Interrupted (The Progress Series) (5 page)

“I’m not sure,” he replied with little interest. “She ended up being a ‘Becky.’”

“I’m sorry, a
what
?”

“Oh, a Becky. That’s what I call the girls who are just like the others. You know, like the red-shirt regulars on
Star
Trek
.” After seeing the confusion on Charlie’s face, he continued, “Oh, not a Trekky? Okay, how do I explain it…hmmm… Here’s me, standing next to a cardboard cut-out. Insert Becky here. So, Amber was just another Becky. The same old shit, nothing to write home about.” He shrugged.

“Why do you call them Beckies?” She couldn’t help but be thoroughly entertained by the thought process.

“My roommate, Gabe, came up with it. He dated a girl once named Becky who was so bland, so lacking in personality…you know, one of the girls who actually say the letters O.M.G., rather than just saying ‘Oh my god.’” He rolled his eyes. “It just started catching on. Pretty soon we all started pointing out Beckies every time we went to shoot some pool, or out at the bar.” He paused briefly. “You don’t know what a red-shirt regular is? You’ve never watched
Star
Trek
?”

Charlie shook her head and took a sip from her beer, smiling.

“What kind of movies do you like?” he asked.

“All kinds. I mean, I have my favorites, but I enjoy different kinds of movies. If the acting and plot are good…”

“What’s your favorite?”

“Oh, my favorite, of all time? That’s so hard,” she said, enjoying the lighthearted conversation. “I’d have to say
The Matrix
…or,
Just Friends
. Oh, and
Heathers
. What’s your favorite?”

“
Suspect Zero
…I think. So far it’s been the most intriguing movie I’ve seen…”

As Samuel continued speaking, Charlie found herself looking closely at his features: the way his dark hair fell to the sides of his temples; his rough hands, stained with paint and ink from whatever project he as working on earlier in the day; his forearms and the dark hair that adorned them. Her eyes traveled back up to his face and followed his unshaven square jawline up to his high cheek bones. She hadn’t remembered thinking that the boy she met in college could somehow turn out to be so appealing. She noticed two small red marks on the bridge of his nose, indicating he wore glasses.

“Do you still wear glasses?” she asked during a short silence.

He eyed her curiously. “Yeah, sometimes. When I’m reading or working, why?”

“I was just noticing the small indents on the bridge of your nose, and I wondered why I hadn’t seen you wearing them.”

He smiled and looked down to Charlie’s breasts. “Checking me out, eh?”

She tried to keep a straight face and control the heat from flaming her cheeks.
Say something, damn it, Charlie.

She began slowly at first, then picked up pace as she found confidence in her words. “It’s only a natural courtesy to make eye contact with the person to whom you are speaking, so you can hardly deduce that I was ‘checking you out’ just because I noticed a couple of red marks. Furthermore, if I was checking you out, I wouldn’t keep something like that a secret, much like the way you stared at my ass earlier in the evening, or my tits just now. Only perhaps I’d be less obvious in my approval.” She raised her brow, waiting for a comeback.

Charlie: 1. Samuel: 0. Ha!

A wide smile rose to his face as he leaned back on the stool, laughing harder than Charlie had ever seen him laugh. The outburst uncovered a slight dimple in his left cheek, and he held his stomach as if his laughter hurt him. “You’re so right! I
was
looking at your ass earlier,” he said, still laughing and trying to reposition himself onto the stool again. Charlie giggled and secretly congratulated herself on winning a small battle.

You can do this, Charlie. You’re already doing better than you thought you would. He’s easy to talk to. Relax and enjoy yourself, like Karal told you.

Their wings were delivered to the bar along with two fresh beers. The aroma of vinegar and cayenne turned her off, but she politely humored Samuel and took a few bites while holding her breath.

After dinner, they played two rounds of video nineties trivia. The questions made her feel smarter than he was, and she wondered if he was letting her win.

“I texted you last night, but I didn’t hear back from you. I thought you were going to cancel on me tonight,” he said.

“Oh, boy. How do I explain this without sounding like an idiot? Okay, so I don’t really know how to text,” she admitted, squinting her eyes shut.

You were so cool up until this point. You were smart, witty, and keeping up with the conversation. Now you get to explain to him how you’re a complete moron. Wonderful.

Opening one eye slowly, she glanced at Samuel when he didn’t respond. He had a strange smile on his face.

“What do you mean, you don’t know how?” he asked.

“Oh god! I was hoping to leave the ‘Charlie is technologically inept’ conversation for the second or third date. You must think you’re out with a real winner tonight. Okay, well, no one has ever really texted me before, that I know of. I will occasionally hear it beep at me, but I’ve only owned the thing for a few months, and I hardly ever use it. No one has ever showed me how to text or email or anything, and I haven’t cared enough to figure it out myself.” Charlie covered her face and rested her head on the table in total embarrassment.

Samuel laughed. “Don’t worry about it. Let me show you. Give me your phone,” he said, reaching his arm out across the table. Charlie got it out of her purse and handed it to him.

“Yeah, see, you have a few texts in here…” Still laughing, he shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Besides mine, the last one was from almost two months ago.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” she pleaded, giggling.

“No, I’m not making fun of you. This is a hilarious conversation. You are absolutely adorable.”

“Oh yes, a true damsel in distress here. ‘Oh Sam, could you
please
show me how to use an iPhone?’” Charlie said, batting her lashes.

After showing Charlie how to maneuver her incoming and outgoing texts, he then asked for her email address.

“Oh, I don’t have one of those, either.”

“How, Charlie…? You know what, nope. I’m not going to ask. Would you like me to set one up for you?”

“Sure.” She shrugged.

“Okay, a Yahoo account okay?”

“Does it make a difference?”

“No, not really.”

“Fine, then.” She smiled.

“What would you like your username to be?”

Charlie shrugged again. “I don’t know, what
should
it be?”

“Something you can always remember. Maybe with letters and numbers.”

“Red,” she spat out. “Red…um…0702. Will that work?”

“Should be fine. What does it mean?”

Of course he was going to ask that!

“My birthday. It’s July second. And the “Red” part is my hair.”
Whew.

*

As they were leaving the restaurant, Samuel grabbed her hand and interlocked their fingers. “So, should I call you Samuel or just Sam?”

“Doesn’t matter, whatever you want. Most people call me Sam.”

“Well then, in interest of avoiding the label of a ‘Becky,’ Samuel it is.”

This whole evening was nice. I barely thought about Jess at all, and Samuel is really…

“Maybe we can do it again soon?”

“Yes, definitely,” she said.

He leaned into her as she stood next to her car. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t contemplated a kiss at the end of the night. She didn’t know how to respond, or whether or not she wanted one. At the last second she turned her cheek and they ended up giving each other a French greeting. She was mortified.

Rolling her eyes and rubbing her forehead, she fumbled with her keys and waved at him as she got in her car. “Call me!” she shouted as she slammed her door.

“Ha! How about I text you?” he shouted back.

She looked in her rear view mirror, and he laughed all the way to his car.

*

When she arrived home at
midnight, her dad had fallen asleep on his chair in front of the television. As she opened the front door, the jingling of her keys woke him.

“Hey, Char,” he said with a yawn, scratching his head. “How was your night?”

“Good, Dad. How was yours?”

“Well, I’ve been asleep for almost an hour now, and I didn’t spill my
Manhattan. I’d say it was a success.”

Charlie laughed.

“So the date was good, then? I haven’t seen your smile around here for weeks.”

“Yeah, Dad. I fumbled the ending. Horribly. But overall, I had fun. He seems like a good guy.”

“What’s his name again?”

“Samuel. I went to school with him. He was a graphic designer after college and now he’s a freelance artist and writer.”

“Is he into SKA music?”

“What? No.”

“How about playing the drums?” he asked.

“Nope.”

“Is he bipolar?”

“Dad. Knock it off! He’s nothing like Jesse.”

“Good. Then I won’t have to worry as much. Remember, if you ever need protection, just look in my top dresser drawer,” he said, getting up from his chair.

“Wow. Way too much information, Dad.”

“Ha! Good night, Charlie. See you in the morning.”

“Love you, Pops.”

“Love you, too.” He kissed her forehead and went to bed.

Charlie made a pot of decaf, prepared herself a cup, and carefully balanced it on her way downstairs to her room. She quickly got undressed and into her pajamas. Taking a deep breath, she was surprised at how smoothly it went through her lungs; she felt her shoulders relax and the tension in her forehead melt away.

I am okay. Maybe everything will be okay.

Her phone beeped and she smiled. She quickly picked it up and checked the text.

Good night. See you soon. ;) Sam

She texted him back immediately.

Good night, Samuel.

After scrolling through the seven texts she had missed for the past several months, she was disappointed to find none from Jesse.

Thinking about her evening with Samuel, she lay down on her bed and crossed her ankles with her hands behind her head, smiling. She looked around her room. First at the sketch that was still up on her easel, then to the bookshelf at the books and movies it held. Her eyes went up to her window and she could see part of the night sky through it. She squinted as her eyes tried to make out another object—she could just see a faint outline. She jumped out of bed and stood tiptoed to see if she could get a closer look.

No way.

She raced up the steps and threw her coat over her shoulders on her way out the door. With only socks on, she ran around to her bedroom window and knelt down.

No!

Lying in the snow was a small bouquet of dead, white daisies encrusted to the frosted ground beneath them.

Something about finding the daisies in the snow the night before gave her hope—a hope that she would someday see Jesse again. Perhaps not soon, but someday. He had left them outside her window in the days before he left. That could only mean that he had a will to see her again, as well. After plucking one petal off a single flower and stashing it in an old jewelry box, Charlie had fallen asleep soundly.

She arrived at work the next night with a smile on her face. Karal noticed instantly and approached her just as she was taking her coat off in the kitchen.

“So, how did the date go?” Karal asked.

“It was nice,” Charlie said.

“Nice? Nice? That’s all you’re going to say?”

“Well, what do you want me to say? It went well. We talked and flirted a little. I told him I’d like to see him again.”

“Well good! What’s his name?” Karal asked.

“Samuel.”

“Oh. Interesting.”

“How so?” Charlie asked.

“Because a ‘Samuel’ dropped this off for a ‘Charlie’ earlier.” Karal lifted an envelope into the air and waved it teasingly in front of Charlie’s face.

“What? What is it?”

“It’s an envelope,” Karal said sarcastically.

Charlie snatched it from Karal’s hand and opened it. Inside she found a movie ticket to the old theater in uptown. They were bringing back the original
Jaws,
digitally restored, for just one night: that very night, at nine o’clock.

“So, what is it?” Karal asked.

“It’s a movie ticket, for tonight.”

“How cute is that? I want a boyfriend,” Karal pouted.

“He is not my boyfriend. We had
one
date,” Charlie said.