When Size Matters. Carly Laine

Keanu and…Rats! What had my friends said about him? I couldn’t recall. Did he really bowl and skin opossums and pick his teeth with a knife? No clue.

      He was waiting with Silence.

      “Yeah, I was. All of the above. Except for the part about being nerdy.” I gave him a little stink eye for that. “In the business, we prefer to call it technical,” I informed him. He kept grinning at me, enjoying himself. “But I decided to get into sales instead. Something opened up and I went for it.”

      “Why?” he asked.

      I had to think a little about what to say in response. There was no way I was going to tell him the real reason.

      “Money?” he guessed, while I was doing my pondering.

      “No, not really.” I mumbled it.

      “Did you like your job, like being…technical?” he asked. “Yeah. I did. It’s who I am.”

      “Then why?” He really wanted to know. This was one of those first-date tests, I could tell. What if I did switch for the money, was he going to think less of me? Probably. And why did I care what he thought? Because I did. For some dumb reason, I cared a lot. And why do you suppose that is, Dylan? I asked myself. Because, I answered a bit testily, gravity is one hell of a force to resist, that’s why.

      “If I tell you, could we talk about you for a while?” “Sure, if you want. Not much to tell.”

      “Deal,” I said. “But you’re going to be sorry you asked, and, okay, here it is. I got out of development because I have a good friend, Rex, who’s one of the best technical guys I’ve ever seen and we were talking one day and he said if I wanted to be really good at it—I mean, really, really good—then I’d have to turn off certain areas of my brain so that more blood could flow to other parts, the analytical ones.”

      His left eyebrow rose slowly toward his hairline.

      I ignored it, took a breath and pushed on. “And the parts Rex was talking about shutting off were the social parts, the parts that care about other things besides geeky stuff, the parts that make normal people different from techies. I thought a lot about what Rex had said and I knew what he meant. And also knew he was right. But I couldn’t do it, didn’t want to do it—I like those social parts—so I got out.”

      Both eyebrows were up. He just sat there looking pleased.

      It was essentially the truth. My decision had been only a little bit about the money. Okay, maybe more than a little bit. But did I pass his test? I wanted to pass. I could tell he was getting ready to follow up with a whole barrage of other questions. I’d never been with a guy who wanted to talk about me so much. You think that’s what you want, what’ll make you really happy, but then it happens and it’s sort of weird. I cut him off before he could launch them. “Okay. It’s your turn. How did you know about e-Boost?”

      I could see him switching gears. Whatever he was going to say about my career strategy, he let it go. “A while back I was considering contracting with them. But—” he took a breath and tried to make his voice small “—‘Y’all are tooo ‘spensive,’ as my little sister would say.”

      What a tempting serving of data that was, all piled up and steaming on the output platter. It looked as if Silence was going to be gone for a while. Which tidbit to munch on first, family or job? I’m a sucker for kids. “You have a little sister, too? How old?”

      “Four. She’s my half sister. Emily. She’s my dad’s kid with his new wife. But, man, she’s a great little kid.” His grin got even bigger, if that’s possible. Or maybe it got less lopsided.

      More data. My mom always said to avoid relationships with men from broken homes. This from a woman who’d busted up at least three.

      “We’re not allowed to say that,” I told him.

      “Which?” he asked.

      “Half. I have a half sister, too, but my mom turns purple if anyone says that. ‘There are no half people in my house.’” I did a pretty good impersonation of her.

      “Hey, I agree with that. Emily’s my sister. She calls me bro. So you got any others? Halves or steps or…half steps?”

      I thought we were going to talk about him. How did we get down in this Dumpster so quick? It was one of the few situations where I followed my mom’s advice. “Avoid revealing the details,” she always said, “until they’re hopelessly in love and less likely to bolt.”

      But it was getting embarrassing avoiding his questions. I opted for a quick, emotionless inventory. Be honest, be light, get it over with. “Yeah, I’ve got a few. Let’s see—one current stepfather, one current stepmother, four ex-stepmothers who each had a kid, so three ex-stepsisters and one exstepbrother, three ex-stepfathers, so add one more exstepbrother, one half sister—no make that one real sister who had a different dad—and one real brother who has a really different dad. Is that right? No, sorry. Only three step-fathers, total. She didn’t marry Asia’s dad.”

      I’d caught him midbite. He didn’t react or say anything, just sat there slowly chewing the little cocoa-dipped toes, watching me. His eyes scanned mine, then my mouth, my forehead, down again to my mouth. He swallowed, took a sip of coffee, swallowed that, eyes studying me the whole time.

      What? That was supposed to be light. What would he have done if I’d gone into some of the nauseating details? Bolt?

      I’d sure been wrong about one thing: Silence was back, filling the space. Boats floated by, people at the other tables talked and laughed and no one at this table made a sound.

      Then a picture of Dr. Matt Sears, erstwhile wedding date, popped into my head. I saw him like one of those white mannequins in the window of some posh store, wearing nice shoes.

      “Hi,” a voice said before he appeared. “I thought I’d find you here.” And his Cole Haan loafers stepped into our silent little world under the gas lamp.

      “Hey, Matt,” I said, looking up at him and smiling, and willed myself physically out of the equation. Whatever happened next, I wasn’t going to be one of the parameters.

      Matt put out his you-could-have-been-a-surgeon hand and said, “Hi. Matt Sears. And you must be the White Knight.”

      Brad beamed his smile in Matt’s direction, stood and introduced himself. We were all just so happy to be there.

      I was left looking at trouser flies. We don’t like to do that nearly as much as guys think. Eyes, I liked gazing at eyes. I moved over on my bench to make room for Prudence. “All right,” I said. “Everybody sit. I’m getting a crick in my neck.”

      Brad said, “Yes, ma’am,” and sat.

      Matt watched Brad sit and then looked back at me, amused. “No, thanks, Dyl. I was just dropping this by your house. Your Jeep was there and you weren’t so I figured you’d be here.” He handed me a white napkin. “I’ll see you guys later. Nice meeting you, Brad.” Prudence was always nice. Super nice.

      Brad raised that eyebrow of his. “Dill? Like pickle?” I shrugged, thinking about the napkin and what was inside.

      We stared at each other a minute and then I unwrapped it. A champagne glass. I set it on the table between us.

      “Oh,” I said. That was a loaded “oh,” meaning, “What in hell?”

      “A souvenir,” Brad answered.

      “Oh.” This time I meant “Souvenir of what? Me leaving with another guy?”

      “Or,” Brad suggested, “it was an excuse to come see you tonight.”

      No comment. I was visualizing Matt walking back to his car alone, head down, shoulders slumped. One of those sad country songs playing in the background. This was Austin, so the singer would be Willie Nelson. I didn’t exactly know any of the words to his songs, but probably he’d be singing something