Page 21 of Just a Plot Twist
Me, texting:Hi Claire. It’s Benson Kilpack. I got your number from Oliver. How’s your ankle?
Twenty minutes later, and still no response from Claire. Why does that bother me? I carried her down a mountain, but that doesn’t mean I’m interested in seeing her again. Still, my parents taught me to be a gentleman, so while I wait around for a response, I take a pause from all things Cinnamon—it’s almost time for another dose of medicine and the dreaded skin fold ointment—to look up the local floral shop in Longdale.
I remember when my ex-wife, Danica, had a minor boating accident years ago, her coworkers at the clinic where she worked as a nurse bought her flowers.
It was a nice thing to do.
I choose a small, friendly looking assortment—a “bright and cheery mix” of daisies and tulips. At least that’s how the website describes it. That’s exactly what I’m going for. Cheery. Platonic.
I’m not about to send red roses to a woman, that’s for sure.
After I type in the city office building address, I get a response from Claire:
Hello to the guy who carried me down a mountain. My ankle is not broken, praise the heavens. How are you?
Me:That’s a relief there are no broken bones. As for me, I’ve been dog-sitting, so I don’t exactly know how to answer that.
Claire:You have a dog at your place? Lucky! When Sophie married Oliver, she took her Bernese Mountain Dog, Wilford, with her. I miss having the big lug around.
Me:Will you get another dog someday?
Claire:My grandparents don’t like dogs and they’re over a lot, so maybe not. Besides, my ankle needs to heal before I can even consider becoming a puppy mom.
Me:Makes sense. Cinnamon isn’t a puppy, though. She’s very much the opposite of a puppy.
Claire:Her name is Cinnamon? Awww!
Claire:All dogs are puppies to me. Send me a photo of her?
I stare at the screen. I could ask Dax to send me some of the photos he took on his phone over the weekend—I’m sure there are at least thirty. But instead, without a second thought, I snap a selfie with the dog. Before I have time to analyze how I look and pressure myself to retake it, I send it. Who cares what Claire thinks about how I look in a photo? She’ll only be paying attention to the dog.
Idon’t care. I am not interested in Claire that way, and it’s good to remind myself of that.
I’ll date again sometime in the future, but there’s this block inside of me over it. I tell myself it’s because it would be too hard for the kids to have another stepparent added to the mix, and it probably would be. But it’s more than that.
I’m not ready. I was blindsided by Danica leaving me. I’m standing on the edge of a fighter jet, with my parachute on my back, peering over the edge, waiting, knowing that the last time I jumped, my parachute didn’t inflate. And as a result, even now, I’m still falling. Still perched in the air, the wind shunting around me, making it hard to breathe. That’s my nightmare.
It’s a twisted sort of thing. And even though my youngest brother, Milo, has found a few nice, lovely women for me on the dating app he forced me to sign up for, I just can’t.
I’m not ready yet.
The buzz of an incoming text from Claire shifts my focus:
Oh my! She looks like a “Cinnamon,” spicy and sweet.
I pull up the photo. Right as I took the picture, Cinnamon’s tongue darted out, sweeping dangerously close to my cheek. I must have been too concerned with looking decent in the shot that I didn’t even notice what the dog was doing.
“Claire is right,” I tell Cinnamon with a growl. “You are spicy. A spicy little pill.”
And that’s when clarity hits me. I can’t send this woman flowers. I mean, carrying her down the mountain is enough to show my sympathies that she got hurt, right?
That was more than enough. I’m not ready to date, and flowers are a natural precursor to that whole thing.
I pull up the florist app again and cancel the order.
Chapter 7
Claire
