“Okay. I’m joking.”
“You’re not very convincing.”
He raises an eyebrow. “If it’s so important to you, you should have asked me about it when you created my dating profile. It should make for a good prompt.”
“I would’ve,” I grumble, “if I knew I was planning on dating you myself.”
Anthony laughs and reaches for one of the marshmallows. He pops it into his mouth and chews.
“These are really not that good,” he says. It comes out half-mangled.
I laugh, pushing at him. “They’re much better half-melted and gooey.”
“Mhm. You sure about that?”
“One hundred percent. How have you never had these?”
He shrugs. “I’ve never been camping. But I trust you. You’re a great cook.”
The earnestness in his voice is what makes me blush. I make simple pasta dishes and know the incredibly complicated recipe for s’mores. But he’s entirely genuine.
“Thank you,” I murmur. “But it must be easy to impress a guy who mostly eats takeout.”
His crooked smile is back. He reaches past me for the tray and we make it out to the patio. “I don’t know,” he says. “My mother used to cook a lot.”
“Used to?” I ask.
“Still does, I suppose. But I haven’t been there for a while,” he says, pulling out my chair for me. It’s such a quaint, old-school movement that I smile, but Anthony looks lost in thought.
I light the candles. Wrap a blanket around my shoulders and pull my legs up beneath me. The sun is setting, and it won’t be long until the sky is star-filled and luminous.
“My parents have a family dinner every Sunday, without fail,” he continues. “They’ll invite people over. Aunts, uncles. Family friends.”
“That sounds nice.”
“Yeah. It can be.”
“When was the last time you went?”
Anthony looks out to the ocean. “I think it was around Christmas.”
It’s July now. I swallow, looking down at the lit candles. My parents would be heartbroken if I didn’t want to remain in close contact with them. So would I, for that matter.
“Anyway,” he says, reaching for one of the skewers and turning it over in his large hands. “I imagine our childhoods were pretty different.”
“You mean mine wasn’t s’mores-deprived?”
His lip quirks. “Right. You probably sat at the campfire every summer evening with your loving parents, surrounded by a pack of well-trained dogs, and grilled s’mores.”
“You make it sound so idyllic.”
“Wasn’t it?” he challenges.
I skewer a marshmallow. “Sometimes it was like that. There were certainly always dogs around.”
“And your friends,” he adds, “who your parents treated like their own kids. You were popular in school. But not in the cliquey kind of way, no, everyone just wanted to be your friend, and you found everyone interesting. ”
I look at him, and he looks back at me, an eyebrow raised. “Am I wrong?”