Three minutes later, she responds.
Elise: Sure. What time?
Yes! 'I'm the king of the world,'I recite in my head, while making a fist and punching the air.Relief floods through me so intensely it's embarrassing. I suggest 7:00, she agrees, and suddenly I have six hours to get my shit together.
I change my shirt three times like I'm sixteen going on my first date. I clean my already-clean apartment and order food from my favorite Chinese dim sum place. I choose a bottle of wine, put it out, then change my mind, re-select, and replace it with another. Then another.
I'm a goddamn disaster. I am never like this, never indecisive.
At 6:58, my doorbell rings.
I take a deep breath, run a hand through my hair one last time, and open the door.
Elise stands in the hallway wearing a simple black dress that hugs every curve, her wavy hair loose above her shoulders. Whatever coherent thought I had flies out the window.
Jesus.
"Hi," she says, a nervous semi-smile on her lips.
"Hello." I step back to let her in, painfully aware of how my apartment suddenly feels underdecorated.
"You look beautiful."
Her smile softens. "Thanks."
"Glass of wine?"
I pour us each a glass. When I turn back, she's standing by the windows, looking out at the traffic below. I walk over, hand her the wine, careful not to let our fingers brush. I'm hanging on by a thread as it is. If we start accidentally touching now, I don't doubt I'll spontaneously combust.
"So," she says after taking a sip, "what reunion details do we need to finalize?"
Her tone is light and teasing. She knows exactly what this is.
"Maybe we should also tell them I've been following your writing career. You know, so it won't seem like we suddenly re-bonded from out of nowhere."
She rolls her eyes. "You mean my non-existent writing career?"
"It exists. I read your work in high school, remember? Was already a fan."
Her blush deepens. Her eyebrows jump, "A fan, huh? You know, I had no idea you even knew I wrote those, and was even less aware that anyone, let alone you..." She pauses, and her blush burns?—
"There's a lot you don't know about me." I'm close enough now that her breath coasts over my skin, enough to cause my cock to stir towards attention. "Like how I wanted to ask you to prom."
Elise sucks in a sharp breath, her eyebrows furrow. "What?"
"I was going to ask you, complete with flowers and everything, but then I overheard you telling someone you weren't going."
"I wasn't going because I thought you'd be with Mia."
Shit. Really? "Well, I didn't go either. Couldn't see the point if you weren't there."
The air goes heavy all at once. Her throat moves as she swallows, and my body responds before my brain catches up.
"That's ... that would make a good cover story," she says, her voice unsteady.
"Would it?"
She sets her wine glass down on the side table, and I do the same. We're only a few inches apart, and I can see the flutter of her pulse at the base of her throat.
