Page 5 of The ABCs of You & Me

The afternoon drags, and by the time I’ve escorted my students out to the buses and get back to Sophie’s office, she’s gone. I make a mental note to thank her tomorrow and pack up to head home. My friends have set me up on yet another date, and despite the fact I don’t want to go, I don’t want to stand the woman up. With any luck, she’ll do that to me.

Paullina is nice enough and attractive, but I can’t help being hyper-aware of how she looks at my tattoos. There is definitely a flicker of disgust that appears every time her eyes skim across my forearms. I won’t change who I am for another person, and I certainly can’t undo the art I have paid good money for, nor would I want to. She orders a salad and water and barely eats, and even though I can see her eyeing my fries she shakes her head when I offer her some.

When the waitress asks if we’d like to order dessert, I’m not sure who says “Just the check please” faster. I can’t wait to get home to my cat, and she probably can’t wait to get home to catch up on the crime podcast she talked about. This may be the first date I’ve ever left knowing more about some serial killer than the person I was on a date with.

At home, Gary noisily greets me the minute I open the door. My sister showed up with him one day, along with a bunch of cat supplies and said, “Congratulations on adopting your first cat.” She’d been there and gone in a flurry of activity, and I had only gotten “But I don’t want…” out before the door shut and I was standing there holding a carrier with a pissed-off cat inside. That was three years ago, and now I can’t imagine walking through the door and not having him immediately attack my shoelaces.

“Zero for ten, Gary,” I announce, bending to pick him up, walking into the living room and slumping down onto the couch. He climbs up and perches on my shoulder when I shift to pull my phone out of my pocket. If reincarnation is real, I’d wager he was a bird in his last life.

Paullina was nice but I don’t think we have a future.

Heather

Shit!

Dan

Miranda is going to be thrilled.

Miranda

Why am I going to be thrilled?

Heather

You won the pool.

Miranda

TBF I’d rather Foster find love than win money.

But I guess I’ll take it.

I think I’m done being set up for a bit, friends.

Nick

No way! Alex and I have the perfect woman for you. Stick with it!

I really don’t want to. Give me a month off, I’m begging you.

Thankfully they all agree, but I know it won’t stop them from making their lists and placing bets on my love life. They all act like I want to be single, when in reality I’d love to be in a relationship. I am a relationship guy. Big fan of love and monogamy and all that. But I don’t like feeling pressured to find it because it only amplifies those buried feelings of not being good enough that filter in from other areas of my life. It would be great if love simply fell into my lap, or walked into my classroom.

Chills rush through my body as I picture Sophie standing in the door, then smiling as she admitted the food was good and finally handing me the bag of candy.

Standing, I head into the kitchen and preheat the oven. I’ve got frozen cookie dough from the last batch I made, and I have a feeling Sophie won’t say no to thank-you cookies.

THREE

SOPHIE

“Fucking kill me,” I mutter when I find the invitation in my mailbox. I knew it was coming; it’s alumni gala season, after all. I just hadn’t expected to find my name listed as one of the graduates being recognized for my role in the development of the humanities mentorship program.

The Annual Alumni Gala, an event I’d been going to for the past four years on the arm of one of the most well-respected professors at the university. A man with credentials well beyond his years and an ego to match. A man who’d waxed poetic about our future together, especially when we were with my friends and family. A man I’d existed for up until five months ago, when he told me out of the blue that he was out because he needed to be on his own for a bit. “I am feeling stifled” were his exact words. It was confusing because we didn’t actually spend that much time together with our schedules, and yet somehow I was stifling him. He told me to move out by the weekend, and seeing as how all the furniture was his, all I had to pack up were my clothes and some books.

The following week, I’d stopped by to drop off a couple books of his I’d packed by accident, and a woman I recognized from a first-year master’s class I had assisted with answered the door. At first I figured she was there for some academic reason, but then I heard Gregory call out from somewhere in the house. “Is that the food, baby?” I’d looked her straight in the eye, turned, and walked right back to my car. I ended up leaving the books in some random Little Free Library down the road from his place.

And now I was being recognized for the mentorship role I took on last year and was expected to attend this stupid gala where he was listed as the keynote speaker. She’d probably be with him, stars in her eyes as he kept her close, guiding her this way and that. Having such a handsome man who was at the top of his field take an interest in you was addictive. I’d ignored every single red flag he’d thrown up, and I’d kept every story that didn’t paint him in the best light to myself, convinced that one day he would change, go back to who he’d been in those first few months when he’d love-bombed me so hard I couldn’t see the truth through the flames.

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