Magan Vernon - The Only One

“Hey, Red. You’re looking good. Are you feeling better?” He had that sexy lopsided smile on his face and it made me melt.

“Yeah. Feeling pretty good.” I stood to the side and let him walk in. He had a backpack slung over his shoulder and took short, methodical steps into my apartment.

“Good to hear.”

“Yep.” I nodded, trying to think of something to break up the awkwardness. I pointed at the open bathroom door. “Um, shower is through there. I already hung a clean towel on the rack and put fresh soap and a new washcloth in there.”

“You’re too good to me, Red.” He leaned over and kissed my cheek. Then he turned around and stood in the bathroom doorway.

I couldn’t help but let my gaze wander as he sat his bag down on the closed toilet lid and his muscles flexed. I had to bite my lip to keep from smiling and hoped that my face wasn’t beet red.

He looked over his shoulder, a grin spreading across his face. “Are you coming?”

“Um, excuse me?” I stumbled back. Did he mean the coming that I was thinking about? Because I could have been.

He nodded his head toward the shower. “In the shower with me?”

I blinked. “Seriously?”

“If you don’t want to, you don’t have to, but I thought if I was going to use your shower we should conserve water and shower together.”

“Um..uh..I can’t. Have. Um. Sexual. Intercourse,” I stammered the words out.

He turned around so he was fully facing me and then slowly inched his shirt off. His tattoos were staring me in the face and I couldn’t help but let my thoughts drift back to visions of him with the water rippling off of his abs. “Who said anything about sex? I just want to shower with you.”

As much as I wanted to press my body against his and see exactly what he would look like naked and in my shower, I knew it was a bad idea. I was still spotting from surgery and I could be for another three weeks. I was afraid that a giant blood clot would just fall out of me and onto his foot. That would be a mood ruiner.

“I don’t think now is a good time.” I was barely able to choke out the words. I’d been dreaming about John naked since the moment I saw him in a loincloth and now I was turning him down. Stupid cancer surgery.

He nodded. “It’s okay. I understand.” He took a few steps backward. “But that doesn’t mean you’re getting out of dinner tonight.”

“I thought you were joking about that.”

He shook his head, putting his arms above his head and leaning against the doorframe. His muscles stretched and gave me an even better view of his perfectly toned abs. The guy had to hide a personal gym in his room or something. He was ripped beyond belief. “I figured if we’re going to try something, might as well do it right and try the whole dinner and holding hands thing.” He had that lopsided grin on his face that made my legs quiver.

“This is supposed to be a date? Like we’re dating now?” I widened my eyes and had to sound like the stupidest girl in the world, but it was too late to take back the words.

“Yeah, I guess you can call it that. As long as you’re okay with that.”

I swallowed. I may not have been sure if I wanted to be with a guy like John or any guy for that matter, but after all he’d done for me, there was no way I could say no. “Of course I am. I think we can try this dating thing.”

He dropped his arms and put his hand on the door. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to shower for our date.”

He shut the door and left me standing there, dumbfounded as usual. It wasn’t close to dinner time, but I hoped he’d get out of my apartment before then so I could get ready without him watching my every move—even though I secretly wanted to watch his every move in the shower.

Luckily John didn’t stick around all morning, so I didn’t have to attempt to get ready with him at my apartment. Not that I minded having him around, but there were certain things I wasn’t prepared for him to see yet, like my beauty rituals. Especially after sharing a small studio apartment with my sister for a week. I needed my space to get prepped for tonight.

Valerie would spend hours in the bathroom every morning, even though we were just sitting around the house. I was more laid back and usually just showered and wore sweats. But tonight was going to be different. I was ready to get out of my sick clothes and have a night out with John.

As usual, I never knew what to wear, but instead of scouring my closet, I just put on the first outfit that looked half way decent and that I wouldn’t freeze in: black skinny jeans, riding boots, a teal tank top, gray cardigan, and a flannel scarf. Valerie got the scarf for me for Christmas last year and said it was by some famous designer that I’d never heard of. I actually never wore it and only found it when I was searching through my sock drawer for a clean pair. It was probably time to drag my stuff to the laundry room downstairs, or to Monica’s. I had an irrational fear that someone was going to steal my underwear out of the laundry room and tried to avoid it at all costs.

At around six, a knock came at my door, but I was putting on the last of my lip gloss so I just yelled, “come in!”

I fluffed my hair one last time, all the while expecting him to open the door, but nothing happened. Maybe it wasn’t John?

Confused, I walked to the door and opened it. He stood there with that lopsided grin on his face looking every bit of yummy in a black NorthFace jacket and faded jeans. I thought only teen girls wore NorthFace jackets, but the way it hugged John’s biceps made it look way too good to ever be worn by some girl with braces at a Justin Bieber concert.

“I yelled for you to come in. Didn’t you hear me?” I raised an eyebrow.

“I told you, Red, I’m trying to do this the right way. I was waiting for you to answer the door like normal people do on a first date.”

I couldn’t help but smile. “Since when has anything we’ve done been normal? This is probably one of the most effed up relationships or friendships or whatever this is.”

He crossed the threshold and put his hands on my shoulders and then slowly slid them down until he laced our fingers together. “Maybe normal is overrated, but I thought we could at least try this and see how it goes. It couldn’t hurt, right?”

“I guess you’re right.” I ran my thumb along his. “Does this mean you brought me flowers and chocolate?”

“D’oh” He tilted his head back and made a lemon face. “No.” He looked back down at me with the smile returning to his face. “Sorry, I fail at being a good first date.”

“I guess I can forgive you. This time.” I leaned up on my tippy toes to kiss him, but he backed away. Did my breath smell bad? I brushed my teeth twice.

“Whoa, no kissing on the first date. Well, at least not the first minute of the first date.”

I rolled my eyes. “Seriously? We’re going to go that far?”

“Yep.” He let go of one of my hands and opened the door. “But if you play your cards right you may get one later.”

We drove off campus and farther into town. The only times I’d ever gone off campus were to shop at the mall or grocery store. I may have grown up less than an hour from Central, but that didn’t mean I explored the town that much.

I had absolutely no idea where we were, but John seemed comfortable and at ease, like he knew exactly where he was headed. Nothing like a normal guy would be on a first date. Which technically we were and we weren’t. The first time we’d gone anywhere together was my doctor’s appointment and I didn’t want to think of that as a date. Nor was hanging out in my apartment and eating cheesecake afterward. Dinner for a first date sounded so much better.

“I hope you like sushi.” John pulled the car to a stop in front of a small strip mall. There was a nail salon and a used video game place flanking each side of Imperial Sushi Lounge. It didn’t look anything like an imperial place with its brick front and neon sign.

“Sushi’s good,” I said. Truth be told, I’d never had sushi. The whole idea of raw fish kind of scared me, but I didn’t want to admit that when he was trying so hard.

Before I could open my door, John ran around to the other side and opened it, offering his hand to help me out. I took it and hopped out of the Jeep. “Wow, you really are going all out on this first date thing.”

He shrugged, taking my hand in his. “I haven’t done one of these in awhile.”

“A date?” I raised my eyebrows. John was the type of guy that could have any girl he wanted and from what Monica told me he probably did.

“Yeah, is that so hard to believe?”

“Um, yeah. You’re hot and I’ve seen the way girls fawn over you at the house.”

He shook his head. “There is a difference between hooking up and taking a girl out on a date.”

“Touché.”

“And you’re the type of girl I want to take out on a date.”

My cheeks warmed at the thought. I had been trying to keep my feelings for John at bay. I shouldn’t have been thinking about a relationship when I wasn’t even a week post-op from surgery, but there was something about John that made me want to give up all my rules and dive head first wherever he wanted me to go. But the more logical part of me was still deathly afraid of getting hurt.

He opened the front door and followed in after me. Even though the outside didn’t look like anything special, the inside looked like it was straight out of Japan. The dark wood-paneled walls had white vertical strips containing Japanese calligraphy. The only lighting came from red paper lanterns that hung from the ceiling and reflected off the dark wood floor. Directly in front of us was a small pond with pretty koi fish. The rocks that circled the koi pond were stacked together behind it to form a large, circular platform which the hostess desk sat atop.