Page 60 of Falling Overboard

Not a dragon, but close enough.

“Maybe this is why I always think the worst is going to happen. A wasp just tried to take me out!”

“My mom always says that who you are when a wasp gets close to you is the real you.”

She picked up her chair and sat back down. “You haven’t really mentioned your parents before. What do they do?”

I hadn’t mentioned them deliberately. They were worried that I would use their name to try to get out of my responsibilities, but I had no intention of doing so. And despite my earlier resolution, I couldn’t tell Lucky yet. I needed more time. “I’m a disappointment to my parents.”

True but not too much information.

“Are they upset that you are a deckhand?”

“No, they’re not upset about that.” It had, in fact, been their idea.

The server came by to fill our water glasses back up to the top. We couldn’t keep talking about my parents. So when the waiter left, I said, “Lightning round.”

“What?”

“You said we don’t know each other well, so let’s do a lightning round so we can get to know each other better. Favorite color?”

“Pink. You?”

“Black,” I said, looking at her hair. “Favorite holiday?”

“Duh, Christmas. What’s yours?”

“Easter. It’s a big deal in my family. Favorite season?”

“Winter.”

“Spring,” I said. “Hobbies?”

“Musicals and eating.”

“Same,” I said with a grin.

I found out her favorite type of sports (none), her favorite type of music (pop), her favorite kind of book (romance), the name of her high school boyfriend (some tool named Wesley), her favorite animal (cat), her favorite dinosaur (stegosaurus), and a hundred other things that it probably would have taken me months to learn about her if we were actually dating.

The waiter returned with our bill and she grabbed it. I was not going to let her pay. Especially not if she was sending her sisters thousands of dollars. She insisted and I recognized that it would hurt her pride if I refused, so I swallowed and nodded.

“Should we head back?” It wasn’t what I wanted. I would happily stay out here all day with her but we did have things to do on the ship.

She stood. “I kind of don’t want to. This has been like a movie date montage.”

“What do you mean?”

“This wasn’t a date because I don’t see myself doing that again anytime soon. You and I are just friends.” It felt a little like she had just headbutted me with that friends thing. “But I always wanted to have that date-like situation with a guy that’s something from a movie. Where it’s just easy and fun. In real life my dates are usually awkward, awful, and full of dread.”

“It sounds like you’ve been dating the wrong guys.”

“That’s for sure.”

If she would just give me a chance ...I put my arm on her so that she would stop walking. “Maybe you should try dating the right ones.”

Chapter Twenty-One

Lucky

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