I shuffle around in my seat. “It’s okay. Sounds like there’s a lot going on.”
“Still, I don’t want my duties to get in the way of this…” He reaches out a free hand and places it on my knee.There are those tingles again.“Let’s change the subject.”
“Okay.”
I lean back in my seat, watch the streetlights swish by, and try to think of something, anything, not pack related to say. After what feels like a lifetime I manage to eke out, “What’s uh, what’s Harvard like?”
“Fine,” Jasper says, not offering more detail.
“Cool.”
A song comes on that I like and I nod along ever so subtly, but Jasper notices and, I think, desperate to relieve some of the awkwardness from the car, turns up the volume. We drive the rest of the way into the city just listening to music and vibing.
Once we’re in the city I’m able to relax a scooch. Something about the hubbub, the busy streets outside the windows, the noise and motion, relieves a bit of the pressure.
“You going to tell me where we’re going yet?” I ask as we cruise downtown toward the financial district.
“Nope.”
Eventually, we pull up outside an art deco high-rise. Jasper casually slides to the curb and switches off the engine.
“Uh, I don’t think you can park here,” I say.
“It’s fine,” he says with a grin. “Wait there.”
I glance around in confusion as he jumps out of his door and dashes behind the car. In a moment he appears at my window to open my door and help me out.What a gentleman, amiright?!
“Sir.” A lady in a red vest appears with her hand open to accept the keys. Jasper hands them over with a twenty-dollar bill and I stare open-mouthed as she slides into the car and takes off.
“You just let her drive off like that?” I ask.
“Of course.” Jasper shrugs like this is the most natural thing in the world, then gestures to the door before heading inside.
We’re whisked up something like sixty floors in a gold-plated elevator, stopping with a ping when we reach our destination. The doors open to reveal a sleek, modern restaurant. Circular tables of black marble are surrounded by designer chairs with deep-mahogany armrests and cushions upholstered in rich ochre-colored velvet. Floor-to-ceiling windows run around the perimeter of the room, which looks as if it could seat a hundred dinner guests but is currently conspicuously empty.
“Are they open yet?” I ask, eyeing the smartly dressed waitstaff idling in the background, the bartender wiping the empty onyx bar, and the maître d’ in a tuxedo coming toward us.
“Master Apollo,” the man—slicked-back silver hair, an impressive mustache, a bend in his back not unlike a banana—says, smiling to greet us. “Welcome, welcome. It’s our pleasure to host you this evening.”
“Thank you, Giovanni,” Jasper says, like he’s greeting an old friend.
“Right this way, sir.”
Giovanni spins on his heel and escorts us to a table right by a north-facing window. Manhattan is a glittering painting stretching out before us.
“Your dinner will be served shortly,” Giovanni says, helping us into our seats. “May I fetch you something to drink?”
“Just a seltzer for me,” Jasper says. “With a slice of lime.” He glances at me and I somehow have forgotten all of the drinks. Do I ask for something sophisticated like wine? I don’t even like wine.
“Uh, a Coke?” I ask, lifting my hands so Giovanni can whip my napkin open and drape it across my lap. “Also with lime.”
“Very good, young sir.”
Once Giovanni is gone, Jasper smiles across the table at me. “They do an amazing tasting menu here. Best vegetarian food in the city. I hear the venison is excellent as well.”
I rack my brain trying to remember if venison is deer or lamb. “Jasper, where, um, is everyone?”
On all sides the remaining tables are set, ready for guests, with silver cutlery placed at exact lengths on either side of a folded napkin, water and wineglasses standing at the ready, bouquets of real flowers—lilies I think—sprouting from designer vases in the center. But the chairs are all empty. Has there been a zombie apocalypse and no one told me?
