Chapter 5

CHAPTER

FIVE

MARTY

" I 'm here to stage an intervention," Scout drawled on Saturday morning, leaning in the doorway of mine and Casey's room.

"About what?" I asked.

Casey, lying on his bed, threw me a curious look.

"About your frankly embarrassing attempts to put together a nice date for your boyfriend," Scout said.

"Did Dalton tell you about the French buttholes and the stripper?"

Scout blinked at me, and then shook his head like Squirrel after a bath. "What?"

"Never mind."

"I've booked you a table for two tonight at Cafe Meow," he said.

I whistled. "Fancy!"

He gave me the cold, dead stare of a sociopath. "It's barely any better than Burger King, but it is, sadly, the best this town has to offer."

"I love Burger King."

Scout rolled his eyes. "You wouldn't know a Michelin star if it poked you in the eye."

"Sounds painful," Casey said with a grin .

"I've made the reservation," Scout repeated, ignoring Casey. "All you have to do is show up." He looked me up and down. "But not looking like that ."

"Looking like what?"

"Come with me," Scout said. "No arguments."

I threw Casey a look that I hoped said ‘Rescue me!' But instead it must have said ‘Throw your shoe at me and laugh' because that's what he did, the asshole.

"Now, Marty," Scout said. "I don't have all day."

It turned out that Scout did have all day, which really wasn't very fun for me at all. Because Scout could look at shirts and ties and things for hours, like they were actually interesting, whereas I got an itch in my brain if I stood still for too long. I didn't know why we had to drive all the way into Richmond just to buy me a shirt. I had shirts. Lots of shirts! But when I told Scout that, he made a face like he'd stood in dog poop in bare feet.

Then, when we'd finally picked a shirt—well, Scout had—we had to pick pants and a blazer as well. And shoes.

"So, it's smart casual," Scout said. "Emphasis more on the smart, less on the casual, you know?"

I didn't know.

"I'd look more at brown shoes rather than black," he said. "Black shoes are for weddings, funerals, and job interviews."

"Scout, these shoes are three hundred dollars ," I whispered. At least, I thought I whispered, but the fancy store employee cut me a narrow look, so maybe I hadn't whispered after all.

"You need at least one pair of good shoes," Scout said. "You can't just wear slides your whole life! What about when you have your interview for law school? Or for an internship? Or—actually, what do you wear when you intern for that hayseed lawyer in town? "

"I wear lace up shoes for that!" I said.

Scout narrowed his eyes. "Are they sneakers?"

"Cal doesn't mind."

Scout pinched the top of his nose. "You can't wear sneakers in court, Marty! You'll get mistaken for the defendant!"

"That's only happened one time."

"Jesus Christ." Scout let out a long breath. "Just let me buy you the damn shoes, Marty. And tonight you can wear them with your new pants and shirt and blazer, and it'll blow Dalton's mind."

"Really?"

"Really."

Well, Scout always did look put together, and I wanted to look nice for Dalton too. Still, it was another hour and a half before we got out of the store. And then we stopped by a barbershop. And not the kind with singing.

Scout made it up to me by pulling in at a gas station on the way back to Hopewell so I could get some Red Vines and a Mountain Dew. They had a bunch of funny little keyrings by the counter, and I bought one of them as well.

It was pretty late when we got back to campus, but I looked good .

"Holy shit," Casey said, blinking at me like he'd never seen me before. Then he gave me a thumbs up. "You scrub up nice, Marty! Scout, you're like his fairy godmother!"

"If you call me that again, I will murder you in cold blood," Scout said. "Your reservation is for seven, Marty. Go and woo your boyfriend."

I drew a deep breath and headed across the street, trying to ignore the way my new shoes were pinching my heels.

Tonight, I was finally going to get everything right.

I was going to romance the fuck out of Dalton Beauregard.

"Are you wearing shoes ?" Dalton asked when I met him at the door. And then, when we were in my Jeep, he said, "Is that cologne I can smell? And what's that in your hair?"

"It's product," I said.

"What sort of product?"

"I don't know. The guy didn't say. Or maybe he did, but I wasn't paying attention."

Dalton kissed me on the cheek and smiled. "You look good."

I puffed up, and I would have flexed my guns except the blazer I was wearing was kind of tight already. "Thanks, boo. So do you."

He always did though. Not like up to Scout's standards, probably, but not everyone walked out the door every day like they were going to the Kentucky Derby, or a cousin's wedding, or a royal wedding. I bet Scout had one of those suits with tails and everything.

When we got to Cafe Meow, I made Dalton wait inside the Jeep while I ran around and opened the door for him. I was going to get tonight right . Dalton gave me a raised-eyebrow look as we walked toward the restaurant.

Cafe Meow was one of the fanciest places I'd been. The silverware was made out of metal, possibly even actual silver, and the napkins weren't paper. The menu, when our server gave it to us, was written in cursive, and there was an actual candle in a little jar on the table. Dalton moved it to the side almost immediately, which was probably a good call.

"Aren't you having the fettuccine carbonara?" Dalton asked when I ordered the chicken. "You always pick fettuccine carbonara whenever you see it on a menu."

"I am definitely having the chicken," I said, remembering Scout's advice not to order anything potentially messy. Unfortunately, that was most things, but chicken seemed a little safer than fettuccine.

"Okay," Dalton said, and showed me a smile. Not the dazzling sort of smile I'd hoped to get out of him tonight. This one was kind of faint, and I didn't like it.

"Would you like to see the wine list, sir?" the server asked.

"Yes," I said, at the same time Dalton said, "No, thanks."

The server eyed us warily.

"You want wine?" Dalton asked me. "Not a soda?"

"I love wine."

"You said all wine tastes like someone left a juice box in the sun for too long."

"Um," I said, hoping the server would rescue me. She didn't.

"Can we have another five minutes?" Dalton asked the server, and she slipped the wine list onto the table and moved away. Dalton drew a deep breath, and stood up. He walked around the small table, and stood next to me.

"What?" I asked, looking up at him.

Dalton stared down at me critically, as though I was a bunch of puzzling symptoms he was about to diagnose. Then he reached out and tousled my hair so roughly that I felt like I was a little kid getting my hair vigorously towel dried by my grandma, my brain rattling in my skull. When I blinked back into focus, Dalton was smiling his usual bright smile. "There he is."

"Who?"

His smile grew. "The guy I fell in love with."

My eyes felt suddenly hot and I wished I had my sunglasses with me. "Fuck, boo. That's so romantic!"

"Marty, do you really want to eat dinner here tonight, or would you rather go and grab a couple of burgers, and park up in the woods and eat them sitting on the hood of your Jeep?"

I could have hugged him, except this blazer really restricted my arm movement. "I would love to get burgers, except I'm trying to romance you here."

"I know you are," he said. "I love that you are, with the shoes and the hair product and everything. And it's perfect, and you look really handsome. But you know what? I really love dating regular Marty, and I could use a burger too."

"I..." I cleared my throat. "I really want fettuccine carbonara, Dalton."

He laughed. "Okay then. Let's have fettuccine carbonara. But how about we skip dessert and grab some donuts and then go for a drive?"

"That sounds awesome ."

Later that night, parked up in the woods behind campus, I sat on the hood of the Jeep and tried uselessly to sponge carbonara sauce out of my new blazer with a paper napkin I'd grabbed from the donut store.

It was nice out here.

Dark and quiet, and you could see the stars.

What made it the nicest though, was that Dalton was sitting beside me, his body a line of warmth pressed against mine. He was smiling up at the sky, the box of donuts in his lap forgotten. Well, by him. Just as soon as I got this stain mostly out, I was going to grab them.

I balled the napkin up and slipped it into the pocket of my blazer. My fingers hit something hard and metal, and I pulled out a keyring I'd bought today at the gas station. It was a little purple dolphin with a goofy cartoon face.

Hey," I said, and dangled it in front of Dalton's face. "Remember when I said that sex with you released a bunch of dolphins?"

He laughed. "Yeah."

"What's the word again?"

"Endorphins."

"That's it." I wiggled the dolphin. "I got this for you."

Dalton took the keyring and turned the full force of his smile on me. "You know what this is? "

"It's a keyring. It has a little clip and everything."

He leaned over and kissed my cheek. "It's romantic, Marty. You saw a dolphin and you thought of me. And every time I look at it, I'll know how much you love me. What's more romantic than that?"

I melted, okay? Right there into a puddle on the hood of my Jeep.

Because it turned out that romancing Dalton Beauregard didn't have to be some grand gesture with a boombox or a candygram. And it didn't have to be out of a Hallmark movie like a picnic or a romantic candlelit dinner. It just had to be me and him being us. Being together, and being in love.

Being us , because we were already perfect for each other.

And we had the donuts and dolphins to prove it.