Page 18 of Your Pucking Mom

The realization struck me, and I had to look away because for once in my life, I could see myself with someone. I wanted to know more about her, who she was, and what she was doing all day.

My house hadn’t ever felt much like a home, but with Auburn in here, it did, and I could get lost in the feeling.

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auburn

As I paced in a stranger’s apartment, my brain sifted through all the ways to talk myself out of this and tell Ledger I needed to go.

Also! Why was I pantless? Why did I think it was a better idea to take off my pants and parade around with no underwear than to wear his oversized sweats, especially since my period panties were in his dryer. I just prayed I wouldn’t get my period in the next couple of hours because that would be a whole layer of embarrassment the world wasn’t ready for.

I was losing all sense of myself, becoming someone unrecognizable—confident, self-assured, and dining with a stranger. I found myself pacing his apartment, torn by a growing urge inside me, as if I’d been given truth serum.

I wanted to explain why dating him was impossible, that I’d probably be the worst date he’d ever had, and had never been on a formal date in my life. Admitting I didn’t know what I was doing, as I’d had one sexual experience with another person, and was terrified around men, especially him, made me feel like a blubbering idiot.

Ledger’s home smelled like him—a pine forest mixed with the warmth of a crackling fire on a chilly day. Don’t ask me how I came up with that, but it just made sense. Everything seemed to make sense.

In the midst of pacing, I glanced up at him on every turn. He said nothing, and his eyes bore no judgment; he just watched me as I processed my thoughts. I needed to use opposite action. Instead of doing the things my fear response was telling me, I was going to do the opposite.

“Listen…” I stopped, needing to put physical distance between us in order to get this out. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

The words slipped out effortlessly, like long-buried confessions bubbling up to the surface. “I don’t either,” Ledger whispered.

I swallowed. “Agh. I hate this,” I confessed, running my hands through my hair, hating the way my curls coiled on my fingers, making the whole motion awkward and uncomfortable.

Ledger got up from the stool but hesitated. My instinct was to run. I kept thinking about the opposite theory. If my mind was telling me to bolt, what should I actually be doing?

I froze, as if my feet were molded to the concrete.

“Hate what?” he asked. His voice warmed me, like feeling the sunshine after weeks of dreary winter days.

“Ledger—” I coughed. “I, er, I have never been on a date before. Yes, it’s because I’m a caretaker, but I could, I guess…”

I was a blubbering idiot. The opposite theory was stupid, and I was going to tell off the person who proposed it. “I’m probably much older than you too.”

He gave me that dimpled smile that made my heart crack in my chest and took one more confident step in my direction. “I’m thirty-two. If you wanted to know my age, you just had to ask.”

I threw my hands up and paced away from him toward the windows. “Ugh. See. You’re too young for me.”

“How old are you?” I was so dumb for admitting I’d never gone on a date with anyone and I was in my mid-thirties.

“I’m thirty-five.” I hung my head in shame.

“Sunshine.”

He’d probably ask me to leave. I would just have to grab my clothes at another time. Maybe I could have Austin come get them.

No. No. I could not have Austin, my son, get my clothes from a man’s house who somehow worked on the team.

“Sun. Shine,” Ledger repeated, snapping me out of the thoughts swirling in my head.

“Yeah?” I whipped around, slamming into his broad chest. “Oh. You’re right here.”

“Right here,” he repeated.

I gaped up at him, and I could’ve sworn he’d grown in height. He was so much taller than me that if I got on my tiptoes my head wouldn’t reach his shoulders.

That fucking dimple appeared on his face and suddenly I was like a blubbering middle-schooler forgetting her words with her first crush. “That makes us three years apart.”

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