Read Online What He's Been Missing by Grace Octavia - Free Book Online Page B

change that. Love is meant to prevail against all odds!
    Still, in case I couldn’t change those things and the date was a disaster, I told Bird to pick me up at the office at five o’clock. That was the only address he’d had on file at the shop and there was no sense giving him my home address.
    Of course, he showed up in a Ford. One older than mine. Shiny and purple and big. He pulled tight to the corner on Peachtree in front of the building where I was standing with Krista. I kept telling her I was all right and I’d see her in the office the next day, but she insisted on reviewing every single detail of the work day while scrolling through messages on her cell phone. I think she was just waiting to see my date, though, because when Bird pulled up in that purple car, she nearly squealed like a preschooler who’d just found an Easter egg in the school yard. “This is your date?”
    â€œHe’s just my mechanic,” I said dryly. “We’re just kicking it.”
    Bird turned off the ignition. I was hoping he’d stay in the car, not make some grand scene, giving Krista something to grin about (I could already see that he was wearing the gold chains), but he got out of the car and walked slowly around the butt so Krista could see his matching brown silk slacks and shirt. A thicker gold chain was around his wrist. Two rings were on one hand. He stepped onto the curb and I introduced him to Krista and her nosy half grin.
    â€œYou look beautiful,” Bird said to me after shaking Krista’s hand.
    â€œI’m just wearing what I had on earlier at the shop,” I said passively.
    â€œWell, you look more beautiful in it now.” He smiled and took my work bag before leaving me alone with Krista on the curb.
    â€œYeah, he’s your date,” Krista affirmed with full backing. She was always trying to link me up with someone, trying to help me escape “the marriage planner’s curse.”
    â€œPlease, it’s not even like that. It’s not that serious.”
    â€œTell him.” Krista nodded at Big Bird, in the car and ready to go. He’d leaned over and opened my door. “See you tomorrow. I’ll expect a full report. Good luck.”
    Â 
    As always, the conversation with Bird was simple, light banter. Nothing too deep. We rode up Peachtree talking about his car, my car, his love of cars, of Fords. Listening to him talk reminded me of my uncles and my father, the old men at my church who stood around talking about Jesus, sports, and cars all day. He wasn’t that much older than me, but his style, how he spoke, and what he spoke about was decidedly dated. He was from a farm town smaller than Social Circle and laughed like it. His cologne was sweet and heavy and all over the car. I rolled my window down.
    I hated to jump the gun—I mean, the man had jumped out of the car to grab my bag and had opened my door (two things fewer than half of my dates in the last three years ever thought to do)—but listening to him and looking at him and smelling him sitting across from me in that purple Ford only confirmed how different Bird and I were. Besides our country backgrounds and Chauncey’s truck parked in Bird’s garage, I was sure we didn’t have anything in common. Shit, I know how bad that sounds— really, really bad . But, that was the thing about the blue-collar brothers like Bird—the ones Oprah and Tyler Perry seemed to endlessly suggest successful single sisters flock toward like an available dick in the veritable glass case—although he was single enough, nice enough, and found me attractive enough, we lived in two different worlds.
    I hadn’t eaten lunch and I was starving, so when Bird asked if I liked seafood, I perked up in my seat and smiled yes, but I should’ve asked a few more questions. On my side of town, seafood meant lobster and oysters, a filet of sole on the back patio at