“But?” I finally prompt.
“But nothing,” he says softly. Still holding out the basket. I look down at the scones, back up at him. I dig my hands deeper into my pockets and will myself to stand up straighter.
“There’s always a but,” I say, and I make myself look right into his eyes. “I like you, but I also wish you didn’t exist. I like you but I love sleeping around. I like you but we both know that liking isn’t enough.”
I breathe deep, look away again because the blank space in the pit of my stomach is still there, writhing, gnawing at me. I know that something ugly’s about to happen. I can see it coming a mile off, like a train’s headlight in the dark.
“Start over with me,” he says.
I hold his gaze, swallow hard because that wasn’t what I was expecting either. None of this is what I was expecting, and I’ve got no idea what to make of it.
“How?” I finally ask.
I also take a scone. They look really good.
“I hate pretending we’re strangers,” he says, voice low, quiet in the cold dark night. “I hate it. We aren’t strangers. Even after all these years, you know me better than almost anyone and I’m tired of pretending you don’t.”
I want to protest, out of habit. I want to remind him of all the ways we’ve hurt each other, all the barbs we’ve thrown, the venom we’ve spat. I want to tell him that being strangers is better than being locked in a joust with each other, always aiming for the heart and running at a full gallop.
Instead, I take a bite of the scone. Mostly so I don’t say any of those things.
“Blueberry lemon,” he says before I ask. I chew, swallow.
“Did you make them?”
“Yup.”
I take another bite, the sweet-tart of a blueberry spreading across my tongue.
“You’re wrong,” I tell him.
“They’re definitely blueberry.”
“You’re wrong that I know you. I didn’t know you made scones. I didn’t know you rode dirt bikes sometimes. I didn’t know you sat on porches in the dark.”
“I don’t, as a rule,” he says. “Ideally I won’t be doing it again.”
“I don’t know you as well as you think,” I whisper.
“I bet you know why I like baking,” he says.
I take another bite, watch him in the faint moonlight.
Seth is beautiful. He always is, but right now the moon is behind the clouds, the pale white light diffused across the landscape. Everything in my front yard has a shadowless, unearthly glow, most of all Seth.
He looks like a charcoal drawing, all shades of the same color, his edges smudged and blurred by the dark. I wonder if any artist could ever do him justice.
“Because it’s quantifiable,” I say, after a moment. “It’s predictable. If you do everything according to the instructions, you’ll almost certainly succeed.”
He smiles in shades of moonlight-blue.
“Told you so,” he says. “Start over with me. We’ll wipe the slate clean of all the bullshit we’ve said and done and we’ll just be two people who like each other, going on dates and having movie nights and taking long romantic walks, and…”
He runs a hand through his hair, smiles at me.
“Whatever other cute shit couples do,” he says. “Just say yes, Bird.”
I breathe deep again, exhale in fog, look away from Seth and over at the driveway.
“So we just… pretend nothing has ever happened between us?” I ask.
Seth doesn’t answer, just reaches his hand to my face. I try to stay still but I can feel myself tilting toward him anyway, like a flower toward the sun.
He brushes a crumb from my cheek. Looks at me. Lets his hand linger before lowering it.
“Exactly,” he says.
“You really think we can?”
“I think it’ll destroy me to keep fucking and fighting and being barely polite in public,” he says, shifting his feet, the basket against his hip. “And I think that if I don’t try this one last time I’ll never forgive myself.”
My throat constricts, and I swallow against it, pressing my lips together. I’ve always been an easy crier and I’ve never liked it.
When I open my mouth, I mean to say yes or okay or even I’d like that, but what comes out is, “I miss you.”
Seth’s face changes, softens. Like he’s just lowered a shield, and he steps forward, slides his free hand around the back of my neck and before I can tilt my face up toward his, he presses his lips into my hair.
“Come out with me Friday,” he says, voice muffled, lips still against my hair. “Our very first date. If you’re lucky, I’ll kiss you goodnight.”
“Just a kiss?” I tease, and he releases me.
“That’s yes, then?”
I take a deep breath and close my eyes for a second, as if I have any wits left about me to gather.
“Of course it’s yes,” I tell him.
“There’s one more thing,” he says.
“You are Bigfoot.”
“I want to wait to have sex.”
Those words, in that order, take several moments for my brain to process. I’d be less surprised if he unzipped his human suit to reveal an ape-man.
“What?” I finally say.
And then, still baffled: “Until… when?”
Sprucevale is small, southern, and has approximately four churches per capita, so when I hear wait for sex I automatically fill in until marriage, which was very much not Seth’s attitude a few weeks back.
“A month?” he says.
I narrow my eyes and tilt my head.
“You can’t do that,” I say, simply.
“I can’t?” he asks, grinning.
“What, you think you’re God’s gift to women?” I tease.
“Not women,” he says, grin gone feral. “Just you.”
I roll my eyes at him, but my heart beats a little faster, harder.
“You cocky asshole,” I laugh. “Ever seen my tits in a push-up bra? You can’t last a month.”
“Only a month?” he says. “Come on, make it tough. A month and a half. I made you see God at Ava’s wedding.”
At least the dark hides my blush.
“I’m not the one who nearly passed out on the floor after we were done.”
“That was the whiskey.”
“Was it?” I ask, tilting my head slightly.
“The whiskey was a factor,” he admits. “Two months. Bring it on, Bird.”
“You’ll never make it,” I say.
“Only one way to find out. Deal?” he asks, and holds out his hand.
I slide mine into it, and we shake.
“Deal,” I say, as he raises my hand to his lips.
“Friday,” he says, still holding my hand. “Six. Don’t be late.”
“Do I even get a kiss?” I ask.
“Maybe at the end of our first date,” Seth says. He grins at me again, all cockiness and rakish charm. “What kind of floozy do you take me for, Bird?”
“Drive safe,” I tell him, laughing. He walks to my driveway, scones in hand.
I go into my house. Lock my door. Head to my bedroom.