“Okay, you realize you could have just told me that, right?”
“I thought it would only strengthen my reputation as a patronizing dick.”
“You have no reputation as a patronizing dick, Isaac. Every worry you’ve had has been completely understandable. Often wrong and misguided. But understandable. And that goes double for this one.”
He did his equivalent of an eyebrow raise: his left eyelid flickered slightly. “Really? Because I really felt the dickishness as soon as I dreamt it up.”
“I can assure you, the dick quotient is zero. It was a good idea.”
“So you’re totally onboard with it?”
“Yes, completely. One hundred percent.”
“We can just do this like we started dating right now.”
“Honestly, that sounds cool. We can do first date things—like awkwardly talking too much about our boring hobbies, or saying something devastating without meaning to,” she said, though really she only did it to keep the mood light. To make him laugh, maybe.
She didn’t imagine for a second that he would seize on it.
But for a second he almost looked eager.
The way his voice sounded when he asked me for more details, she thought, and actually got a little thrill. Even though he only asked, “How about sharing our favorite movies? Is that a first date thing?”
“You’ve been dying to ask me that, haven’t you?”
“Fuck,yes. Every time I tried to segue into it we started talking about sex instead.”
“Oh you poor thing. How did you ever cope?”
“With great difficulty. Now come on.”
He gestured at her, in a way that seemed familiar.
Then she remembered: he’d done it during defense training.
Come at me, she thought he meant. So she did.
“Okay, okay. Mine isGrosse Pointe Blank.”
“So completely unrealistic fairytale about a murderer.”
“I guess that would be one way to look at it, yeah.”
“And what would be the other way?”
“Martin Blank is fucking awesome.”
He rolled his eyes, at that. Very obviously, too.
And when he answered, his voice was heavy with sarcasm.
“Tell that to the people he kills with a fork,” he said.
But she wasn’t about to let him get away with that.
Not when she suspected they weren’t talking about Martin at all.
“Oh you mean the awful, terrible bad guys.”
