Our Story

The Date

I got to the restaurant at 8:05pm and waited. Slight nausea and an inability to warm up were my companions as I sat there in the booth perusing the menu. A body sat down at the table across from me. "Hey, Jo? I'm Adam."

When he had first sat down, I wasn't sure what I had expected. He was just as nervous as I was, it seemed. I tried to break the ice and make up topics of conversation. He followed my lead and one conversation lead to another. We talked about everything under the sun. At one point, our waitress told us that she was going home because her shift was over, but we were welcome to stay since they were open 24 hours. We nodded, thanked her, and went back to our conversations.

It seemed like only twenty minutes, but an hour or two later the new waitress came by and offered us some water apologizing because she had forgotten that we were sitting there. Again, we simply nodded, thanked her, and went back to our conversations. When we finally looked at a clock, it was after 1am. I felt so bad that it was so late, especially since he had work at 9am the next morning.

"Would you want to come and stay at my place tonight?"

He looked surprised by my question. "No, that's okay. You don't have to do that. I'll be fine going home."

Something in me didn't want the night to end. "But it's so late, and you already said you were tired. I really don't mind."

"It's really okay. I can make it home alright if you don't want me to come over."

I bit my lower lip. "I do want you to come over. I wouldn't forgive myself if anything happened to you on your way home."

He hesitated for a brief moment. "Okay."

My mind started racing a mile a minute in the space of that one word. Okay. That means he's coming over. He'll be staying at your apartment. You've been sick for like three days. You haven't done dishes or straightened the living room. You didn't put laundry away on Tuesday. Your apartment is a mess. "I will warn you," I told him. "My apartment is a little messy. I've been sick for a few days, so I have just kind of walked in and set stuff down instead of putting it away..."

"That's fine."

"And I haven't put laundry away or done dishes either..."

"You're okay."

"And I only have a twin-sized bed, so..."

"If you don't want me to come over, you can change your mine, it's okay."

I gave a sigh. "That's not what I meant... I just... I want you to know going in that it'll be a mess, so... just try not to look at the apartment, I guess?"

He gave a little laugh. "As I said, it's fine."

I looked away. I felt my cheeks get warm. "Okay..."

After a little longer, the waitress came back to refill our glasses. "You guys have been talking up a storm over here." Immediately, both Adam and I began to apologize for being there so late. "Oh, no," she told us. "It's really nice to see people talking like this. You don't see that anymore."

Adam and I gave each other a sheepish smile. "Actually, we are getting ready to leave," I told her. "We've been here talking for about five hours now..."