Nice to (Re)Meet You

6 | delusional fangirl

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6

delusional fangirl

ZEKE DIDN'T EVEN look at his phone.

In one swift move, as if it was a nuisance that he couldn't be more delighted to get rid of, he switched his phone to mute and turned it over on the counter, keeping his eyes on me the whole time.

"Not an important call?" I quipped, storing my blackmail-wielding phone in my pocket. For safekeeping.

The way he just glared at me made me bite back a pleased chuckle.

"Meow, meow?" I asked with a straight face. Because "cat got your tongue?" just didn't have the same impact.

The puzzlement on his face slowly transitioned into the edges of his lips twitching. Well, almost twitching.

"Angeles, did you just make a joke?"

I offered him a casual shrug, half-relieved that he got my joke—and also half-embarrassed that he got my joke. "So no, then. Damn it. Tongue-less Velasco is a quiet Velasco."

He cocked an eyebrow at me, crossing his arms against his corded chest. "Bit weird how you're talking about my tongue, Angeles."

"Right. I should be talking about the apron you're wearing," I said, tipping my chin at the tiny cursive letters threaded across the pocket of said apron, Barbie's manicured fingernails pointing at it. "Hot men wear hot pink. I see a hot pink apron right here. Where's the hot man?"

As if remembering the evidence I had in my possession, Zeke's eyes flickered to the pocket of my slacks, and then back up to my eyes, narrowing. "You've got a picture of him in your phone."

"You mean a random picture of Cillian Murphy that I grabbed from Pinterest? Yeah, sure."

"You know what? I'm not even going to argue that. He's an amazing actor. Really brought Oppenheimer to life."

"I know! I was on the edge of my seat when I watched it. The way he brings so much nuance to his portrayal—"

I trailed off when I realized what I was doing.

Zeke realized it at the same time as me—in a snap, he zapped all animation from his face, hitting me with an impassive look. He cleared his throat, saying, "The picture you took of me. Mind explaining that, Angeles?"

I took a preemptive step to the side, furtively glancing at the exit and calculating how quick I'd have to be to make a break for it.

A wisp of a smile crossed his face. Like he had all the time in the world, he leaned against the counter, one elbow planted on the lacquered marble. "I wouldn't if I were you. I was in track and field in high school, remember?" And then, quieter: "You used to give me so much shit for it."

Two things descended on me at once.

First—okay, fine, outrunning Zeke, with his athleticism and my sore lack thereof, would be a pipe dream in this universe. Perhaps in a different timeline, I was the Bugatti and he was the Mirage, but in this reality, he'd be feeding me a deluge of dust in his wake. And I wasn't particularly craving debris today.

Second—I knew that I wasn't the embodiment of celestial grace back in high school, and that I actively engaged in not-so-fair battles of wits with him, but I'd like to think I wasn't the kind of person that made fun of his genuine interests.

Was I?

He misread the confusion on my face. "Why, did you somehow master the art of running in the past few years?"