Feigning irritation, she said, "How am I going to get rid of you now?"
"If you ever want to, just sleep with Matt. I promise it'll do the trick."
Wrinkling up her nose, she said, "Eh, I think I'd prefer to live under the bridge."
With a wide smile, he said, "Hey, good answer."
"My turn," she said, rubbing her hands together. "Hey, you know, that Kelsie girl is really pretty."
"Is she? I hadn't even noticed."
Grinning, she said, "Oh, you're good at this, too."
Aaron shook his head, saying, "You are crazy."
Kelsie was approaching the table again with a basket of bread and butter, and she said she was going to bring out the salads, and asked which dressing they wanted.
"Italian for me," Aaron said.
"Ranch please," Julie requested.
"Those will be right out, then I'll take your order."
Raising her eyebrows Julie said, "Oh, we're really ordering? I figured since we were the only ones here…"
Aaron shook his head. "No, you can order whatever you want. Personally, I recommend the pesto. It's pretty amazing."
Nodding her head, she said, "I will trust you on that, and if you're wrong… we can stop at Pizza Hut on the way home."
"It's a deal," he agreed, smiling at her.
---
"Songs. I could write songs about how good that pesto was," Julie stated as she and Aaron walked up the hallway to their apartment.
"Oh my God, the list continues?" he asked, exasperated.
"Endlessly. I would even write the songs on those little grains of rice, like those guys at the mall write names on. Yeah, I would write poems and love songs to pesto—or, the cook for making pesto."
"Keep you away from the cook," he said with a nod, pulling his key out of his pocket. "Noted."
"Let's see, what do we have now?"
Sighing, Aaron said, "You would choreograph a dance routine for the pesto. You would choreograph an interpretive dance to interpret pesto. You would name a country after pesto. You would name your child after pesto. Since I said no, you suggested we get a fish named Pesto, which you would feed pesto and inadvertently kill, and then we would have a funeral for Pesto. Along the way you said you would perform cheers for pesto, write poetry for pesto, take pictures of pesto, and finally write songs—even on grains of rice. I think you liked the pesto."
"It was so good. I would write a book about it."
"You need a self-help book," he stated.
Grinning at him, she said, "It's not my fault, you should have never recommended it."
"Well, I've never made it myself, so you're going to have to temper this addiction with something else."
"Mm, I have just the thing," she said, lightly grabbing him by the arm to slow down and then catching up to him, leaning in against his shoulder and giving him a little kiss on his cheek.
"I can only hope you like me as much as pesto."
"Maybe after tonight," she said with a nod.