Ship It(43)

“I would! I absolutely would!”

I start laughing. “You don’t even know how to use Twitter; you’d have to call Rico and have him help you.”

“Stop changing the subject. You text that girl back right now and tell her you’ll meet her in five minutes.”

I look at my phone, but I can’t bring myself to do it. My stomach twists in knots at the very idea. Why? Why?

“I get it,” Forest says, getting serious. “It’s scary, meeting people you like.”

“I’m not scared, I’m just…” I trail off.

“What?”

Great question. What? What? What, Claire? What’s the problem? Tess is cool and she wants to get dinner, what could possibly be wrong with that?

Maybe because she might like me, and that’s scary as hell. Maybe because I can’t seem to stop noticing things like her cute legs and her smile and her lipstick, and I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I don’t even really have friends, so why should I have a date? Not that this is a date. Because it’s not. And if it were, I would definitely ruin it somehow, by talking too much, or not enough. Or getting too personal, or not personal enough. Whatever. It’s just safer not to go.

“I’m not good with other people, I’m not good at… talking,” I say, gesturing back and forth between us. I mean, prime example. Forest has disliked me since practically the first moment we met. Most people do. That’s fine. I’ve accepted it. Tess just hasn’t figured it out yet, but this dinner tonight is sure to turn that around.

“You’re fine at talking. What do you mean?” Forest asks, and I honestly can’t tell if he’s being genuine or if he’s just acting, like always.

“You don’t get it. She’s just supersmart and very cool, and she wears dresses with little foxes on them. I could never do that. She’s just… She’s more than I am, you know?” I sigh. “No, you probably don’t know what that feels like because you’re rich and too pretty for this world and you’re famous and you’re not a teenager anymore. But Pine Bluff is so much less and Tess is so much more. Maybe if I didn’t put people off so much, but I do. She’ll want to look at her phone, but she’ll be too polite to. That’s just what happens to me; I’m not good at being interesting.”

I stop rambling, and I can’t look at him. This is the most I’ve ever told him, the most I’ve maybe ever told anyone. Shit, why did I do that? Now he probably thinks I’m some small-town loser with no friends and social anxiety who can’t talk to people about anything more personal than a TV show. Which is completely accurate.

“Never mind,” I mumble as I close my laptop and slide it in my bag, then grab the power cable. I don’t bother winding it, I just shove handfuls of it in my bag, probably hopelessly knotting it forever.

“Claire,” he says, but I don’t look at him, I just zip up my bag and grab the box of doughnuts. I’ll keep those for later tonight when I have nothing else going on except room service and a three-hundred-thousand-word fic.

“Claire,” he says again, soft but firm. I shoulder my bag and, slowly, turn to face him. He’s still sitting in the chair where I left him, his arm looped over the back of it as he’s turned around to watch me leave. His expression is serious, genuine. “Trust me when I say, you’re good at being interesting. Interesting is not your problem.”

And maybe it’s just because he’s an actor, but when he says it, I almost believe him.

“Text her back,” he says.

And I close my eyes and let all the air out of my lungs in one long exhale. When I open them, I look at my phone, type as quickly as possible, I’ll meet you in five! and hit SEND before I can talk myself out of it.

“Okay,” I say.

His eyes start smiling first, then his cheeks, then his mouth breaks open and his whole face brightens. God, what an image. I wish I had that as a gif.

“Have fun!” he says. “Tell me everything tomorrow.”


It was Tess’s suggestion to go to a place she read about online called the Roxy. It lights up the whole block with the red neon in its windows. The inside walls are covered with faded ancient signed 8x10s of famous actors from twenty years ago (everyone’s a fan of something!). On the far wall there’s a jukebox underneath a life-size hanging sculpture of Jesus on the cross, bloody and anguished. My eyes about bug out of my head when we walk inside. We don’t have anything like this in Pine Bluff. Or Boise. Or all of Idaho.

As we walk in, our server hollers at us from the kitchen that we can take a seat anywhere. It’s pretty empty in here, just us, a group of four punks in ripped denim jackets and dyed hair by the windows, and two elderly gentlemen by the jukebox who are… holding hands. Oh my god, are they on a date? That’s so adorable!

I notice they’re selling T-shirts in a glass case, including ones that say PORTLAND FUCKING OREGON and GAY FUCKING PRIDE. And maybe I should have figured it out before then, but that’s the moment I realize that this is a gay café. Blood rushes to my cheeks as I wonder if everyone in here assumes we’re on a date. Are we on a date? How am I supposed to figure it out?

Tess leads us to a table by the wall, and we sit down. Our server comes over, and I realize I can’t tell what gender they are. I must be making a wide-eyed Where am I? kind of face because our server smiles warmly at us and says, “Welcome to the Roxy, this your first time?” Their voice has just a touch of Southern lilt to it, which is a nice change from the bland Northwest accents around here.