By mid-morning, I’d managed to keep down a cup of tea and a piece of dry toast and was ready to visit not the next town, but one over an hour away. And during the drive, I listened to the local radio and refused to think about the one person I needed to contact.
Saying I didn’t have his number wasn’t an excuse. The production company card was in the café office or I could contact Abrar. No way was I talking to him. He was a smart businessman, but he also loved matchmaking, and if he had an inkling Chet and I had… he’d never let me forget it.
With a baseball cap pulled low and a pair of sunglasses perched on my nose, I snuck into the pharmacy having no idea where pregnancy tests were located or what they looked like. A young assistant appeared at my elbow and asked, “Can I help you?”
I grabbed the first thing on the shelf. Got six of them and squeaked, “No, I’m fine.”
The guy stared at the bottles in my basket and took a step back. “Okay, I’ll leave you to it.” That was weird. But as I peered at the words in huge letters that spelled out, ‘Head Lice Shampoo’, I understood. Good. Now people might leave me alone.
When I finally found what I was looking for, I shoved three different tests in the basket and sidled up to the checkout. The woman leaned back, and I guessed she was trying to put as much distance between the two of us as possible. She hardly took any notice of what I’d bought. I uttered a mumbled thanks as I took my stuff and left.
And when I arrived home and peed on different sticks, it was the first moment of stillness all day. My thoughts went to the future. I always wanted kids, but after almost dying in a gangster attack, the future had been bleak the past few months. Giving up my corporate job and moving was all the change I was planning on for a while.
And now—if I was having a baby—I’d be responsible for someone else. A someone who would be completely dependent on me. I’m not ready. I can’t do this. The baby needs two loving parents, not one damaged omega.
Time’s up! But as I checked the tests, and one by one they told me my life was never going to be the same, I placed a hand on my belly. I’m a dad. My son or daughter was only the size of a sesame seed, but I was now a parent. And I had to step up.
The phone beeped. Chet! For the first time since he’d left, I didn’t want to talk to him. But I sort of did, though I wasn’t ready to tell him about the baby. But it wasn’t Chet. It was Charlie and his message read, Glad you’re taking a few days off. None of us wants head lice!
Fourteen
Chet
The episode of my trip to Café Om was about to air, and somehow, having it air without Stan by my side sounded beyond wrong. Not that I could do much about it. We were hours and hours away and hadn’t even spoken since I left.
And really that was my fault. Not that I ignored him or anything, but I was the dumb ass who let their phone fall into the toilet before it backed up. I was the idiot who had the stupid thing sitting in rice for a week on the off chance of a miracle. I was the one too lame to do anything about it like call his fucking store.
It wasn’t like I couldn’t get a hold of him. But yet I didn’t. And really that was more about me than him. If I heard his voice again I’d miss him more. Gah. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It was a fling—that’s all it could be. We both knew that going in, and yet there I was wanting to snuggle up on the couch with him to watch the episode and then to take him to bed.
The thing was, if that was what he wanted, he’d have taken my number too, not just slipped me his in case I “needed it for taping.” Not once had we texted or called while I was there. Why would you, dumbass? You were with him constantly. There was that.
I looked at the number across my computer screen for Café Om. It would be nothing at all to call it. And yet, it felt huge.
Fuck it.
I dialed and hit send, not wanting to give myself a second to change my mind. I wanted this—to hear his voice—to talk to him—to connect again. And really, that was what this was all about. Sure he was hot and the sex amazing, but at the end of the day, it was the way we connected and just fit that I missed the most.
“Café Om, how may I help you?” a voice I didn’t recognize but was somehow familiar answered.
“I was hoping to speak with Stan.”
“Can he call you back or maybe I could help you?” Who was this?
“Yeah, okay.” I gave him my name and number, and he promised to give him the message as soon as he could. Whatever that meant.
I hung up and stared at the phone like a highschool kid who gave his first crush his number...just hoping for something—anything--to happen.
Ten minutes went by, and just as I was about to give up, assuming he had the day off or something else the person on the other end didn’t inform me of, the phone rang, only it wasn’t flashing the name Café Om, it was just a number and not even with the same area code as the café. Oh well.
“Hello.”
“It’s me. Stan.” His voice was freaking music to my ears. “Taylor said you called?
I raked my mind trying to place Taylor, and the only one I could think of was Ms. Bea’s son, and he was very much not an employee of Café Om when I’d been filming there.
“Taylor? The realtor? Ms. Bea’s son? Is he working there now?” Not that there was shame in the job, but he’d seemed all in on the realty stuff, and I kind of felt bad if he already gave up on that dream.
“Him and no, he doesn’t work here. He just answered as a favor when I had to use the restroom.” Leave it to me to call the man of my dreams—at least the naughty ones—and take the conversation straight to awkwardville where we discussed needing to pee instead of happy things like coffee and television premieres.
“Why did you call work and not my phone?” Was that anger I heard or was that wishful thinking because anger meant he wanted me to call. It also meant I had grovelling to do. Which was fine with me as long as it meant I got to talk to him. Because yeah...I’d become that guy.
“Long story short, I hate rice.” I forced a chuckle.
“How about a little bit longer version?” I could almost envision his side eye, and so I told him the entire tale, including fishing my stupid phone out of the toilet, which he seemed exceedingly amused by.
“I’m glad you dropped your phone,” he said as I finished regaling him with my toilet phone adventures.
“Thanks?”
“No, I mean, it meant you hadn’t just not wanted to talk to me.”
“It very much did not mean that.”
“I’m—hold on,” he told someone, I assumed a customer, he would be right there. “Listen, I have to go.”
“Okay. Can I call you later? Maybe we can FaceTime watch the show together?” Not that I’d exclude other possible uses of FaceTime, but it wasn’t every day you got to be on television. I mean, for me it was, but not for Stan and the others.
“Yeah, I think I’d like that.” He said good-bye, and as much as I didn’t want to let him go, I got it. Work came first. At least I had that night to look forward to.
I had a date. Sure, it was a long-distance date, and it would predominantly be a television no-chill kind of evening, but gods did I feel like a schoolboy about to go on his first date. The mixture of excitement and nerves and disbelief that he would go out with me all wrapped into one.