pulls the car back on the road and drives in the direction of the hills.
“What’s wrong?” he asks after seeing me grimace.
I stick out my tongue and try to air-wash the taste from it. “I don’t like my coffee.”
“You can have mine,” Nat says, offering me his cup.
I inch away from it. “Don’t you drink coffee black?”
Our mom never allowed us to drink coffee while we were kids, but Nat’s parents were more carefree and he had a coffee order from the age of sixteen.
He used to say ‘I like it black, like the puck’. And that was that.
“I do, but I saw that you had a ton of vanilla nutmeg coffee packs at home and I figured you preferred your coffee sweet, so I got a coffee you’d like. Just in case you hated your order.”
My heart turns to mush. “Thank you, Nat.”
“You’re welcome.” He grins, proud of himself. “I hope you like my next surprise too.”
The pickup jolts as it moves over rocky terrain. I look out the window and notice that we’re climbing to the precipice of a hill. From this vantage, I can see the airport.
