We walk out to my car, and all the while I’m chanting in my head, I will not ogle Caroline’s boyfriend anymore. She is my client. I think I can even call her my friend after today and I am in desperate need of friends. But I also want to get to the bottom of this relationship. Why would these two stay together all these years when they seem so opposite? When there doesn’t seem to be any romantic attraction between them?
I get a grip and say, “Here she is,” pointing to Frankie, my purple Honda Civic hatchback.
Blake looks at Frankie peculiarly. “She?” he says.
“Yeah, Frankie.”
I give him the keys and he opens the passenger door and guides Caroline by the hand into the backseat. Once Caroline is in, he turns toward me. “You named your car?”
We’re looking into each other’s eyes. There’s a small smile playing on his lips. “Her full name is Frances Pea Civic. She used to be green.”
“Ha!” He laughs once and then boops the front of my nose with his index finger. “You’re a funny girl, Hayden.”
Why couldn’t he have said “beautiful” instead? I guess that would be wrong.
He has to move the seat back before he even attempts to get in because his legs are so long. Once he’s in the driver seat, he adjusts the steering wheel and starts her up. Caroline is quiet in the back and I’m still giddy over how close he is to me. “I didn’t think this was a factory color,” he says as he’s pulling onto the road.
“No, I got sideswiped by some beef-head driving one of those tractor trailers.”
He glances over and makes a horrified expression. “You were okay?”
“Yeah, I was totally fine. Terrified, but fine.”
And then he says, “Poor Frankie,” and I’m practically ready to declare my everlasting love for him.
Caroline chimes in from the back. “It smells like a dead body back here.”
Trying to make light of it, I joke. Because what else could I do but own the embarrassing moment? “The smell of my favorite and also very old ballet flats can easily be mistaken for a rotting corpse.”
Blake laughs out loud. He thinks I’m funny. Caroline’s not amused.
“That’s disgusting, Hayden. You should just buy a new pair.” The urge to say, “Money doesn’t grow on trees, Caroline” is strong in me, but I stay quiet.
Blake looks over and smiles. “CC has hypersomnia. Don’t sweat it.”
I turn around, look at Caroline, and say, “What is hypersomnia?”
Caroline laughs a little and then says, “It’s a hypersensitivity to smells. Blake thinks I have it because he threw away a piece of fish once in my trash can and I complained about it.”
“No, C, tell her the truth.” He’s looking at her in the rearview mirror.
She relents. “I smelled it for six months after we had basically bleached the trash can and my entire kitchen.”
It occurred to me that Caroline’s condo seemed sterile when I was there. But now she’s in the back of my old smelly car after having just eaten a Coronary Bypass. I’m making progress with her.
It’s only after several moments on the road that I wonder if the two of them are going to drop me off and then take Frankie to Caroline’s. I’d have to get another Uber tomorrow to get her. These Cromptons are starting to cost me a lot in Uber charges.
Before I even have a chance to ask, Blake says, “CC, do you want me to take you first or we can take Hayden and Uber to my place and stay there tonight?”
“No, just take me to my place, Blake. I wanna sleep in my own bed. I have to catch up on some work tomorrow.”
“I can Uber from Caroline’s, if you wanna stay there with her?” I offer, though that would mean two trips for me.
Caroline speaks up, “Blake, do you mind running me home first? You can Uber from Hayden’s, right? It’s not that far from your place.” It seemed like she wasn’t offering for him to stay at her condo. Kind of awkward for a young couple in love on a Saturday night to not be sleeping next to each other…But who am I to judge—I’ll be sleeping alone tonight anyway.
“It’s fine,” he says hesitantly. A few seconds pass and we’re at a stoplight. He turns to me and asks, “Is that okay with you?”
I guess he must think it’s weird to be driving another woman’s car. Then, on top of it, to have to drop off his girlfriend and take the other woman home…alone.
