Page 37 of Love Rescheduled

From there, it was a mutual love-fest as they conversed about their adoration of seventies rock bands. The only good thing I could say about it all was that there was no need to feel self-conscious while eating, considering no one was paying attention to me.

The patrons in the restaurant were lucky enough to get serenaded as Josh and Seth sang a loud chorus of “Stairway to Heaven.” And Seth did an air guitar solo of “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” even though the song came out in the late sixties. They both agreed it was a classic worthy of any decade.

I mostly sat in thought, contemplating whether I should even go on my date with Kyle this weekend. I knew one thing for sure: Josh wasn’t going to know where we were meeting. In fact, I was kicking his butt out of my house for real this time.

“I just thought of this. It’s open mic night down at the comedy club here in town. We should go. Man, how funny would it be if you got up?” Seth asked like a kid in a candy store.

Josh’s face lit up at the prospect. It was exactly the kind of thing he would love to do. He turned toward me. “What do you think? Should we go?”

I placed my napkin on the table, more than done with the night. “I’m going to head home. I have to get up early, but you two have fun.”

Seth’s face turned a tad pink, and he cleared his throat. “I feel terrible. This wasn’t much of a date, was it?”

“It’s fine,” I lied.

“Honestly, I feel awful. I’d love a rain check.”

That wasn’t going to happen. I gave him a placating smile before facing Josh. “Excuse me.” He needed to get out of my way in more ways than one.

“Come with us, Nat,” Josh pleaded.

There was one thing I was for sure never doing again, and that was going into another comedy club with him. I could see the pointing and hear the whispering now. No need to relive exactly how my life with Josh had been. I was completely overshadowed or silently mocked—in public, that was. There was no in between when I was with him.

“Goodbye, Josh.” Please let me go.

“IS IT A LOVE MATCH?” Tara asked first thing when I called to tell her and Jolene about my disastrous date.

“I think Josh and Seth will announce their wedding any day now.” I snuggled down into the covers, still not believing how the night had turned out.

“What?” Jolene roared.

“You heard me right. Josh showed up, and the two of them are a match made in heaven.”

Tara giggled.

“It’s not funny.”

“Sorry,” Tara snorted. “You’re right, it’s not. But it kind of is. The boy obviously has it bad for you.”

That boy was an idiot. “He had the audacity to text me I love you on my way home as he headed to the comedy club with my date.” Of course, I didn’t check it until I got home. Safety first. I wished I would have never told him where I kept the spare key so I could lock him out. If only I knew how to change the locks. Maybe I could YouTube it. But did I really want to get out of bed and make a hardware store run late at night? It was tempting if it meant locking Josh out. Knowing him, he would call some locksmith and convince him this was his house, so it would all be futile.

They both went silent when I expected them to be outraged on my behalf.

“What?” I asked.

“Do you still love him?” Jolene asked.

“You know I do,” I sighed. “But that doesn’t mean we should be together.”

“True,” Tara agreed. “It’s just that we’ve been talking, and it kind of says something that he’s still staying with you. Are you, you know, friends with benefits over there?”

“Absolutely not. He’s getting zero benefits.”

They both laughed.

“What benefit are you getting from him being there?” Jolene got serious once she stopped laughing.

I curled into a ball, thinking about that hard but important question. “I don’t know. He leaves his clothes everywhere, destroys my kitchen daily, and ruins my dates. Not to mention my schedule. So, I guess I’m getting tortured.”

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