Page 4 of The Dating Game

I trip over my own feet. Strapped? To him? I temporarily forgot about that part of tandem diving.

Silent confession: I do not hate the idea of being strapped to Will. Will who promised I wouldn’t get hurt on his watch.

I eye Grant. He’s already strapped to Heath and has struck up a conversation with the woman next to him.

I’m really starting to wish Sydney were here. If she were I could inform her hotly how mad I am at her in this current moment. After all, it’s her fault I’m in this mess. The bet that I’m trying to win was her cockamamie idea. And if I hadn’t bet Sydney that I could stay with a guy for three months, I wouldn’t still be dating Grant. And if I weren’t still dating Grant, I wouldn’t be 10,000 feet up in the air with only a parachute standing between me and certain death.

And I would be free to not feel guilty about the fact that I’m looking forward to being strapped to Will and his fit body.

Although…I guess if I weren’t skydiving I wouldn't have the opportunity to be strapped to Will, so…hmmm. I really don’t know how to reconcile all of these hypothetical scenarios into one where I’m not dating Grant, I don’t have to skydive, but I still get to be strapped to Will.

I think it’s important I pause here and reflect on the fact that it may make me a horrible person to be dating a man simply to win a bet, but in my defense, Grant informed me pretty early on in our relationship that he didn’t usually like to get exclusive with a woman until around the three-month mark. Normally this would have been grounds for immediate dismissal, but I’d already made the bet with Sydney at that point, and this news about Grant made him seem like a good candidate for helping me win the bet. If I were stringing along a good guy who I'd changed my mind about, I’d feel bad. As things stand, I’m happy to know Grant has other women waiting in the wings.

“Alright, I’m going to hook our harnesses together at the hips and shoulders,” Will explainsas he does so. I nod.

“I’m still not doing this,” I inform him and he chuckles, his breath blowing warmly against the bare skin of my neck.

“Don’t count yourself out yet.” There’s one last click and we’re strapped together. Will hits the side of the plane. “Let’s do this!” he shouts. A minute later the plane’s door is wide open and the noises of the wind and sky fill the plane. Oh my goodness. OH MY GOODNESS! I push backwards against Will, but the man is an immovable force.

“I have to use the bathroom!” I announce wildly.

“No you don’t,” he says in my ear. It would so serve him right if I peed on him right now. Unfortunately, he’s correct. I don’t have to go. Darn it. The first pair jumps and dread coils in my stomach. “Just wait till you get that adrenaline rush as we’re falling,” he says.

“I don’t need a rush of adrenaline,” I reply. “I have plenty of adrenaline racing through my body as we speak. Adrenaline of the fight or flight variety.”

“So go with literal flight,” he says, gesturing to the open door to the sky.

“No, thank you.”

The next pair jumps. Now it’s only Grant and the guy who kept pulling on his ears left before it’s our turn.

How did this happen? Ten minutes ago I was safely in my seat, determined not to do this very thing.

“Ultimately it’s your call,” Will tells me. “And while you decide, hopefully you won’t mind if I say a prayer. It’s sort of a rhythm of mine before I jump.”

“Because you’re afraid you’ll die, and you want to make things right with God?”

Will chuckles. “Nothing like that, no. I just like to thank Him for the opportunity to experience His beautiful creation in this uniqueway. Every time I jump it hits me that I’m falling through the sky He created. It just…” he draws in a breath of wonder, “blows my mind.”

My heart flutters in my chest. “How poetic,” I whisper. Unlike when he speaks to me, my mouth is far from his ear, so I don’t think he hears me over the roaring of the wind. I barely hear myself. My mind rushes with the thought of Will praying over this jump we’re about to take, and warmth fills my body. Gosh I love a man who prays.

Ear-pulling guy and his instructor jump, the man’s exhilarated scream swallowed up by the wind.

Grant turns his neck to look at me. “You ready for this, baby doll?” he shouts. I paste on a smile. Or at least I hope it’s a smile. It feels more like a grimace. I cover it up with a shaky thumbs up, and he grins at me, returning the gesture.

“Relax,” Will tells me. Ha! He might as well have told me to turn myself green for how possible such a thing is. Relax? Not going to happen. I turn my head back to look up at him, but his eyes are closed and his lips are moving ever so slightly. He really is praying.

The sound of Grant’s signature whoop fills the plane, and I look back just in time to see Heath and him make the leap.

It’s just Will and me now.

“Ultimately this is your decision,” Will repeats, “but you’ve come this close. All that’s left is to let yourself fall. I’ll take care of the rest.”

I suck in a breath. “My legs won’t move!” I cry.

“If you tell me you want to do this, I can take care of that,” Will shouts back.

What does that mean? I think it’s my desire to find out, more than anything else, that makes me shout desperately back, “Fine! Let’s go!”

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