Fiona, for her part, gapes at me, for once in her life struck silent with shock.
I shake my head. “Some other kid was bugging me, being a total creep. This guy chased him off. Then he asked me to come for a coffee, to make up for it.”
“To make up for defending you?” Fiona arches an eyebrow.
“You know, because he said I could’ve done it myself…” Fi continues to stare at me like I’m crazy, so I just shake my head. “Never mind. Anyway, I agreed, and a coffee turned into bar-hopping, turned into going back to his place…” I trail off, because, like it’s been doing all morning at all the inopportune moments, a sudden memory pops into my mind. The way Charlie stopped me just inside the door of his apartment to push me up against it. The way his hands felt as they roamed down my hips, tracing every inch of me, like he already knew me better than I knew myself.
Fuck. The man knew what he was doing. No wonder it had never even occurred to me that he might be younger than me—young enough to be a student, no less.
At least he’s a senior, I remind myself. It only helps a little bit.
“Wow, Lila.” Fiona stares at me, until I shrink in on myself.
“I didn’t know, okay? I thought he was like, a professor or a grad student or something. He didn’t dress like anyone else coming out of the engineering building, in their sweats and all. Plus, the way he acted when he chased the guy away from me was like… In charge. I don’t know.” I grimace, realizing I’m repeating myself now. “I’m sorry I didn’t get what we needed for the article. I can go to another college campus and try it again, maybe?”
Fiona sighs and shakes her head. “What, so you can rob another cradle?”
I glare at her.
She smirks. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist. But no, actually…” Fiona leans forward. I’m not sure what I expect from her—a reprimand? Another word of rebuke? Instead, she smiles at me. “This could be a good thing, Lila.”
I resist the urge to groan again. “How so?”
In response, she kicks back her chair, crossing one leg over the other. “We can change the focus of the article.” She waves a hand dismissively. “Nobody wants to read about old-school dating techniques anyway. We all know they don’t apply to the modern era.”
Then why did you assign me that article in the first place? I think, though I bite my tongue before I actually blurt that out. “Okay…” I reply slowly, still not quite sure where she’s going with this.
“I got some feedback from our last article, the one about marriage statistics and how the divorce rate is skyrocketing, that we ran last month?”
The one Fiona wrote about her own parents’ divorce. I nod, recalling it. “Sure. What was the feedback?”
“Well, just that our readers really seemed to resonate with it. Everyone wanted to talk about how they went into their marriage with a certain set of expectations, only to have those blow up in their faces. Because modern relationships don’t work the way old-school ones did. We got hundreds of comments and emailed replies, even responses to our tweets of the article. More reposts than any other article we’ve written this year, in fact. Turns out failed marriages are a hot topic right now.”
Probably because so many people could relate to such an intensely personal subject. “So… you think we should write about marriages again?” I frown. “What’s the angle this time?” I thought we’d already covered modern divorces pretty well in Fi’s article.
Fiona’s smile widens. “Well, wouldn’t it be great if we could track the formation and breakdown of a marriage in real-time? Especially one that’s like those we wrote about in that first article. Marriages based on old expectations.”
“That does sound interesting,” I admit. “But where are we going to find a couple to volunteer for such an intensely personal article? Especially a couple who are only just about to get married or engaged, and who we already know will break up soon.” I let out a little laugh. “I mean, that would be like finding a golden needle in a haystack.”
“Unless you rig the system.” Fiona’s eyes sparkle. “Unless you hand someone the needle before they jump into the haystack.”
I frown, not quite sure where she’s going with this. “What do you mean?”
“Well, if we had someone who had just entered into a relationship based on old-school expectations of what it would look like… or someone who could push things in that direction, at any rate. But who plans to make sure the relationship bombs in the end, so she can write about it afterward…”
I blink at her for a few seconds, while she continues to grin at me, like she’s just spouted off the most genius piece of wisdom ever. My heart sinks into my stomach. “Hold on. You’re not talking about—”