CHLOE BAKER'S LOST DATE

Chapter Seven: Hell, No

Not for my parents, but for Kit's. For Jack's. I believed it could happen for me. Maybe not like in the movies, on a crowded street where we'd run to each other in a moment of realization, but in a series of days like the one we'd just had, where I felt a sense of synthesis. Could Jack turn out to be a worthless jerk? Of course he could. Whatever it was that he hadn't said could reframe the entire day, but it didn't feel that way.

And then it was late, the sun thinking of setting. I walked to the subway and when I got off at my stop my phone was ringing. Kit.

"You haven't turned that tracker thing off, have you?"

"I will, I will."

"Uh-huh." I stopped outside my local bodega. I was still full from the meal with Jack, but I knew that would wear off in an hour, and I was out of provisions. "How was your day?"

"Eh. We were shopping for furniture."

"For the new apartment?" Kit and John were moving to a two-bedroom in Harlem that had me drooling over the massive increase in space. Real estate wasn't the main reason to be with another person, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't sometimes get turned on by Zillow listings.

"Two weeks till moving day."

"You've hired movers, yes?"

"What? You don't want to schlep our stuff up and down a million stairs?"

"I do not. Has he proposed yet?"

"You sound like Lian."

"I assume you're going to tell me before Lian when he does."

"Maybe I'll propose to him."

I eyed a box of stale-looking donuts through the crowded window. I already had to run to work off the meal I'd had with Jack. What was another thousand calories, give or take? "There's zero chance of that happening."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you made me enact proposal scenarios a million times when we were kids?"

"I forgot about that. You were so good at getting down on one knee."

"I had to after Ken's leg snapped off. Anyway, I don't think that's the hard part."

"I know." Kit sighed. "Honestly, I think I'm nervous about it."

I eyed the donuts again, their powdered sugar calling to me. "Screw it."

"What?"

"Sorry, that was my internal monologue about whether I was going to buy donuts."

"Yes, obviously."

"You're right." I pulled open the door, the bell tinkling above me. I breathed in the musty smell and picked up a rickety basket. The first time I'd gone in there, I'd been too scared to buy anything, used to the pristine Kroger's near my old apartment. Kit had told me I was being a snob and to get over myself. She was (mostly) right. Ninety percent of the food was perfectly edible. It was just a matter of knowing which ninety percent. "Why are you nervous about John proposing? Are you thinking of saying no?"

"No."

"Then what?"

"It's scary to think of something like that being decided. Like, am I never going to fall in love again? Never going to sleep with another person? For the rest of my life?"

"Sounds like heaven."

"You only say that because you're single."

"I don't think that's true." I scooped the donuts into my basket then walked down the nearest narrow aisle. This is how I grocery shopped, no lists or planning, just snagging what caught my eye in the moment.