Page 35 of Some Things Never Change

“I think I’m good for now. But if the right guy magically appears out of the blue, then I’ll consider,” I said.

Suddenly, my phone suddenly vibrated with a notification.

Andy: Where are you?

I immediately text back.

Me: By the plaza with Cindy.

Andy: OK. Heading over

Me: ??

“Fine. I’ll shut up about the dating until I see the right guy for you.”

I let out a laugh. “Thanks, Cindy.”

She smiled back. “You’re welcome. How’s your mom and her prospective bachelors and bachelorettes for you and your brother, though?”

I groaned as I stabbed my salad. My mom called me over the weekend to ask for permission to give out my phone number to one of her friend’s “wonderful son.” She has tried several times to play cupid for Jonathan and me, but we have always nipped it in the bud.

“God, don’t remind me. My mom’s been trying to set Jonathan and I up for months now and I just tell her I don’t have time. It’s the easiest way to deter her from bringing it up for another month or two.”

“Yeah, all our Asian parents see is that you’re not married at twenty-eight and that’s it. You’ve practically done everything else they wanted, such as going to college, getting a degree, and having a financially stable career. Now, they expect grandkids out of nowhere.” She let out a long huff. “At least your mom can be sort of understanding.”

Cindy and her husband were going to go back to San Ignacio for the Lunar New Year this upcoming weekend. They’d been married for two years now, and she mentioned before how both her parents and in-laws have been casually dropping hints that they expect to see a grandkid soon.

“Good luck on your trip home.” I gave her a supportive smile.

“James and I are dreading it a bit, but I doubt it’s going to be that bad. Our parents are like your mom. They can be understanding, but they also start dropping hints again about grandkids a month later.”

“Our parents just need to be patient. We’ll have a partner or kids when we want to. That’s if we want to, too.”

Cindy was about to reply when she suddenly perked up. Her eyes suddenly shifted from me to something or someone behind me. I immediately turned to look over my shoulder to see what got her attention. That was when I caught the sight of Andy striding directly toward our table. He instantly smiled as the two of us made eye contact.

Andy had taken off the blue tie he had on this morning and was sporting just his white button-up, navy blue blazer, and slacks. Two of his buttons were undone, showing a bit of skin underneath. It looked like he donned a tighter fitting shirt today, since I could practically see the shape of his pecs under the thin cotton.

If I wasn’t so distracted by how enthusiastically he was walking over to us, I might have taken the time to gulp like the audible sound I heard from a lady at the table next to us. I quickly glanced at her, and her eyes were glued onto Andy and his big grin.

“Ti—I mean, Julie! Hey,” said Andy, as he came up to our table with his eyes glued to me. I let out a giggle at the way he almost called me by his nickname for me in a professional setting. “I brought you a little something.”

Before I could ask him what he meant, he placed a small pink bakery box on the table in front of me. The box had a sticker slapped on it reading Brown Sugar Bakeshop in cursive.

“One of my coworkers stopped by this place to grab his daughters some cupcakes, since it’s always packed after work. So, I decided to grab you something, too. I got enough for the two of you to enjoy,” he continued as he stood close to my seat.

“Seriously?” I asked, surprised.

I quickly ripped through the sticker to open the box. Inside were two perfectly frosted designer cupcakes. One topped off with cute little red hearts and the other with gold pearl sprinkles. Looking at the little heart sprinkles on the cupcake reminded me Valentine’s Day was just around the corner.

“Aw, Andy,” I said, looking up at him. “Thank you.”

“Oh, wow! You went all the way to Brown Sugar?” asked Cindy ecstatically. “That’s at least three blocks away.”

“It is?” I asked.

“Yeah!” replied Cindy. “It’s a brisk walk for sure.”

Andy laughed. “It’s fine. It wasn’t even that far. I wasn’t sure what to get so I just got vanilla and red velvet.”

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