Page 36 of Handling the CEO

She laughs at me, snorting her coffee all over my counter.

“You are a couple of adorkable nerds!”

“How is a rage room nerdy? We literally blew shit up with baseball bats. Jon also impressed-slash-scared the kid at the till asking for an even bigger sledgehammer.”

“I bet he had a big sledgehammer,” Laura adds, winking at me, “and he did very bad things with it. And that you… blew… something”

He does, and he did... and I did. But I don’t want to share with my nosy sibling.

“Lau—you need to get a life… maybe a cat. I still don’t understand why this was worth a trip here. You could have just called to get snubbed.” I stick my tongue at her, then have another bite of my delicious pastry.

“OK, I think you may want to sit down for this...” At least she has the good sense to look a bit remorseful during her dramatic pause. “Mamáaccidentally heard Marcus and I talk about you and yournovio.”

I cringe, knowing exactly what was to follow. I don’t cringe exactly at the thought of Jon as my boyfriend, even though we didn’t specifically have the ‘talk’.

“Is she going to call today, then?”

“Probably tonight. I told her you are working all day,” she grins. “She will eventually ask you to invite him to lunch on a Sunday, you know.”

“OH MY GOD Laura,” I groan, “it’s way too soon, I’ll scare him off!”

“You’ll scare him off or yourself?” Yoda-wannabe in front of me asks, but it is I who almost says the words backwards.

“Umm,” is all that comes out.

My older sister knows me all too well sometimes. I have been enjoying my time with my caveman but have been scared of asking the Questions.

“DJ, is this about Richard? You don’t think they are the same kind of man?”

“I don’t know,” I confess. “Richard was funny, and we got along great at the beginning as well… and look what a turd he turned out to be. I recognize I am the one who finally dragged Jon to me, and I should be a bit less unsure, but still. That is why I am trying to not go too fast. Fighting with him and then finding excuses not to be with him… was easy. Now that we are together—I am just…” I can’t seem to identify the words to say out loud.

How frightening it is to be with someone again who means more than a one-night stand, who makes me all mushy when he kisses my neck, whispering how beautiful I am. With a man who made sure my favorite yogurt brand in his fridge. How terribly alarming waking up alone at night is when we don’t sleep in the same bed. How petrified I am he will want less than what I found myself wanting again.

“Lil D—this is the first guy I have seen you with which puts that smile I just saw on your face when you were thinking about yesterday. That includes Richard—who wasn’t even in contention. This is a bit about you acknowledging to yourself that you are ‘all in’ with a man again, and being unsure if he won’t skip on you like your ex. Tell me, how many times a week do you see him?”

“Well, we go out a lot as neither of us cooks, but mostly we stay at his place—as mine, as you pointed out, is a bit… barren—playing video games and watching movies. Last Saturday we went through season one of the ‘Line of duty’ while doing fake British accents. Jon was far better than me, but I won’t admit it to his face. The fucker knew it, though. Then he pretended to be Scottish for dinner, fooling the servers and talking about his family’s kilt while I had to suppress bursting into laughter whenever he used ‘aye lass’. But I think we have been taking it easy, really.” It all comes out in one, and I didn’t even realize how much I had to tell.

“Well,hermanita, I believe you need a dictionary—preferably one thrown at your head—if a dude spends so much time with you, it isn’t casual or easy. Especially as I have seen you drooling after falling asleep at the movies. You, my idiot sister, are in a full-blown relationship. And if you talk about him like I just heard, you are more than happy to be in one, whether you want to accept it or not. Silly DJ…”

Laura gets off her stool, comes next to me and puts her arms around me. She hugs me as I just stand there as the fool I am, berating myself on how I told Jon he is a dumbass for not reading a contract when I can’t see what’s right in front of me.

“I will not repeat this for an audience, but you may be correct,” I sigh. “But not sure if meeting everyone at Sunday lunch will not panic the shit out of him. It sure does me.”

“Don’t worry, I will be right again. I can give you a pass today.” She obviously hears the first sentence loudest. “It’s not every day my little sis finds herself a good dick to take home to momma.” She lets me go and pours herself another coffee then forages my fridge for her milk, as I try to scrub THAT particular image from my mind.

“OK, but definitely not this weekend withmamá. I think as ‘step 1’ I may need to admit out loud…“ I breathe in and breathe out… “I have a boyfriend. And I need to talk to him about where our relationship is.”

“Well, ‘step one’ is admitting you have a problem,” she jokes, and I roll my eyes. “And… What else about your cavemannovio?”

“And,” I ponder what to add, but I allow myself to say, “I really like him.” I tap my forehead on the marble countertop as my sibling pats my back gently, chanting, “There, there, that wasn’t that hard, was it?”

It wasn’t.

Should it have been?

Shouldn’t I just keep myself in check until I know for sure?

But I can’t, as my dumb heart is all decided.

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