Page 35 of Mr. Hotshot CEO

“Sure. I don’t see how you could hate ice cream. I’m not saying I haven’t eaten it in twenty years, though I don’t think I’ve had a cone in that long.”

“Well, that’ll change in ten minutes. I hope we aren’t waiting any longer than that.”

“Mommy,” says Joey the Kid, “you won’t make me go twenty years without an ice cream cone, will you? Even if I leave Lego all over the floor and you step on it in the middle of the night?”

* * *

The gelato is fantastic.

All the seats in the gelateria are full, but we snag a bench in the parkette at the corner. I’m enjoying my lemon cherry sour cream and pistachio, and I’m trying not to look at Courtney because watching her lick her gelato is more than I can bear. The cactus sits between us, a calculated move on my part so I wouldn’t be able to shift closer to her without getting poked.

“I can’t believe you ordered pistachio,” she says. “That’s such a boring flavor.” Courtney got quince white wine, in addition to the lemon cherry sour cream.

“I hadn’t had it in ages, and this one is very good.”

“Can I try?”

I hand over my waffle cone, and she takes a nibble of my gelato.

Courtney’s mouth. Phallic object. Yeah.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asks.

“Like what?”

“Never mind.”

“I’m looking at you with fear because I’m afraid you’re not going to give that back once you discover the awesomeness of pistachio gelato.”

“Did you just saw ‘awesomeness’? That’s so unlike you.”

“You’ve known me less than twenty-four hours,” I point out, though she’s correct.

“True.” Thankfully, she hands back my gelato cone. “You’re right. It’s pretty great.”

She takes a photo of me with my gelato, and then we eat in silence. When I’m finished, I start to stand up, but she pulls me back down.

“We’re going to stay here for a while and people-watch.” She points to a man on the other side of the street, hurrying down the sidewalk. “What do you think his story is?”

“He’s hurrying because he has a very important meeting.”

“Come on. You can do better than that.”

“Fine.” I can be creative if that’s what she wants. “He’s divorced and has custody of his five-year-old daughter. He just dropped her off at his ex-wife’s for the weekend, then realized he forgot to pack Joey—who is not a phallic cactus, but a cute stuffed koala—in his daughter’s overnight bag, and she won’t go to sleep without him. He’s hurrying home to pick up Joey and bring him to his ex-wife’s before his daughter notices Joey isn’t there.”

Courtney cracks a smile. “That’s better.” She points at a young couple, maybe in their mid-twenties, who have just walked past the parkette. “What about them?”

Like the man on the other side of the street, they’re hurrying, not slowing down to eat gelato and enjoy the sunny day. Normally that would be me, too, and admittedly, it seems rather sad to spend your whole life like that.

“They’re rushing home,” I say, “because they just said ‘I love you’ for the first time, and he wants to fuck her brains out.”

Courtney’s eyes widen.

“Pardon my language. He wants to make sweet, sweet love to her.”

I need to stop saying such things around Courtney Kwan.

“Oh?” She looks rather intrigued, or is that just my imagination?