Page 36 of Ten Years and Then…
Nora, about eight o’clock
At first, Nora didn’t think it really mattered what she wore tonight. She’d be wrapped up in a heavy coat in Times Square and Daniel wouldn’t see it. And if—when—they came back up to the apartment, whatever she wore would end up taken off and tossed on the floor in short order.
But what about dinner? They’d have to eat somewhere, and she could hardly keep her coat on inside the restaurant. So she was going through Rachel’s closet looking for just the right dress. Nothing seemed exactly right; there were several good dresses, but none that were great.
Except, maybe—there was that red dress in the back. She’d skipped over it the first time—it seemed too dramatic, too much.
She pulled it out, held it up to herself, stared into the mirror. It was definitely too much. But maybe, tonight, too much was just right.
This was New Year’s Eve, in Times Square. Their first new year together. The first big holiday date she’d ever had with a boyfriend. If that didn’t call for drama, what did?
Daniel, half an hour later
Daniel wasn’t sure if the leather jacket objectively looked better on him than when he’d bought it a year and a half ago with his high school graduation money, or if he simply saw himself differently now.
Older, more adult.
Between the jacket and the cologne, he felt—he wasn’t honestly sure. He went back and forth between thinking he was legitimately well put together, and that he was simply playing dress-up.
Mom had insisted he wear the cologne—and then supervised the application, “So you don’t overdo it and smell like you dumped a whole bottle on. Your father used to do that.” She had gotten it just right, as far as he could tell. He smelled it, but just barely, a faint scent of pine combined with—the best word he could think of was cleanliness, but not the kind after you cleaned the kitchen. He hoped Nora would like it.
He got his answer a half hour later when he stepped out of the subway and walked the half a block to her building. She came running out—she must have been waiting in the lobby—and hugged him. Then she sniffed, and leaned in closer. “Oh, that’s nice. You should wear that all the time.”
As understanding as Nora was, as much as she could laugh at almost anything, Daniel didn’t think telling her Mom had picked out the cologne was the right approach, so he just thanked her and then took stock of her. She had her hair up, sort of how she’d had it on their first date, but fancier. Had she gone to a salon just for tonight? Just for him?
She was wearing perfume, too. It had to be the same as that first night, she smelled like jasmine and vanilla and something else he couldn’t identify. But it was—well, it put him in mind of that night, so it was obviously doing exactly what it was supposed to do.
“It’s only eight-thirty,” he said. “Let’s get something to eat. Is there any place around here you like?”
He took her hand and they started off down the sidewalk. “There’s a great Chinese place over on 82nd and Columbus. It’s only four blocks or so.” Then she hesitated. “You like Chinese?”
As long as it wasn’t from the crummy takeout place Dad liked over on 233rd street. “Yeah. That sounds great.” But when they got to the restaurant, and Nora unbuttoned her heavy parka, he no longer cared about food. All he could do was stare at her; she wore a stunning red dress that could have come straight out of a fashion magazine. She must have noticed him staring, open-mouthed—how could she not?—and did a little twirl before she sat down.
How was he expected to eat, or make conversation or even think coherently, when she looked like that?
Nora, an hour later
Nora was nearly as overwhelmed with Daniel as he clearly was with her. He’d been nervous—not quite jumpy, but almost—from the moment she’d taken off her coat, straight through the egg rolls and the General Tso’s Chicken to the fortune cookies sitting unopened on the table.
She wasn’t showing her own nerves; she supposed she’d had more practice at covering up that kind of reaction. But it was right there under the surface. His cologne was—well, sexy. There wasn’t any other way to say it. And he’d put on just enough that it made her want to nuzzle right up to him to get a better whiff of it.
He couldn’t have done that on purpose. It wasn’t his style, and, anyway, seeing how he’d never worn cologne in the two months they’d been dating, she doubted he could have applied it that perfectly on purpose even if he had wanted to.
She wondered if it had been his mother or his father who’d done it for him. Another question she’d never ask him.
Well, not unless there was a serious uptightness emergency and she needed to change the subject immediately. That was a “break glass in case of fire” kind of question if ever there was one.
Besides the cologne, she loved that jacket. It fit him perfectly, and the brown was such a good color on him. “Did you get that jacket for Christmas?”
He shocked her with his answer. “No. I’ve had it for a while. I bought it myself, after high school graduation.” She would never have guessed he picked it out himself. It suited him so well, but buying an expensive jacket like that didn’t fit with anything he’d said or done since they’d met.
“Why am I only seeing it now?”
His next answer wasn’t surprising at all. “I thought it looked so cool in the store, but when I got it home and I put it on and looked in the mirror—it didn’t feel like me. It was like, the jacket was cooler than I was. Like it wouldn’t want to be seen with me.”
That was stupid. And sad. And exactly how she imagined the boy he’d been a year and a half ago would think. “Well, you can tell the jacket from me that you ‘re more than cool enough for it.” She laughed. “But I guess you figured that out for yourself already.”
He reached across the table, took her hand. “Well, you helped. But I think the jacket probably feels kind of underdressed tonight, compared to you.” And then he grinned. “I’ll give it a little pep talk later, maybe I can boost its confidence, you know?”
