Page 98 of February

“I may have overordered. I told them just to bring up whatever.”

“We couldn’t eat that much in a month.”

“We can take any extras to the office tomorrow,” she replied as the man handed her the padfolio. Monica opened it, saw the amount, left a more-than-generous tip, and closed it after signing, handing it back to him. “Thank you. Please thank the rest of the staff for me as well.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” he replied.

Monica closed the door behind him and turned to see Bridgette standing in front of the cart.

“Anything you’ll eat?” she asked.

“That’s a loaded question,” Bridgette replied.

“Where are all these sex jokes coming from all of a sudden?” Monica laughed and wrapped her arms around Bridgette from behind.

“Now that it’s possible we’ll be having sex, I feel more comfortable saying them. You got Zapp’s.”

“I did.” Monica kissed her neck.

“Like, every kind of Zapp’s. And are those…”

“They said they do this a lot, so it wasn’t a huge request,” Monica replied as Bridgette stared at the beignets from Café Du Monde. “And their coffee, too. I guess they carry that here. They got those pie things we were talking about the other day.”

“And just about every other snack in the store,” Bridgette pointed out. “We should eat the beignets before they get cold.”

“Whatever you want,” Monica replied. “Just one more second of this, please.” She rested her head on Bridgette’s shoulder.

“You know you didn’t have to do this, though, right? Buying out the store, the fancy special delivery thing.”

“I know.”

“I’m not a fancy person, Mon. I don’t need all of this. We could be walking around the city with a bag of chips, and I’d be happy.”

“I know that,” she said. “But these are all New Orleans staples, right?”

“Yeah.”

“I wanted to try them,” she replied. “You can warn me which ones might be too spicy.”

“Can I ask you something?” Bridgette asked.

“Yes.”

“If this goes well between us… I mean, if this keeps going and we end up trying to do something long-distance, would Ifitwhere you live? I wear jeans to work, and I don’t understand the whole town car thing when a cab or an Uber works just fine. Iguess I could take the subway, but I’ve never been a fan of going underground. I don’t have the fancy bags, and I’d probably break every nice appliance in your kitchen, but–”

“Hey,” Monica said softly. “Let’s not talk about that tonight, okay? We were watching a movie. Let’s eat our snacks and–”

“So, no, right? No is the answer?”

“Babe, I–”

Bridgette turned around in her arms then and said, “It’s okay if it’s no. I’m just trying to figure this out. I know I’m getting ahead of myself, but I like to prepare. If I’m going to get my heart broken again, I guess–”

“No one is getting their heart broken,” Monica told her as she pressed her forehead to Bridgette’s. “We’ll figure this out, okay? Just not tonight. Tonight, I want to eat too much food with you, finish this movie that’s not really all that good, and fall asleep with you, okay?”

“Fine. But can I kiss youbeforewe eat all this stuff? Your breath is going to be horrible.”

Monica could only smile through her concern before Bridgette leaned in, connecting their lips. They stood there, holding on to one another and kissing for a long moment before Bridgette was the first to pull back. She kissed the tip of Monica’s nose once and turned back around to take in the snacks.

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