Page 29 of A Journey For Jasmine

“The River Park. Pick up sandwiches and some drinks. Sit outside and relax and you won’t have to worry about moving fast to free up a table. He owns a marina. He must love the water and you’re on the water there. You’re one with nature and are comfortable there. Put yourselves in a good zone.”

“I like it,” she said, typing back and hoping Wesley did too.

She was going to put her phone back in her pocket, but Poppy grabbed her hand. “Just wait. I bet he replies. I think like you, he might want to get it out of the way. Maybe he doesn’t want to change his mind. Why else say tonight or reply so fast?”

“You’re making me second-guess everything now,” she whined.

“Don’t.” The phone vibrated and she looked down. “Is it him?”

“Yes. He said he’ll bring the food and drink and meet at seven if it works for me.”

She typed back she’d see him then and put her phone away. “Okay. I’m done now. It’s set and I have all day to stress about what to wear, but at least I’ve got time to go home and shower first.”

“Which was nice of him to pick the time a little later,” Poppy said. “I can’t wait to hear how this turns out. I’ll make sure I’m here bright and early tomorrow. I’ll bring in muffins too from the bakery.”

“You think bribing me is going to make me tell you everything that happens?”

“Maybe,” Poppy said. “Or it could be I’m just in the mood for them too.”

She shook her head and left and told herself not to stress about tonight but knew she would more than her first day meeting her college roommates and hoping she didn’t embarrass herself.

9

A Difficult One

Wesley was trying to figure out how the hell he was walking into the park looking for Jasmine with a bag in his hand full of sandwiches and water. He wanted to get wine but wasn’t sure if that was allowed on the grounds and didn’t have time to check.

He didn’t want to chicken out either on his first real date in fifteen years.

He’d dated Noelle for a year, they got engaged, and married fast. They were married almost twelve years, and she’d been gone two. In that time he hadn’t been out once that he’d consider an actual date.

Sure, he’d gone out with a few friends and met up with some women. Like he was set up, but he had his friends to fall back on. In his mind they weren’t real dates and they flopped worse than a whale in a kiddie pool.

He hadn’t wanted to be there and didn’t talk to those women individually. More like it was a table full of friends and he talked to everyone evenly.

It got him out of the house but not much more.

And sex? Yeah, not in two years and though his body was missing it, grief sometimes held it back even more.

But here was a woman who didn’t know his story and suspected it was a difficult one. He hadn’t seen his mom today and was glad because she might have brought Jasmine up and he wanted to get through this on his own without any advice or input.

He saw Jasmine sitting on a bench in the shade and made his way over.

“Hi,” she said. “What a beautiful night.”

“It is,” he said. “Glad you found a spot in the shade.” He sat next to her on the bench.

“I brought a blanket too if we want to sit on the grass. Or if we couldn’t find a bench, but I was lucky.”

“It’s late enough and early in the week,” he said.

“I hope this location was okay,” she said. “I guess I wanted to keep it simple.”

“It’s great,” he said. “I’m sure you’ve got a lot of questions and there is part of me that wants to explain.”

“I’ll listen if you want to talk.”

“Thanks for that,” he said. The wind was lightly blowing her hair around. It was in a ponytail when the past few times he’d seen her it’d been down. But he figured it’d get in the way if she was trying to eat outside.

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