"Okay, so here is kind of what I was thinking." He says leaning back against the headboard with his hands behind his head, still wearing nothing but a towel.
"Don't you reckon you should at least get dressed first?" I laugh, nodding towards the towel.
"Am I distracting you?" He teases playfully.
I roll my eyes at him.
A little.
"Ok, so what is it?" I ask, avoiding the subject of him being nearly naked.
He rolls over toward me, and I avoid looking at the towel that is so close to falling open.
"I was thinking we could do this whole dating thing on a kind of trial basis."
"How so?" I ask a bit confused and, yeah, somewhat distracted by the towel that is coming undone, revealing more and more each time he slightly moves.
"Well, we are here for two weeks. We can try it out while we are here and see if this is going to work or if it is just a really stupid idea. And if it doesn't work, then everything has to go back to normal when we get home." He says reasoning.
"And if it does?" I ask, trying not to let my eyes venture downward.
"Work out?"
I nod.
"Then, when we get back home, we will continue and see where things lead. But this is our two week trial."
"God, you make it sound like something you buy off the television from one of those old infomercials." I say rolling over onto my back and staring up at the ceiling.
"Try it risk-free for fourteen days guaranteed, or your money back." I laugh.
"Kandi." He chastises
"What?" I giggle. "It's the truth."
♡♡♡
Finally dressed, or at least with some lesser distracting shorts on, Kole sits down on the bed with the room service menu.
"What would you like?" He says scanning over the overpriced list of things they offer.
"I don't know; just order me something."
"We can always go out to get something."
"No, not tonight. That car ride done me in. I just want to lay around and do nothing tonight. We will go out after you finish up with your interview tomorrow."
"You want to come with me?"
"And meet the famous baseball player?"
"Yeah."
"Honestly? Thank you, but no thanks. I am just going to stay around here, maybe check out the pool, and try out some of this whole relaxing thing you keep telling me so much about."
"Ok, but if you change your mind..." He says picking up the phone from the bedside table.
I wander around the room while he is ordering our food. I stop in front of the window and pull back the curtains, letting what is left of the evening sun in.
Our room has a fantastic view of the sunset, and I stand back admiring it.
Growing up, I always loved going to the top of the hill at Pap's farm and sitting on the fence to watch the sunset.
It is something I haven't done in years, and I didn't realize until just now how much I missed the simplicity of it.
"Beautiful, isn't it?" Kole says coming up behind me.
He brushes my hair to the side and bends down, resting his chin on my shoulder. He wraps his arms around me, standing here watching the bright orange glow of the setting sun shine on all of the buildings in view.
"Do you think this is a mistake?" I ask him, laying my arms over his that are holding me, linked together across my stomach.
He turns me around to face him.
"Are you already having regrets?" He says seriously. "Because if you are, then we can forget this, we can end it before we even..."
"No, it's not that. It's just.. I don't know Kole. I am just so damn tired of being alone, so tired of going out with all of these...."
"Assholes." He fills in for me.
"Yeah, and you are just so, so"
"Perfect?" He teases.
"Well, yeah, actually. I just don't want to force you to do this, and you end up hating me for it. I don't want you to settle with someone like me just because you think that ..."
"Kandi, listen to me right now. Anyone would be lucky to have a chance to be with you. You are the one who is perfect. If anyone is settling in this situation, it is you." He says tucking my hair behind my ear.
There is a knock at the door.
"That would be my food." I say pushing against his chest.
"Our food." He corrects.
"That entirely depends on what you ordered." I laugh as I go to open the door.
♡♡♡
Sitting there stuffing our faces, we decide now is as good a time as any to discuss what he keeps referring to as "the rules."
By the time we are finished, we have come up with several—so many that I grab my journal and pen to make a list.
1. Friends First: Always remember that, regardless of where this leads, we are friends before anything else.
2. No secrets: We tell each other everything, just like we always have.
3. Only What Both Are Comfortable With: We will both always be considerate of the other when it comes to anything physical or otherwise.
4. Honesty: This goes along with number 2, but, we must always be honest with each other.
5. If Either One Of Us Starts Having Doubts, Speak Up: - Never lead the other on
6. If Either One Finds Someone Else Or Has Feelings For Someone, We Must Tell The Other immediately.
7. No One Knows Until We Are Ready: No one knows about our arrangement until we are ready to let them know.We make this rule because we both know that our family and a few mutual friends will go crazy once they find out, and it is best we wait to see how this is going to go before we say anything.
8. No Cringey Couple Nicknames
( because apparently me calling him Ko and him calling me his Kandicane isn't cringey.)
9. No Sex With Anyone Else: As long as we are a "we", we will not date or hook up with anyone else. If we feel like that is where something is headed, then we keep an open dialogue about it and tell each other BEFORE anything happens.
10. NOTHING CHANGES!!!
This is the most important rule! So that we won't let anything that may or may not happen take away from what we have and only, hopefully, add to it.
I think that this rule and what all of this means is what scares both of us the most—the possibility of it ever coming between us.
Driving us apart instead of closer together.
But we are both hell-bent and determined not to let that happen.
"Number 11" Kole says with a mouthful of food.
"What?"
"Write it down. Number 11." He says waking his fork at me.
"Ok?"
"We reserve the right to add more rules as we see fit or as they come up."
"Only after discussing it with the other person first."
"Of course, now put it down."
I jot down number 11 at the bottom of the list and close the notebook, leaving the pen inside.
"Ok, so I guess that makes it official?" He asks, looking at the closed notebook.
"Guess so." I say smiling.
An actual couple. Us. I still can't believe it. Now, where the hell do we go from here?