Page 25 of See You Sometime

What were her parents going to do, ground her for dating a boy?

Yes, but please don’t hold my parents against me. Dad’s reverting back to a 15 YO boy now that he’s retired.

He responded a few minutes later.

:) 7 okay?

She took a deep breath.

Perfect.

With that she had to get back to work and set her cell phone aside. It’d be too damn easy to sit there texting with him all day, and she couldnotafford to lose this job.

At lunch, she finally sated her urge to text him again.

I had a lot of fun last night.

She wasn’t expecting it when her phone went off with a text alert before she could even set it down.

Me too. I hope you keep gaming with us.

Was he just being nice? Or was there more to it?

Or was she driving herself crazy and twisting innocent comments completely out of context?

I’d like that.

* * * *

Axel stared at his phone. He struggled not to work himself into a panic attack. He didn’t want to come on too strong if she was simply being nice, friendly.

He also didn’t want to come off sounding too nonchalant if she meant more by what she said.

Why is it that I’m forty-one fucking years old and still feel like a goddamned teenager in the bad ways?

Hopefully he didn’t lose his sanity.

They texted off and on the rest of Wednesday, and when Thursday came, Axel actually left work early so he could stop and get his car washed and vacuumed and have time to go home and take a shower before their date.

Then came the struggle to find something to wear. A business suit would be too…weird. Shorts and a T-shirt were right out. Jeans and a button-up shirt, then, maybe. Right?

With his stomach wound into a huge knot, he headed over to Skye’s place and arrived five minutes early.

He barely remembered her parents, thought he’d met them at least once but wasn’t sure. The man who answered the door had Skye’s red hair and green eyes and fair complexion and wore a dark and angry look that nearly turned Axel around and sent him running for his car.

“Um, hi, Mr. Bauer. Axel Lewis. I don’t know if, uh, you remember—”

“Moon! Get my gun, there’s a boy here for our daugh—”

“Howard, Iwillkill you myself if you screw this up for her!” an older woman yelled at him. “Getcher ass back in this houserightnow.”

The man grinned. “Hey, son.” He invited him in, shaking hands. “Come on in. Skye’s getting ready. Which means I probably have a two-minute head start before she comes out and kills me for that.”

Now he remembered her dad having a good sense of humor. “I’ll tie her up for you.”

“Ooh, good. She’ll like that. You’re into that, too?” He led the way into the living room, which was a good thing because Axel was still trying to figure out if the man was kidding or not and trying to process how to answer that question.

Or what, exactly, he was asking Axel was into.