Page 103 of Holidating
But he was waiting for an answer. And I owed him one, because I was the idiot who had us standing out here in the cold.
“Okay,” I tried. “My mother has a saying that you shouldn’t do anything you don’t want reported on the front page of theNew York Times. And I’ve never been very good at following that rule,although I wish I were. Because my ex and his pals weren’t very nice about… a recent embarrassing episode.”
Again, Andy’s brown eyes darted over to the sorority house and then back. But his frown lost some of its depth. With what I’d just told him, he would probably assume that I’d gotten drunk and puked all over the place, or something. “Well, okay. Going in or not is your call. We could always just go for ice cream at Scoops instead. I saw on Facebook that they made a new batch of salted caramel today. That’s my favorite flavor.”
I reached across to give his arm another squeeze. “I like your style, Andy. And it’s tempting. But then they win, right?”
Andy shrugged. “You could look at it that way. Or you could just say that life is too short to spend even ten minutes with assholes.”
Aw. This guy! I liked him already. “You are a very smart man. But I spent a lot of time on this charity thing, and if I don’t see it to completion, I’m going to feel bad about that, too. So tonight I’m going to put on my big girl panties and give it a shot.”
“Fine.” His face lit up then with another winning smile. “But if you change your mind, what’s the word? Give me a code so I’ll know when to help you bail out.”
“How about ‘scoop’? As in ice cream.”
“Deal. If you say ‘what’s the scoop?’ we’re outie.” Then he held out his arm in that formal way, as if escorting a lady to dinner inside the pages of a Jane Austen novel. That was even weirder than shaking my hand. But so what? I took his arm, and in we went.
CHAPTER 3
ANDY
Together, we climbed a set of wide steps, passing a perfect row of rocking chairs on the porch. Until tonight, I’d never been inside of a sorority house. To me, they were mythical places, where the toilet seat was always down and the air smelled of flowers instead of feet. I opened the door, then stood aside for Katie.
And then we were inside, and the place did not disappoint. Like so many of the buildings at Harkness, Tri Psi had been built about a hundred years ago. The big front room had high, beamed ceilings. On one wall rose an oversized stone fireplace, where orange flames licked the air behind an iron metal grate.
All around the room, shiny-haired girls buzzed like bees. It was just the sort of estrogen-fueled chaos that reminded me a lot of my sisters.
Katie tagged one of the girls on the elbow as she flitted by. “Amy?”
She turned to look over her shoulder, smiling at us. “Hey! You look gorgeous. And have I met your date?”
I was introduced to Amy, who seemed to be in charge. She rattled off a bunch of instructions to Katie at warp speed — there were tables to set up and rolls of paper to find and toys to wrap. Katie nodded along at this barrage of details. But when Amy moved on, Katie turned to me with a smile. “First things first.” She sidled up to a table bearing a metal tub full of ice, with dozens of bottles ofbeer nested inside. This was obviously not a keg-and-red-plastic-cup affair.
“Thanks,” I said when she handed me a cold beer. “What’s next? You can put me to work.” Honestly, I was thrilled that this party had a mission other than small talk or — God forbid — dancing.
In high school, I was the scrawny nerd who never got invited to parties. Even though I’d grown into my long legs and stopped getting shoved into lockers years ago, I had never mastered small talk. And we won’t eventalkabout what kind of a dancer I was. Because that way lies the abyss.
College had been much more fun for me than high school. Except for my nonexistent love life, I was happy at Harkness. Although our basketball team kind of sucked, my teammates were happy to have me. And on a basketball court I always knew what to do. I knew to always be ready to catch the pass. To find an opening and go for it.
But at a party? It was like I’d never received the playbook that everyone else got at birth. A party with Katie Vickery was double trouble, because her hotness made me into more of a bumbler than usual. A job was just what I needed.
Katie shifted her weight from one long leg to the other. “Well… most of the guys will be in that room,” she tilted her head toward an arched doorway at the side. “They’re putting up the tree. But if you wanted to stay here with me, you could help with the wrapping.”
For a second I wasn’t sure what to do. I didn’t want to be underfoot. But there was something hesitant in in Katie’s expression. As if perhaps she could use a little backup. “I’d just as soon help you, if that’s okay,” I said.
I knew I’d made the right choice, because the most beautiful smile lit her face. “Awesome. Then will you help me set up a folding table? Last time, mine fell down on one end, like a wounded camel. And all the Halloween pumpkins went rolling off.”
Well, okay then.
There was a stack of collapsed folding tables leaning against one wall. I grabbed one and let Katie show me where to set it up, which took about sixty seconds. Then I drank my beer while she went running off for wrapping paper and tape. The beehive was infull swing around me. There were girls on the old wooden staircase, wrapping strands of Christmas lights around the banister, and girls toting boxes of Christmas cookies through the front door.
Katie returned with three enormous rolls of wrapping paper. “I’ll just grab the first stack of gifts,” she said.
“Are you sure I can’t help with that?” I asked.
She waved me off. “It’s mayhem back there. I’ll be right back.” True to her word, she soon reappeared with a stack of boxes. They were rainbow looms — those things that little kids used to make bracelets out of rubber bands.
Measuring the boxes, I began cutting pieces of Santa Claus paper to size. Functioning as an assembly line, Katie and I became a wrapping machine. I cut. She folded and taped. Working side by side made it easy for me to admire Katie. As she moved, her silky hair fell over her shoulder like a curtain. It made me want to sift my fingers through it, to see if it was as soft as it looked. And the way her dress skimmed her hips was making me a little bit crazy. In a perfect world, I would have loved to fit my hands around her waist.
