Page 3 of The Kiss Class

“Ow.” My yelp is nasal as I hold my breath because someone seriously needs to bathe.

She doesn’t apologize, nor does she make eye contact.

When I turn back around, the guy who helped with my hardshell suitcase taps it and says, “Pink. Cute.”

My tummy does a little flip-flop.What’s cuteis the wrong question. It’swho is cute. The answer: he’s cah-yute.

“Thanks. I’m a triplet. Our mom designated us each with a color to simplify things. I got pink, and my two sisters got purple and red.”

“There are three of you?” He flashes a slightly less than pearly white grin.

I bite my lip because, if I’m not mistaken, he’s being kind of flirty. Short-circuiting, I stutter a dumb reply.

The woman behind me pokes me in the kidney with her umbrella.

“Sheesh,” I mutter. It’s not like I can move since we’re packed in like sardines.

Checking my boarding pass, I climb over a man wrapped in a trench coat who is seated in the aisle. I catch another waft of BO and am glad there’s a seat between us, but I feel bad for whoever has to sit there.

Except it’s the cah-yute guy. No sooner does he also manage to wedge past the immovable man in the trench coat—no shade, there’s nowhere for him to go unless a crane appeared from the hatch in the ceiling and temporarily lifted him—Icatch the rank scent of body odor again. I discreetly do a sniff test. I’m daisy fresh even though the plane is stifling, causing a rash of prickly sweat along my spine.

After preparing my reading material for the flight, the cute guy next to me stretches his arms overhead and yawns. I realize the source of the stench. It’s my seat neighbor. The cah-yute guy. More like pee-yew guy. I knew it was too good to be true.

Dreams of an inflight start to my happily ever after dashed, I do my best to breathe through my mouth to avoid the offending smell.

“Hey, by the way, I’m Richy,” he says.

Not wanting to be rude, I offer an apologetic smile. “Oh, um, I’m reading.”

He tilts his head. “That’s your name? Hmm. Are you a library book?”

Flustered because I’m not used to flirting, not even with a stinky guy, I point to my tablet. “I meant?—”

He taps his fingers in the air at me. “If you’re a library book, I’d like to check you out.”

My cheeks instantly match my suitcase. “Oh, um, do you have a library card?” Maybe I’ll just crawl under the seat now.

This is not what I meant when I mentioned I have criteria.

He chortles. “I can’t say I’ve done much reading lately, but I’d love to do something about that.”

He makes some more flirty small talk that could land him in the penalty box when, thankfully, my phone rings. Ducking my head in an excuse-me gesture, I pop in my earbuds and answer, telling my dad I’m on my way.

It’s sweet that he still checks in every time I fly. He’s not overprotective. He is hyper-protective.

When we lost Mom over a decade ago, he dedicated his life to our safety. The rest of his energy goes to the Nebraska Knights, his hockey team, who received the tough side of asingle dad raising three girls because there’s nothing soft or cushy about the fiercest players on the ice.

I happen to know that some hockey players are also skilled at deception. But that’s not a Christmas story anyone wants to hear. It doesn’t have a happy ending and might be part of the reason I’m still single . . . and will remain so for the duration of this flight.

When my father and I get off the phone, I leave my earbuds in and search for a podcast, hoping to avoid another cheesy, bookish pick up line even though I’m a self-professed reading junkie. However, I cannot ignore Richy’s odor, which is a combination of old cheese and pizza onions.

But before I tune out to a long-form podcast about storm chasers, the text thread with my sisters beeps repeatedly.

Kangaroo Ilsa: Christmas is coming and I have a surprise for our Cara-Lou-Who.

Anna Bannanna: Me too, and Santa’s sack is full of one of Cal’s college roommates coming to town.

Me: That just sounds wrong. I appreciate you trying to find me a Mr. Wonderful, but . . .

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