I shrug. “I don’t know. He’s thoughtful and . . . sweet.”
I see Thomas stop in my peripheral vision and turn my head to see him standing there on the sidewalk, pretending to be asleep. Loud snoring and all. A group of people pass by us, giving him strange looks.
“Stop being annoying,” I say, reaching over and grabbing him by the arm. I pull on him until he opens his eyes and we start walking again.
“He’s thoughtful and sweet,” Thomas says, trying to do an impression of me, but he ends up sounding like a girl from the eighties. One with a side ponytail and bright-pink lipstick.
“He really is,” I say, ignoring his teasing.
“Mmmm,” Thomas says, the sound coming off like a low growl. I hate this sound from him. It’s his judging sound.
“We’re going to be friends for now, take it slow.”
“That sounds like a bad idea,” Thomas says.
“Why?”
“Because you’ll do that Quinn thing you do,” he says.
“What Quinn thing do I do?” I say, my voice mocking.
“You’ll get all cozy and comfy with Brady, and then you’ll settle.”
A car with a loud muffler drives by, the sound reverberating off the buildings around us.
“What? I don’t do that,” I say, once the noise has passed.
“Don’t you?” Thomas asks, his hand coming up to rub his chin. A very know-it-all-professor look.
“No,” I say. “I don’t.”
“Okay, but what about your job?” Thomas says.
“What about my job?”
“Wasn’t your goal to do the morning or evening news or whatever?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“Exactly,” he says.
I stop in my tracks, forcing Thomas to stop as well. “What’s that supposed to mean?” I feel my face flushing and not from the hot and damp evening air.
“You’ve gotten comfortable in midday.”
“No I haven’t. I’m just stuck there because of that stupid video. And now there’s a blooper reel.” My words come out defensively, which doesn’t help my argument.
He bats my words away with his hands. “Yes, yes. We all know about the videos. But what about your goals? Your big dreams.” He waves his hands around in circles. “What happened to those?”
I stand there staring at Thomas, his words swarming around me like a bunch of annoying gnats.
“Have your dreams changed? Are you fine with midday, fine with dating someone you don’t really have feelings for?” he says when I don’t respond.
I look down at the pavement, then to my feet, then up to the city bus that just pulled over across the street to pick up people waiting at a stop. Anywhere but at Thomas.
“Don’t do that settling thing,” he says.
“I’m not settling,” I finally say.
“Yes, you are. Just like that game you used to make me play. You’re a settler from Catan,” he says.
“Of.”
“Huh?”
“Of Catan, and I’m not settling. I’m just . . . I don’t know.”
This isn’t me settling; this is me taking what life has to offer and dealing with it. How is that settling?
“Listen,” Thomas says, putting a hand on my arm. “I like you more than most people, which isn’t saying all that much since, in general, I hate people. But I do want you to be happy. So don’t go doing that Quinn thing you do, okay?”
I let his words—his annoying words—swim around in my brain for a second. It’s rare to get a moment of sincerity from Thomas, and it makes me actually stop and consider what he’s saying.
But it’s too much to think about, too much to realize right now, here on the sidewalk in downtown Winter Park.
“I really hate you sometimes,” I finally say to him.
“Yes, I get that a lot.”
This makes me laugh, which helps the tense cord between us slacken a bit.
“You may hate me all you want, but I’m hungry, and you promised me that if I went with you on this junk hunt that you’d feed me. So can we do that part now?”
“Okay,” I say on a breath. “Fine. But no more lectures from you during dinner, okay?”
“Oh, for sure. We’ve talked about you too much anyway. Our dinner conversation will be all about me. Promise.”
Chapter 17
Her name is Kristin. With an i, not an e. This is what I was told when I first met her. She’s tiny, and blonde, and her nails are too long and her eyebrows a little too dark. And I’m being a rotten judgmental cow right now.
It’s Henry’s first date, and the cameras are all set up outside a quaint little bistro called the Vineyard that’s not far from the station. We picked this particular restaurant because it has huge floor-to-ceiling windows where we can get some shots of Henry and Kristin on their date from outside the restaurant. In fact, all of Henry’s “dates” will be brought to this same place. The owners were all too eager to comply. Especially with all the free advertising.
The evening sun is starting to make its way toward setting, causing the temperature to drop a few degrees. It’s still hot and muggy, and I can feel it from my head to my toes. Even with my jacket off, my light cream sleeveless shell offers little reprieve.
In all, there were nearly twelve hundred people that wanted to go out with Henry. The interns narrowed the applicants down to ten. This was supposed to be based on compatibility and overall likability—this is television, after all—but I’m pretty sure since the bulk of the interns put on this project are horny college boys, the main requirement was mostly that they were “hot.”
Henry was very hands off during the decision process, stating that he trusted us to make the right choice. I also took myself out of the decision process because there were too many to go through, and I really didn’t want to be part of it. I’m sure I’d have been biased anyway.
Once the ten were picked, the viewers voted and narrowed them down to three. Each week—starting tonight—Henry will go on a date with one of them, and then at the end he gets to decide which of the three he’d like a second date with.
I’m waiting with bated breath to find out who he chooses. This is a lie. I don’t want to know. In fact, if I hadn’t been put on this stupid feature that I came up with, then I wouldn’t even have to know unless I watched it—which, let’s face it, I probably would have. Since I like to punish myself. But now I don’t even have the choice since Jerry opened his big mouth and insisted that this feature go to me. Stupid Jerry. If he hadn’t piped in, the story would have gone to Moriarty and I could have kept on living the super unfair life I was living before. My unfair life was actually better than this one. How ironic.
It’s not like this is reality, like there’s a guarantee that any of these dates could turn into more. But there’s a possibility. And all three of these women that have been picked have one big thing in common that I don’t have—Henry is not their boss, and he won’t have any rules or policies in place to hold him back. Three women, three possibilities. And I get a front-row seat to watch it all happen. Lucky me.