18
“Yes,” Tam said, her voice hushed though she lived alone, and Blaine had left twenty minutes ago. “He showed up here and kissed me.”
“I just…I can’t believe it,” Cara said. “Was it a good kiss?”
Tam sighed and looked up at her ceiling. “Yes,” she said. “Amazing. Not long enough, though, and then I ruined it all.” She proceeded to tell her sister the rest of the story, ending with, “That’s it. He drove away.”
“But you’re going to dinner with him tomorrow.”
“I don’t know,” Tam said. “He didn’t show up last time, and I’m planning to be at least half an hour late, just to be sure. I might actually text Trey and find out if Blaine has left for the restaurant before I even get in the shower.” Her chest pinched as a replay from earlier in the week moved through her mind. It had been on a loop for days, and Tam had barely slept the past few nights.
“Do you need help with the rules?” Cara said.
“I know Blaine,” Tam said. “The rules will take ten seconds.” He’d have put no kissing on it, but they’d already broken that rule.
He won’t again, Tam thought. Blaine had an iron will, and he stuck to things he’d decided to do like glue. The man lifted weights six days a week, no matter what. He’d barely left the ranch after his break-up with Alex, and Tam knew he’d decided to simply surround himself with family and never date again.
“You know what they say,” Cara said. “Rules are made to be broken. Put everything on the list that you really want to do, Tam. Then shatter those things.” She laughed, and Tam let the infectious nature of it put a smile on her face too.
“Okay,” she said. “Enough about me. What about you and Chris?”
“Oh, Chris,” Cara said. “He’s being an idiot, because he thinks we’re too young to get married.”
Cara was a decade younger than Tam, but, “Twenty-five is not too young to get married,” Tam said.
“I know,” Cara said. “He is a year younger than me, and he wants to finish law school first.”
“Have a long engagement then,” Tam said.
“I’m going to let it be for right now,” Cara said. “He sometimes gets too far inside his head.”
“Right,” Tam said, and she realized that she could’ve said the exact same thing about Blaine. He was incredibly smart, and he got lost inside his mind sometimes too. “All right, I’ll let you go.”
She hung up with her sister and stayed on the bed for another minute. Then she quickly tapped out a text to Blaine.
Dinner tomorrow night. I’ll come pick you up at 6:30.
He didn’t answer right away, not that she expected him to. Blaine would shut down for a while after an encounter like the one they’d just had. She’d shut down while he was still talking on the sidewalk.
Her mind was moving again now, though. She’d heard the tell-tale rumble of his engine when he’d pulled into her driveway, and she’d given him a minute to come inside. When he hadn’t, and he’d leaned over the steering wheel, she’d gone out to him. She’d thought maybe he’d fainted or didn’t feel well and had just pulled over at her house, because he knew it.
You forgot me at the house.
Blaine didn’t understand that he was impossible to forget.
Rule #1: The relationship will not ruin our friendship.
Sent.
Rule #2: The relationship will only be binding while Hayes is in town.
Sent.
Rule #3: No kissing.
Sent.
Rule #4: Public displays of affection will be limited to flirting, laughing, and hand-holding and only for the purpose of perpetuating the relationship’s validity for others.