Nanny Diaries

Chapter 10 - Drumroll, Please

“The best part of any first kiss is the lead-up to it. The moment right before the lips touch-” he begins, quoting the exact line from my favorite TV show, from where we got the idea. 

“It’s like a big drumroll.” I continue. 

“So, how ‘bout today, we just stick with the drumroll.”

Our faces get closer and closer, and I stare into his eyes, now fully understanding the emotion and passion, the restraint behind the proposal. How exciting the actual buildup to the kiss is. It’s almost better, because like Victoria said, once the lips do meet, the spell is broken. 

“You have beautiful eyes.” Zack murmurs, our noses are touching, and our lips are only a few millimeters behind them. 

“Thank you. So do you.”

I lose myself in his eyes, just like so many girls say they do in those cliche books or movies. I feel like I’m watching a show of his soul. I can see so much there. 

“Excuse me, Miss Lauren, but where are you-” Henry, the limo driver says, as he rolls down the divider, separating the front of the car from the back. I jump away from Zack, my face on fire. I cough, covering up my discomfort. 

“Oh. Oh, my apologies. Home, then?” he asks, clearly shaken and embarrassed himself. 

“Actually, can you go to 113 Main Street?” Zack says. 

I shoot him a confused look, but Henry only nods obligingly and rolls the divider back up. “Where are we going?” I ask. 

“You’ll see.” Zack says. 

.  .  .

Zack leads me up the steps to his apartment building, which is really fancy. I am honestly taken by surprise, but I follow anyway. 

He presses his thumb into the ‘up’ button, and the elevator slides invitingly open. 

“What are we doing here?” I ask again. 

“Okay, so. I was thinking.” he starts.

“Yeah?” 

“If we’re going to have a relationship for five months, but it’s not really real, then we might as well do all the cliches right? From movies, or from TV shows. We can even keep doing How I Met Your Mother stuff. But I have a different idea right now.”

I stay silent, since it seems like he’s done talking for the moment. When we stop on the second-to-highest level, I follow him to the door on the end. 

“Oh, my God. No way.” I say as he opens the door. 

His apartment is almost exactly like Jacob’s house in Crazy, Stupid, Love. I can’t believe it. Right down to the furniture. 

“You like that movie more than I thought.” I say. 

“I had it this way before the movie came out, I swear. But you’re right. I do like that movie. You watched it, right?”

I smile. “Yes, I loved it.”

“You remember that scene after Hannah dumped her boyfriend at the party when she passed the bar test?”

“Yeah.”

“She goes to the bar, and finds Jacob and leads him home. You remember how she asked him how he got women to come home with him?”

I nod again. “The scene in Dirty Dancing where Patrick Swayze lifts Jennifer Grey?”

“Yeah. Well,” he says, a half smile lifting a corner of his mouth. “I can do it, too.”

I half laugh. “No way.”

“Way.” he nods. 

“It’d be dangerous.” I argue. 

“Oh, come on.”

I think it over, but almost immediately say yes in my mind. “Okay.” I grin. 

“That would not work on me.” I say, as he presses play on the docking station in the corner. Time of My Life begins to fill the room. “Oh, God. This is ridiculous. I don’t want to do it.” I say, really meaning it. I’ve backed up so I’m on the other side of the room. 

“Come on.”

“This is, beyond ridiculous.”

“Run and jump.”

“No.”

“Come on.”

“No, thank you.”

He motions me forward with his hands. 

“Thank God I’m drunk.” Now that line is not true. I sprint forward, until I feel his arms circle around me. I squeal as he lifts me up, and my hair falls onto his face. His grin is contagious and I feel one of my own spread across my face. 

I slide down as he slowly lowers me onto the floor. 

“That was so fun.”

His cheeks are flushed as he says, “It really was.”