It took us a few days to be able to find a good time that worked for both of us, but eventually one Saturday morning I found myself nervously waiting at the agreed-upon location, an hour early – just in case, you know – and crossing my fingers that she would show up. It wasn’t like I thought she’d stand me up or anything like that intentionally, but what if she forgot, or what if something came up with her family again, or what if she got lost, or wait was I even at the right place? What if I was the one lost and I went to the wrong coffee shop?
I quickly checked my phone, going back over her messages to see what she’d said and double-checking my location. Triple checking, really. Yes, I was at the right place. Okay, Kade, calm down. You’re just over-thinking this and panicking as usual. Try to be cool, try not to scare her off.
What would we even talk about? I hoped she would talk about stuff, it was easier that way. If the conversation was left to me, I’d stumble and fumble around and make a mess out of it, so hopefully I could just get her to talk about her family or something. She liked talking about them, it should be easy.
There was still almost half an hour until our meeting time, so I didn’t pay much attention as the door opened and someone came in until the someone came over to my table. I looked up, prepared to politely tell them I was waiting for someone, only to see it was Honey.
I almost bolted to my feet. “Oh, uh, good morning. You’re early.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You’re earlier, so I think I get off free on that. How long have you been here?”
“Um, not long?” That didn’t even sound convincing to me, and it was pretty clear she didn’t believe me, either. “So, uh, what would you like? I can order while you sit down if you want.”
Honey apparently decided to let it pass and gave me her coffee order. She started taking off her coat and scarf while I went to stand in line and tried to calm my nerves before I had to talk to her again.
When I ordered our drinks, I hesitated just a second before ordering some breakfast treats, too. I knew she liked berry-flavored foods, and it was morning, so…she should be okay with that, right?
Honey reached for her coffee when I arrived at the table, but then she paused, her eyes on the plate.
“I, uh, thought we could use some breakfast,” I said lamely.
She gave me a surprisingly soft smile. “Thank you.”
And then we were just sitting there, in silence, me awkwardly wanting to come up with some kind of topic to talk about, but not able to think of anything other than the boring ‘how are you’ and so on.
Honey suddenly placed her elbows on the table, rested her chin in her hands, and fixed me with a steely gaze. I felt a little taken aback, like I was about to be challenged and I didn’t know why.
“I think we need to have a real talk,” she told me.
I cringed back a little, uncertain what that meant. Did she…think I wasn’t being honest with her? I would never lie to her. What had I done wrong?
“I’ve told you a lot about my life, but…you never seem to want to talk about yours. I don’t really know that much about you and,” she paused, the slightest hint of pink tinting her face, “I want to. I want to know more about you, Kade, not just that you’re an only child and you want to go into research, which is practically all I know. I want to know more about how you think and what you feel. I want,” she paused, seeming almost frustrated with trying to find the right words, “sometimes I feel like you’re acting almost like my therapist, listening to my problems, being supportive, but…it’s a one-way street. I don’t want that. I want to actually be friends with you, know what you really like and dislike. I want to know if one day – ”
She cut herself off, the pink slightly darker, then took a good look at my face. Her eyes widened a bit. “Did I scare you? You seem – I didn’t mean – ”
“No,” I said swiftly. It wasn’t entirely true, I was shocked to my core. She actually wanted to be friends with me and know me. Uninteresting me who was probably one of the most boring people on the planet. But Honey wanted to know me.
And I needed to make sure she understood that I wanted that, too, I desperately wanted to be friends with her. Somehow, I needed to figure out how to actually say this.
I took a deep breath. Words, please don’t fail me now. Please, please, cooperate.
“I – I’ve wanted to be friends with you since our first year,” I began, “and I – I may have intentionally tried to get classes with you, um, all throughout school because you – being around you makes me happy, even if – even if we never talked. This semester I knew, uh, I knew it was my last chance so I just…just decided to sit by you.” I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that if I didn’t see her face I could get through this. “I know people think I’m popular and all that but I’m – I’m actually really…shy.” The last word was quiet, like I was embarrassed to admit it. “I was never brave enough to approach you but – but I had to when I was running out of time and I didn’t want to miss my chance to be friends. Or try to be friends,” I amended.
“I’m not trying to keep things from you or have this be like a therapy relationship,” I continued, “it’s just sometimes hard for me to, um, talk to people and uh, carry on conversations. And I like listening to you,” I said quietly, opening my eyes again but focusing on my hands on the tabletop so I wouldn’t get distracted by her face and could finish this. “I enjoy being with you, it’s just harder for me to know what to even say and your life is so…interesting while I can’t see anything about me you’d even want to know. I’m just pretty – boring.”
I took one more breath, trying to calm my nerves, and took a very, very cautious glance up at her face.
She was staring at me in blank astonishment. “Holy shit, he was right,” she whispered.
I had no idea what that meant but I didn’t think it sounded like something good, so I flinched automatically.
Maybe…maybe this was all a bad idea. I’d just told her the only secret I really had, that I was so shy carrying on conversations normally was difficult for me, and I still had no idea how she was reacting.
Then, to my surprise – and to totally send my heart into a panic of fluttering and somersaults – she reached out and clasped my fingers resting on the table with her delicate, warm ones.
“Kade, look at me.”
I did, slowly, afraid of what I’d see there.
But I only saw kindness radiating from her and a bright smile that somehow helped make me feel whole even though I didn’t know why.
She squeezed my fingers lightly. “I’m sorry if I pushed you before you were ready – some people take longer to open up, and I may have been impatient.” She looked almost rueful. “But…I’m not entirely sorry about it because I feel like for the first time I’m finally seeing you. Not whatever image everyone thinks of you. And I think the real you is interesting, okay? I want to get to know him. Just because you’re not dealing with covens trying to kill you doesn’t mean you’re boring. It may not be easy, but if I promise to try to be patient, can you promise to try to keep talking to me? Really talking to me?”
I looked at our hands on the table, swallowed hard, then looked up to meet her eyes and nodded.
Then she smiled again with an almost calculating look in her eyes. “Am I to gather that you might have been interested in me all this time?”
I tried to pull my hands back, panicking, but she just tightened her grip and held me still.
I swallowed again, then gave in and slumped down in the seat a bit. “Yes,” I whispered.
She tugged at my fingers until I looked up at her reluctantly.
Her smile was even bigger this time. “I’m interested in you, too, you know. I wouldn’t have told you all about my family stuff and wouldn’t have come here today if I weren’t. You made me notice you with that sunflower four years ago and,” she bit her lip, “you’ve made it so I look forward to our class because I wanted to see you. That’s why I was so upset about feeling like you weren’t willing to let me see the real you, I wanted – I wanted to know if we could ever maybe be a thing, but I couldn’t see how that could happen if you didn’t trust me enough to open up.”
She…was interested in me? That…seemed…what?
Honey watched the emotions play across my face and seemed almost amused, but was still smiling at me. “So…you’re interested in me, and I’m interested in you, so…can we maybe try a real date? An official one?”
I found myself nodding eagerly, even though I still couldn’t fully figure out if I was dreaming this or what. I’d just wanted to be friends with her for almost four years now, never even dreaming of anything more, and yet somehow she was offering me something more without my even asking.
“Good.” Honey gave me a smile that rivaled the brightness of the sun and then finally pulled her hands away so she could actually start eating the breakfast I’d totally forgotten about.
“Can we try…having you tell me one new thing about yourself?” She took a bite of a donut, that slight pink tint back on her face. “You don’t have to tell me everything all at once, but I’d like to learn something new. Your favorite music, or where you went to high school, I don’t know, anything.”
That seemed like such trivial stuff, but if she wanted to know, I’d tell her anything. “I, um, like jazz music,” I admitted. “I find it soothing. I tried to take up the saxophone in high school so I could play but, uh,” I wiggled my fingers, “I wasn’t very good at it. There’s a good reason I’m going into research and not surgery, even if it weren’t for my dad.”
She actually laughed, which made my heart thrill a little. I had made her laugh. That made me unreasonably happy.
We ended up talking for a few hours. Well, she mostly still did all the talking, but I tried. I made an effort to try to talk and tell her my opinion or my thoughts, even if I didn’t think they were all that important. However, every time I did open up a little, her sun-bright smile was my reward, making it a tiny bit easier to do it again.
When it was time to part ways, Honey paused in front of the coffee shop, looking like she was debating something in her head, before nodding to herself and looking up at me. “Would you…like to come to dinner,” oh no, not again, I kept trying to come up with excuses for why I couldn’t go, and even if we might now be starting to try to see where this could go, I was not ready to meet her parents. “With Ren and Riven?” She finished.
I blinked. I wasn’t expecting that.
“Just the four of us,” she rushed to explain, “and they won’t pressure you to talk or anything. I mean, Riven even,” she gave a rueful laugh, “back at the beginning of the semester when you sat next to me the first time? I was talking to him about it and he guessed you might be shy and that you switched classes to be with me, but I thought he was crazy.”
I was so startled I didn’t know how to answer that. How had someone I’d never met read me so well? Was I that obvious? I mean…probably not, if Honey hadn’t noticed, but how did her brother’s boyfriend?
Honey noticed my confusion. “Riven’s just…special,” she explained fondly. “You’ll understand if you come. Trust me, you’ll like him, and if anyone can get you to open up without you even knowing, it’s him.”
I was kind of intrigued, really, and these people were important to her, people she cared about, people she’d talked to me about for months now. They sounded a lot less intimidating than her parents, so…maybe it’d be worth trying.
“They got a dog!” She added brightly, as if that would be the cincher. “A fluffy baby that is everything, you’ll fall in love with her.”
Truth was, that was an excellent bribe. I loved dogs.
“Okay,” I agreed. “Text me when?”
She gave me that sun-bright smile yet again, almost blinding me, and I found myself leaving soon after in a daze, thinking through today.
This had only been a few hours of my life, but I felt like everything was different now, like even the sun was shining brighter. Somehow, a miracle had happened, and I hoped it would only get better from here.
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