this time.
âHey, Joss, itâs me.â
âWhatâs up, Matt?â
âInstead of going out for dinner, do you want to come over? I can make something.â
I did a double take at the phone. This was completely unprecedented. It took a second to find a normal tone to reply. âWow, youâre spoiling me rotten today. I canât wait to hear this story.â
âIâll tell you over dinner,â he said. âPasta okay?â
âYeah, sounds fine. Do you want me to bring anything?â
âJust yourself. Be here at seven.â
A glance at the clock told me it was a few minutes after six. I would have enough time to control my hair and make it to Mattâs right on time. We said goodbye and disconnected. Dewey was on the threshold of the bedroom, eyeing me with no small amount of contempt.
âWhat is going on in your boyfriendâs head?â I asked him. The cat loved Matt with slavish devotion.
âYeah, I donât know either.â
He yawned and eyed the silk underwear still in my hand.
âYouâre too late,â I told him, shaking them in his direction. âIâm putting them on.â
I stepped into my underwear and headed back to the bathroom to do battle with my hair. Curls are nothing to be trifled withâif you can master them, youâll have good hair for life, if you canât â¦Â you might as well start amassing your hat collection now. There is no hope.
Three products and a light diffusing later, I was satisfied with the result. The last step was a little makeup, and then it was back to the closet. I couldnât help hesitating. Normally, Iâd pick something and call it a day, but Matt had thrown a wrench in the system with this whole dinner thing.
Am I misinterpreting this? I wondered. Maybe he didnât mean he needed me.
I drummed my fingers on the edge of the closet, considering. There was something distinctly unusual about the evening and I couldnât put my finger on it. I could call Matt back and demand answers, I knew. That was part of the deal. We were friends. Good friends.
He would probably laugh it off and tell me I was thinking too hard.
I sighed and chose a trusted black top. It was one of those go-to shirts that I put on when nothing else seemed right. It would be fine for dinner, and it would be fine for my walkâer, driveâof shame tomorrow. I supposed I could bring a change of clothes for the morning, but that was never part of the deal. I donât exactly know why, other than the fact that we established the rules during college.
Written rules. Now that I thought about it, I couldnât remember which one of us had them last, though I remembered clearly when Matt had started the list â¦
Chapter Eight
Seven Years Earlier â¦Â Second Semester Freshman Year
There is an art and a science to staying friends with someone youâve slept with. Matt and I were blazing new territory in the field, however, as weâd never had a relationship prior to having sex. Since heâd come up with the concept of Sorbet Sex, it was tempting to defer entirely to him for protocol. But he didnât know what to do any more than I did. We never talked about it, but the casual touching was the hardest part.
When Iâd get to chem lab, heâd be waiting in his seat and I never quite knew what to do. Act like he hadnât seen me naked and keep my distance? Embrace it and kiss him on the cheek? High five? Fist bump? Perhaps just a thumbs-up. Eventually, we settled on a high tolerance for incidental touching. Like when I slipped into class late, he leaned in and put his hand on my thigh to ask if everything was all right. But we never went beyond that, which was good, because another guy in our lab section asked me out just before finals.
He was my first First Date since my First Date with Ben. No lie, I was nervous. But I knew I would have been more nervous if it
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