Dating You / Hating You
Page 11

I flip a pencil along my knuckles. “Michael.”
“You know I’m just yanking your chain. You’re my favorite third wheel.”
“Very funny.” My phone vibrates against my ear with an incoming text. My mom has called twice since we last spoke—to ask if I’ve reached out to Jonah yet, I’m sure—but I haven’t called her back either time. It’s terrible, I know this, and I know that if she’s texting me right now, I have two choices: man up and call my brother, or learn how to make my own lasagna when I visit. I really don’t want to do that because Mom is the best cook on the planet.
I pull the phone away to check, but it’s not my mom’s name on the screen. It’s Evie’s, and she’s texted me a few times already.
“I need to call you back,” I tell Michael, and quickly end the call.
Hi stranger.
Not to be a total creeper but, do you know an agent named Elsa Tippett?
She’s interviewing here.
We’re having drinks tonight and Steph mentioned she used to work with you.
I did work with her, at Bradford.
She was nice.
And hi back!
A few minutes pass and I wonder if that’s it, if that’s all she had to say.
Elsa worked at Bradford for four years, overlapping with me for three of them before I moved to LA. Some of the grosser men called her the Bone Collector for her propensity to sleep around the office. For the record: I never slept with Elsa, nor did I ever call her by that name. But the idea of her and Evie talking about me makes a nauseating hum take up residence in my blood.
I turn back to the open script on my desk. I read. I check my phone. Nothing. Another minute ticks by. I’m halfway down the page and have no idea what any of it said. I glance at my phone again.
Should I elaborate on my connection to Elsa? Say something else?
Probably yes.
Should I ask her out? Think, Carter.
My phone buzzes again.
I emailed confirming tonight and happened to mention your name.
Apparently she has a few Carter Aaron stories . . .
Oh Jesus.
/is intrigued
I have no Elsa stories. Others, however . . .
Heading out. I’ll report back later.
An hour goes by with nothing from Evie, and I’ve just forgotten about it when her name pops up again on my phone.
Oh boy. Elsa LOVES you.
Oh, God.
This is like meeting a Penthouse letter in person.
She joined the firm about a year after I did.
She may have . . . known some of the men there. I am not one of those men.
Ugh I feel faintly queasy imagining what yarns she is currently spinning.
Five minutes go by, then ten. Nothing. Crap.
Evil?
I’m watching TV almost two hours later when I finally get a response.
Okay drinks are over.
And yes her stories were really oversold.
Also lol @ Evil
Told you.
And my phone autocompletes it.
It’s like it knows.
I was hoping for some dirt.
Apparently you’re sweet, sexy and responsible.
Snore.
I want to point out you called me sexy.
Do you want to grab dinner next week?
Yes. Yes I do.
So of course I immediately text Michael Christopher.
ALL HAIL THE LUCKY TIE
No.
Yes.
NO!
YES!
We’re having dinner.
YES
I’M GOING STREAKING
Noooooooooooooooo
Chapter five
evie
“Are you nervous?”
I look up at Daryl from where I’m currently curled in half in the leg-press machine. “For what?” My eyes go wide in fear. “Are you adding more weight?”
She stares at me, unblinking, and then looks across the gym with a pointed sigh.
“Oh. Because of Carter?”
“Yes, because of Carter,” she says, and follows it with this deep little growl. “I can’t believe you have me sucked into this soap opera. I’m basically wandering the social Sahara by myself, but I could probably recite your text messages from memory. What am I doing with my life?”
“Sorry, I’ve been trying not to think about it,” I say. “Like, if I pretend I’m hanging out with any old agent buddy it won’t be as big a deal.”
“I still can’t believe you asked him out.” She takes a drink from her water bottle. “You’re usually so good about sticking to your guns, but you folded. You’re so going to bang him.”
I cover my ears. Don’t get me wrong, I do want to bang him, but Carter and I have been texting back and forth over the last week, and with each exchange I actually like him just a little more. And this is why the nerves are really starting to sink in. It’s all well and good to have this flirtation when he’s on the other end of a screen. It’s harder to mess up when I have minutes to craft perfect witty responses. But face-to-face I’m likely to mess it up somehow, right?
As much as I try to avoid this way of thinking, it’s hard not to be cynical. Like every single woman my age, I’ve been fixed up, from the bar scene to the book club and everything in between; had plenty of spectacularly bad one-night stands; and test-driven my fair share of dating sites. Personally, I’d rather die alone in a house full of cats in tiny matching sweaters than ever attempt any of it again.
I try to ignore the pressure to be coupled up, but it’s everywhere. Romance is the subject of movies and books and practically every song on the radio. There’s my own biological clock, quietly yet persistently ticking away. My parents—who had me later in life—are nearing their seventies. They’ve long since retired from their own Hollywood careers, and when they aren’t gardening or grooming their shih tzu, they’re asking me about my dating life.
But of course there’s that niggling voice suggesting I not care about any of it, that maybe I should give in and buy the cats instead. The problem is that I don’t like them. I may be a terrible married person someday, but I know for sure I would be an even worse cat lady.
“Evie?”
“Sorry,” I say, exhaling as I push the weight up, extending my legs. “I was just trying to figure out whether I could still be a crazy cat lady without the actual animals.”
“Don’t be weird,” Daryl says. Helping me up, she reminds me, “It’s just a date. If you hit it off, you tell me every filthy detail tomorrow. If it sucks, you go home and we plan how we’re finally going to give up on this whole dating thing and just marry each other for the tax breaks.”
“It’ll be fine.” I inhale, watching as she takes my place on the bench. “Anyway, how’s your new assistant?”
Daryl lets out a loud laugh, looking up at me as she moves through her reps. “Eric? Let’s just say I probably do more of his work than he does.”
“Oh, no.”
On top of all the other weirdness at work right now, Daryl’s boss called her into his office on Monday to inform her that she’s got a new assistant on her desk: Brad Kingman’s nephew. Recently injured UCLA quarterback Eric Kingman is six foot three, gorgeous, and not the sharpest tool in the shed. It took him two days to realize that the people calling his desk and asking for Daryl did not, in fact, have the wrong number.
A little smile plucks at me. “It’s not getting any better then?”
“I wouldn’t say that, exactly.” She sits up, shrugging as she stands from the machine. “The dryer in his apartment complex overheated and all his shirts shrank. So at least the view from my office door has greatly improved.”