Page 6 of Business or Pleasure

“Holy shit.” I flutter my lashes as I lean forward across the table. “You are... a huge nerd.”

The groan and balled-up napkin he tosses my way are 100 percent worth it.

The doorbell jingles as another group pushes inside, and it takes me a moment to realize why they’re all wearing costumes—Yoshi, Wonder Woman, and something I don’t recognize—because in Capitol Hill, you never know. One of those comic book conventions is happening downtown this weekend, and I’m guessing they just came from it.

On the other side of the table, Drew stiffens, seeming to relax only once the group takes their pizza to go. Secondhand embarrassment, maybe? Residual childhood trauma involving Mario Kart? Whatever it is, he doesn’t offer an explanation, and I don’t ask for one.

“You’re a journalist,” he says, spearing a green pepper with his fork. “Did you study that in college?”

I nod. “It was a lot of doom and gloom. Newspapers had started folding all over the country, and it was made clear early on that none of us were going to be able to find jobs at a local paper working one specific beat, in part because some of those papers wouldn’t exist, or they’d be online-only, and also because it was getting less and less common to even have a specific beat. We had to learn how to do everything—photography, video, basic coding. And then I minored in gender and sexuality studies.”

At that, Drew coughs a little, then swallows. “Really,” he says with a gentle thwack at his chest. Another cough. “That’s... intriguing.”

I roll my eyes. “I can never tell anyone without getting a completely pervy response. Like, ‘What are the practical applications of that?’ or ‘Hey, you wanna show me what you learned?’ Sure, I can give you my junior year textbook about data bias. Guaranteed to make anyone horny.”

Drew laughs, but I don’t miss the way his cheeks have turned pink. Even when he’s trying to play it cool, his face gives him away. “It’s not something you hear every day. What made you decide to go for that? And what are some of the practical applications?”

Groaning, I lean in and give him a nudge, a soft tap of my fingers against his sleeve. That’s it—a split second of skin-to-sleeve contact, but it has deadly consequences. He glances down at the spot I’ve touched, his blush deepening, which makes my heart leap into the general location of my trachea. Immediately, I want to touch him again, and based on the lowering of his lashes, he might want the same thing.

“A horrible abstinence-only sex ed program in high school,” I say, refocusing on his question, because it’s something I feel strongly about. A program that didn’t properly prepare me for what happened my sophomore year of college, but we’re not talking about that right now. And since he doesn’t live here, we probably won’t talk about it ever. “Or at least, that was part of it. I’d never had a chance to learn about sexuality anywhere but the internet, and I barely even knew my own anatomy. It seemed like something I could use beyond an academic setting.” I feel myself getting flustered, especially with the way he’s watching me, so I pass the question back to him. “And you studied... business?”

“I didn’t finish college.”

“Oh—I’m sorry—I shouldn’t have assumed,” I say, stumbling over my words, but he holds up a hand.

“No, no, it’s okay. I always meant to go back, but I’d been working since I was in high school, which led to a full-time opportunity I couldn’t pass up. And then it just never happened.”

“No shame in that.” I take another bite of pizza. I can’t decide if he’s being purposefully vague about his job, or if it really is so dull that he can’t bear to talk about it except in generalities. “If you’re traveling for work, you must be good at what you do. Successful.”

“Successful,” he repeats, directing that word to the crust on his plate, which he’s cutting into with his knife. “How do you even measure that?”

“Ah, so we’re moving on to the philosophical portion of the night?” I gaze around the restaurant, wondering how I got here, spilling my career woes to a Jewish vegetarian stranger who works in sales. It’s wild how easy it is to talk to him, this guy I didn’t know only an hour and a half ago. “I guess I just thought I’d be... well, more successful by now,” I say, brushing this off with a hollow laugh. “So there it is. It’s not that I want to be famous or anything. I just want to create something I can be proud of. You know?”

“I do,” he says quietly, his eyes heavy on mine, the soft creases on either side of them making him seem weary for the first time all evening.

We finish our pizza and continue wandering. As his self-appointed tour guide, I go deep into Seattle lore, pointing out the Jimi Hendrix statue on the intersection of Broadway and Pine, the movie theater that used to be a Masonic temple.

At one point, he holds out his phone, beckoning me closer to see what’s on the screen. “I googled ‘dearly beloved.’ You can say it at a funeral, too.”

I exaggerate a groan. “I hate being wrong.”

“Would a churro make it better?” he asks, gesturing to a food truck on the next block, and I instantly brighten.

We take our churros to a bench in Cal Anderson Park, which even this late is full of people picnicking, drinking, dancing to music blaring from phones and mini speakers.

“I’m kind of glad that bartender’s guinea pigs were such agents of chaos,” I say. “Or we might not have met.”

“God bless Ricardo and Judith.” Drew nudges his churro out of the paper to take a bite. As he does this, his jeans brush against mine, our hips just barely touching. My lungs catch on an inhale, and when I finally let out a breath, I can sense the heat of him not just along my thigh but in the tips of my toes, the back of my neck. He’s half a foot taller than I am, but all night, he’s carried his height with a quiet kind of grace I’m not used to. He doesn’t slouch, but he doesn’t lord it over those of us who are vertically challenged.

We could spread out if we wanted to; the bench is big enough.

It quickly becomes evident that neither of us wants to.

This whole thing is surreal. There’s no desire to check my phone for the time or chart an escape route, the way I might if I’m at a gathering that’s gotten too people-y. When I’m on deadline, I’m laser-focused, but I sent off a final revision of the personal trainer’s book last week, and now I’m waiting for my agent to submit me to other gigs, browsing job websites, sitting in that strange void of what’s next. This is the first time since that mistake with Wyatt that I’ve felt at home in my own skin. Maybe since before then, if I’m being honest.

“Seattle is winning me over,” Drew says. “I might even be a little sad to leave tomorrow.”

When he says it, there’s an inexplicable twinge in my chest. Of course he’s leaving—he’s only here on a business trip.

---