C'Mon, Would It Really Be So Bad?

Birthday Dinner

This time we did stay in touch. We texted sporadically and sometimes had lengthy phone conversations. Nothing about us or any sort of feelings or attraction to each other, though. I think we both knew that it was still very much there, but neither one of us wanted to disrespect Shawn. Sometimes he would make a random comment that gave me butterflies and then other times it felt like I was talking to my old best friend, the one I had before anything happened between us. Like any romance that might have been there for a second was now long gone. 

Things with Shawn continued to go well. Work continued to go well. And my friendship with Ed got even better once he rented a penthouse in LA. He was going to be temporarily living there while doing some studio work on upcoming projects. The chances of us being able to actually hang out were much greater. 

Greater, but still not great. His schedule was still really full and so was mine. It was frustrating when he first got to California because it was like he was just out of reach. He was close, but we kept missing each other. Whenever I was free, he had to be somewhere and vise versa. It felt like we had been trying FOREVER to meet up. 

When it seemed like it was finally going to happen, I was in the process of getting ready when he texted me and said something had come up. My stomach dropped. This was impossible. 

(text) Me - Ugh, okay. Try another time? 

Ed - Why don't you just come with me?

Me - Where?

Ed - It's a dinner. I can pick you up. But you have to wear a nice dress.

Me - What? I don't want to go to a fancy dinner with strangers. It's okay really, we can just reschedule.

Ed - I have to leave for New York in 2 days. Not sure how long I'll be there. C'mon...it could be another year before we'll both be able to hang out at the rate we've been going 

He was right. I wanted to see him, and I needed to take whatever opportunity I had. So I changed into a good dress and agreed to go with him. He was knocking on my door 45 minutes later. When I opened it he was doing something on his phone but he immediately turned it off as he looked up at me. When he saw me in my dress his jaw dropped just a little bit and he almost dropped his phone as he went to put it in his pocket. 

He cleared his throat and I could see he was a little embarrassed by his reaction. "Hey. You look - I like that dress. It looks nice. You look..nice. Good. I mean, you look good."  

"Thanks," I laughed as I went in for a hug. Seeing him flustered over me was adorable. 

He looked past me to my front door. "Isn't Shawn coming?"

"Oh, no. He's out of town for work. Didn't I tell you?" 

I hadn't, because I never talked to Ed about Shawn. Something I didn't even realize at the time. It was really cool of Ed to automatically include Shawn but I was kind of glad to have a one-on-one hang out with him. Well, at least on the car ride to and from where ever we were going. And hopefully after dinner. 

"So," I started once we were in his car. "Are you going to tell me what this dinner's for?"

"Oh, yeah, my parents are in town visiting. It's my mum's birthday."

A heat wave of nerves washed over me. "What?? This is your mom's birthday dinner?"

"Yeah. It's nothing big. Just me, my brother, mum and dad."

"Well why are you bringing me to a family dinner??"

"Why not?" He made it sound like no big deal.