There were only a few other people in the theater for the mid-afternoon showing on a Thursday. Some solo movie goers had snagged seats near the front, and there were two pairs of friends in the middle rows. Maybe they were blowing off steam too.
As the hero hacked into a laptop, an idea flashed before me. I’d once made a custom necklace for a computer programmer-turned-bestselling author and had scoured the city for the charms she wanted — floppy disks and motherboards I cut down to size. The vendor I’d hooked up with had started expanding into other recycled materials, including old tires and worn-out bike chains.
I made a mental note to track down the name later, and then returned my focus to the screen.
When Ryan Gosling scaled an impossibly high ledge, I caught a flicker of movement at the back of the theater. I turned to look, and I froze when I saw Bryan. He was still in his workout clothes, and even in the dark I could see the slight sheen of sweat on his brow and his tee-shirt. He scanned the aisles, and when he spotted me, he didn’t look happy. His jaw was tense again as he walked across the aisle. His eyes were lined with anger, and his fists were clenched. He sat down, turned to me, and placed a hand on my cheek so I was looking at him.
“You’re making me crazy,” he whispered in a hard voice.
“I am? Why?”
“You act like nothing happened.”
“What are you talking about?”
“How can you just be like this? Like it was nothing what happened?”
“How can you?”
“I called you that day. I emailed you that afternoon. You totally blew me off, and I’ve been looking for every chance to talk to you.”
“You haven’t been trying that hard.”
“Bullshit, Kat. I’ve tried to talk to you every time you’ve been by and you know it.”
One of the guys a few rows ahead turned around and gave us a dirty look as Ryan Gosling smashed open a door with his elbow.
Bryan lowered his voice further. “Do you have any idea what I’m going through at work?”
“No. Why would I?”
The guy looked back again. “Keep it down, okay?”
I tipped my forehead to the exit. Bryan took me by the elbow and guided us out. As the door to the theater swung shut, we were alone in the dark hallway.
“I’m doing everything to keep it quiet, and you can’t say a word. Promise me you won’t say a word.” His voice was laced with equal parts stress and fear.
“I promise.” I wanted to reach out and run a hand gently over his cheek. He seemed to need it, but I kept my hands to myself.
He took a deep breath. “Wilco is suing us for wrongful termination. That’s what went down the day I had to take that board call at the factory. We learned he was suing. It’s totally ridiculous because he was in the wrong. He crossed every line imaginable with the intern. But the board is pissed, and I’m pissed, and I can’t take a chance. The guy’s unhinged, Kat. He calls me at my home and hangs up. Does the same to Nicole too, and she’s also seen him skulking around near our offices. I thought I knew the guy. I thought I knew what to expect, but now everything has changed. And on top of that, my board is incredibly conservative and I have to do everything properly. I can’t have a trace of anything that isn’t 100 percent professional. Which makes it really incredibly difficult when all I want to do is finish what we started.”
Everything inside of me turned hot. “You do?”
“I have not been able to stop thinking about that afternoon. I have not been able to stop thinking about you.”
My heart leapt into my throat. “Really?”
He moved closer. He was so dizzyingly near to me it was as if every nerve ending in my body was exposed. The possibility that this wasn’t one-sided made me deliriously giddy. That it was more than just a romp on the couch in his office.
“I think about you all the time. I think about how beautiful you are and how smart you are and how funny you are, and how I want nothing more than to take you out to the movies, and hold your hand and laugh at the same time. Or not even at the same time. To laugh at different things. To learn more about what you think is funny. Like, I don’t even know if you think it’s funny when people fall down stairs. Do you like pratfalls?”
His eyes were sparkling and playful.
I grinned so wide my face would hurt, but I didn’t think I could feel anything except happiness right now. “I love pratfalls. I love non-sequitur humor, and I love dark humor, and I especially love stupid humor. I laugh when I see videos of guys being pushed down hill in shopping carts, and when they slip in their socks and fall down stairs. Well, as long as they don’t really get hurt.”
“Of course not. You’re not a jerk. You just appreciate good physical comedy.”
“That I do. And what about you? What do you laugh at? I mean, besides Bucky from Get Fuzzy.”
“Ah, she remembers.”
“Of course I remember.” I punched him in the arm, and even though I wanted him to touch me all over, it meant so much more to me that he wanted to talk. That he wanted to know me. How I’d changed. How I hadn’t changed.
“I remember everything too,” he said softly, and I felt a ribbon of heat rush through my body. “To answer your question. Cartoon cats are still a yes. I’m almost embarrassed to admit this, but I like those silly Internet pictures with dogs saying ridiculous things. I mean, not really saying ridiculous things. Just captions. Like this one husky dog, and there was a caption that said ‘Oh you ran a marathon. How heavy was the sled?’”