Page 54 of Catching Kyle

He scrunches his face and nods like it couldn’t’ be more obvious. “You’re funny, and you’re smart. And you’re so driven. I’ve never met anyone who goes after their goals like you wanting to be an author. And it shows. Your writing has really improved. I read over your most recent draft.”

I blush. “You really think this about me?”

He rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “You want me to explain it all a second time? Because I can and will. You’re a good guy, Michael.”

Kyle quiets himself when the waiter arrives with our appetizer and drinks. After we order our entrees, I take some buttered bread and lather it with spinach-artichoke dip. I can’t resist letting out a moan when I taste it.

“Good, huh?”

“This is the best dip I’ve ever had,” I say.

“You ain’t tried nothing yet,” he says. “If you think this is good, I got a lot of places to take you.”

I smile, but the pain in my stomach has risen to my chest. Of course, he’s saying this now, but how many other places have discreet rooms like this? Where all Kyle has to say is that I’m his cousin or something so that nobody suspects?

“So tell me, Michael,” he says, taking a sip of his whiskey on the rocks. “How’s work been treating you?”

My stomach sinks to the ground. All this pomp had me briefly forget. “I was laid off,” I say flatly.

He leans forward, his hairy brow forming a V. “Really? Are you okay?”

I shift in my seat, the concern on his face doing crazy thing to my stomach. “I have one more week of work, then a month of severance. After that I’m on my own.”

He leans back and folds his arms, thinning his lips. His concentrated face is almost as handsome as his smile.

“And don’t worry,” I say. “I haven’t made any more videos.”

He lets out a heavy sigh. “Good,” he says. “Thank you.” His relief is palpable. I didn’t know I mattered that much to him. “But I don’t want you to go broke, and I don’t want me to stop you from making money through your videos if they help.”

“Well, they help, but I can’t live off what I post,” I say. I take a sip of my spritz, and I taste that nostalgia of staying home from school again, relaxing when I’m supposed to be working. And I’ve realized that this entire dinner has either been me skeptical of Kyle or talking about my shitty job that’s about to end. If this is really a date like Kyle says it is, we should treat it as one.

“But enough of that,” I say. “I’ll figure it out. I have something else important to tell you.”

He raises his brow, intrigued, as he takes a sip of his drink. This has only been his second sip, and the glass barely has a dent. I love that, at least so far, he doesn’t seem to have a drinking problem. Unlike David.

I shrug, almost embarrassed. “I think I’m a fantasy writer now.”

His face lights up. “No way. Did Brandon Sanderson finally get to you?”

I nod. “And not just him.”

I list off all the fantasy books, explaining why I love each. And Kyle just stares at me, rapt. And when I tell him what I’ve been writing, he nods his head vigorously.

“Oh, yeah,” he says. “That’s a banger idea. Tell me what you have so far.”

By the time our food arrives, Kyle and I are still talking so much about it that we barely dig into our food.

“Okay,” he says. “Enough talking. Just for a minute though. We need to try our food.”

I have half a whole chicken with rice pilaf, while Kyle got some gourmet steak burger.

“I would make fun of you for ordering off the kids’ menu, but that’s the best-looking burger I’ve ever seen. It looks better than what I got.”

He starts cutting into it. “Then you gotta try it.” He slices off a generous piece and puts it on a small plate, then slides the plate to me.

“Well with a piece that big, you need some of mine.” I pull off the chicken wing and put some rice on a small plate and give it to him.

We both try each other’s dish at the same time, before we even try our own.