Page 64 of Hello Stranger

He had a bright pink scar on his shoulder that looked like he’d gotten stitches. “Where’d you get the scar?” I asked. “It looks pretty recent.”

“I crashed into a lamppost,” Joe said, not seeming too interested.

He crashed into a lamppost? Was that the drinking-and-carousing lifestyle he lived?

So many red flags with this guy.

But I must have been much more lonesome than I realized. Here was a man who I didn’t even like—but the nearness of his naked torso was putting me into some kind of a trance. What was going on with me? I was dabbing at the scrapes, but I kept losing my concentration and dabbing the wrong spots. My eyes kept wandering away from the task, traveling up his spine, out along his shoulder, down his arms. His skin was kind of buttery-tan, and he had freckles on his shoulders, like he’d worked outside a lot with that shirt off.

I pictured him raking leaves shirtless. And washing the car shirtless. Maybe tending to a vegetable garden shirtless? Then harvesting the vegetables and bringing them inside to make a shirtless meal from scratch?

Hey!I could suddenly hear my own voice saying inside my head.Pull it together! Stop fantasizing about the Weasel!

But the acoustics in my head weren’t great. The voice sounded tinny and echoey like I was at the bottom of a well. Whereas Joe’s voice—and everything else about him—was coming in loud and clear.

Honestly, Dr. Nicole would be very proud of me right now.

“You know what I love about this moment?” Joe asked then, sounding sleepy as he rested his head on his arms.

I leaned forward to take a guess. “The fact that I feel genuinely sorry about doing this to you, even though it was entirely your fault?”

“I definitelylikethat. But I’m talking about something Ilove.”

By accident, right then, I caught the way his plump bottom lip pressed against his teeth when he made the V in the wordlove.

“What do you love?” I asked, now suddenly aware of my own lip doing the same thing.

He glanced back with a vibe that felt positively affectionate. Then he said, “You’ve still got your roller skates on.”

Thirteen

THE NEXT NIGHTwas Friday. The night of my synchronized caffeination event with Dr. Addison.

Also known as my first date with my future husband.

He wasn’t calling it a date. And neither was I—out loud.

But that was all for the loophole.

He’d be at Bean Street Coffee—just a short walk for him from his work—at six o’clock. And I would be there, too. It was a bad idea, for sure. But more important: What should I wear? Jeans and a top? Sneakers? Sandals? Or god forbid—heels?

I tried many outfit options and modeled them all for Peanut. We don’t need to get mathematical about it. Let’s just say I was very thorough.

In the end, I settled on a black wrap dress with white polka dots and a ruffled hem—with the mental caveat that if it was too fancy, I could always pop back up to my place and change.

Other than the historic nature of the First Date, there was one other notable thing about today. But I wasn’t sure if I was going to share it with Dr. Addison.

Today—March fourth—was my mother’s birthday.

And I always celebrated my mom’s birthday. Just the two of us. I’d tuck a flower behind my ear, the way she always used to, and I’d bake a cake from scratch, and I’d buy candles, and I’d sing happy birthday to her. And then I’d talk to her like she could hear me. Just out loud—alone in a room by myself. As if the birthdays of the dead were the one day of the year when they could tune in to the voices of their loved ones left behind like a radio frequency.

I’d tell her about my life—catch her up on all the nonsense and goings-on. Give her the Peanut update. Reminisce a bit about fun things we’d done together when she was alive. And then I’d always, always thank her for being my mother, and for being such a source of love and joy that I could still feel it all these years later, so long after she was gone.

That was no small feat on her part.

But it was also a choice on my part.

It was so tempting—even still—to feel bitter that I’d lost her so soon. I had to work to turn the other way: to remember to feel grateful that I’d had her at all.

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