Page 106 of Perfect Mess

“I suppose you have a pretty good personality.”

“You said personality wasn’t important.”

“Well, no, what I meant was, personality is important, in an established relationship, just not in the initial, you know, attraction phase.”

“Attraction phase? Is that the phase we’re in now?” There was a bit of a twinkle in Gary’s eye.

I tried to steady my accelerating heartbeat, but my cheeks flamed in bright scarlet despite my best efforts. “I think we blew right past the attraction phase. Now we’re in the ... retraction phase, when you try to figure out how to undo everything that went wrong.”

It took more willpower than it should have to pull my eyes away from him. I tried to focus on a pair of swans swimming side by side out on the lake. When I turned back toward him, Gary still hadn’t looked away. And the twinkle was still twinkling.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like you have something to tell me.”

“I do.” Gary paused for a moment, but kept staring at me. “You still have some Teriyaki Sriracha dip on the corner of your lip.” Gary batted his grey green whirlpool. My heart started doing round off back handsprings inside my chest and every molecule in my skin fizzed like a shaken up can of ginger ale.

“So that’s it then?” asked Gary. “I have to rely on my personality?” The look on his face pinned me to the sidewalk.Curiosity. Amusement. Danger.He reminded me of the way Purrfect looked when I caught her toying with a lizard she caught on the pool deck. Enjoying a little pre-meal entertainment.

“Well, no, the situation isn’t that bad,” I said, distracting myself with a pair of swans gliding across the lake. “I mean, you’re nice too. You’re not bad looking.”

“You think I’m not bad looking?” Gary’s Cupid’s bow twitched and his front teeth grazed over his bottom lip.

I had to clear my throat to keep from coughing. “It doesn’t matter what I think,” I said, avoiding a direct answer to his question. “It matters what Janet thinks. She’s the only one that matters.”

“Janet.” Gary’s eyes widened.

“Yes, Janet,” I repeated.

“No, Janet.” Now he was pointing.

“Huh?”

Gary pointed behind me. “Janet’s here.”

I spun around to peer at Janet, passing out pink pamphlets in the line of pamphlet pushers to each passerby. From what I could tell, she hadn’t seen us yet.

“What do we do?” Gary’s voice dropped to a whisper, even though Janet was at least twenty yards away.

“I don’t know?” I whispered back. Run? Hide? Go back and sign up for a whale saving expedition to Antarctica? I couldn’t let Janet see Gary and me together. The last thing I wanted was for Janet to get any more crazy ideas that Gary and I were anything more than friends. If Janet saw Gary and me together, the plan would be ruined. I might as well just book my passage to Antarctica and hurl myself into the path of the first harpoon I could find.

“Mary?” A man’s voice called my name, but it wasn’t Gary’s voice.

Slowly, I turned.

Jack stood in front of me with a stack of pink papers under his arm. Apparently the same flyers Janet was distributing. His eyes drifted down my body, settling on my feet. “How’s the ankle?”

“Better,” I said. “Thanks.”

Jack turned to Gary. “You look familiar.”

“We went to the same high school,” Gary explained.

“Larry?”

“Gary.”

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