Page 2 of Time for You

Daphne checked the time on her phone again and tried not to whip her head around the second the door jingled with a new customer.

Behind the counter, a machine hummed as the barista worked on an order, and a group of elderly men held court on the chairs nearest the window.

Daphne drummed her fingers on the table and sipped her drink slowly, hoping she wouldn’t look impatient if her coffee was more than half-gone before he even arrived.

Her date had said he could probably make it by two, but like her, his job could be unpredictable and tough to schedule around, so it really wasn’t unsurprising he was a little late.

A half hour is more than a little late, Ellie’s voice whispered in her head.

No dick is worth that. Ellie had slightly different opinions about men and dating than Daphne did, to be sure.

Ellie wasn’t interested in romance, or dating, or really anything other than friendship and fucking.

Which worked very well for her, Daphne had to admit.

But that wasn’t the vision Daphne had for her life.

She had done her best not to think about romance for the last—well, a lot of years, because she was so sure it would distract her.

Daphne didn’t need to go all soft and mushy while she was applying to med school, studying in med school, and scoping out residencies. She needed strict, uninterrupted focus.

She wasn’t sure exactly why she’d decided the time was right for dating a month ago, after years of self-enforced semi-celibacy. (That guy from that party two years ago only half counted, seeing as only one of them had gotten off, and it sure as hell hadn’t been Daphne.)

Her date, assuming he wasn’t standing her up, checked all the boxes for a future Mr. Daphne Griffin: tall (six three according to his profile, which meant he probably cleared six feet, once she accounted for the Dating App Inflation that Ellie said was currently running at about two and a half inches); blond ( You sure you won’t look like twins?

Brittany had asked, clearly underestimating the key role Peeta Mellark had played in Daphne’s middle school life); and the founder of a tech start-up, which meant he was ambitious, just like her.

“Daphne?” a deep voice asked, and she stood up, pleased to find he hadn’t been lying at all about his height.

“You must be Anders,” she said. He was broad, big shouldered, and thickly muscled. Clearly, he spent a lot of time at the gym. Maybe too much. No judgment. We all have hobbies, she reminded herself.

There was an awkward moment where they did a little half dance, him leaning in for a hug while she moved out of the way, holding out her hand instead. She was acutely aware of all the times she’d been called cold , but Anders let it pass with an easy grin. One point for Anders.

“I’ll just go get my drink,” he announced.

He returned soon after, with a mug of tea and a scone. A scone. That he put right in front of his chair. “Today’s my cheat day. I do intermittent fasting the rest of the week,” he explained.

It wasn’t that Daphne particularly wanted a scone, but it would have been nice to be asked, that was all.

“You were saying you’re working on a new app?

” she prompted. She had been chatting with Anders for a couple of weeks, so she knew the rough contours of his job, but the specifics, as he’d explained over text, hadn’t made a ton of sense to her.

His eyes flashed but his smile didn’t waver, and it was over so quickly she decided she’d imagined that split second of annoyance. “It’s a podcasting app that uses generative AI,” he said.

“How does that work, exactly?”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “Why?”

“Um, because I’m interested? I’m not super familiar with how AI can work to help podcasts, I guess,” she replied, a little taken aback by his suspicion.

“Oh.” He laughed, and the tension bled away. “You mean you don’t get it. Okay.”

“What did you think I meant?”

He shrugged and pinched off a piece of scone. “We’ve got some rivals who are interested, that’s all. Can’t be too careful, you know?”

Daphne didn’t know, quite frankly, but she nodded like thinking she might be engaging in corporate espionage was a super-understandable mistake anyway.

Not everyone clicks right away. I just have to give it a little more time, she reminded herself.

Texting with him had been if not great, then okay enough, so maybe they just needed a little bit of time to warm up to each other again.

Anders started explaining—and explaining.

And explaining. As far as she could tell, he was using generative AI to create prompts for podcasters, which he was hoping to sell as a sort of “idea machine” to interested hosts, who would then pay him to also host the podcast itself on the app.

Daphne wasn’t particularly creative, but she wasn’t sure how necessary the artificial intelligence part was to his whole idea, since it was really just a brainstorming session.

She stared down into the dregs of her coffee and tossed it back, annoyed to find it had gone ice cold in the past five minutes.

Daphne hid her grimace and kept listening, waiting for a chance to ask a question.

The moment finally came. “So, it sounds like this is a podcasting app that also comes with some ideas for them to use?”

Anders sighed, almost imperceptibly. “Almost, but it’s a lot more complicated than that,” he said in a tone that could be read as either understanding or condescending, depending on how she chose to take it.

She wanted to lean toward understanding, but as he launched into another round of explanations, she started leaning toward the latter instead.

The more he kept talking, the more certain she was that she’d been right—he just didn’t want it to sound that simple.

She kept waiting for him to ask her a question about herself, literally any question, but it obviously wasn’t going to happen.

“Did you like her?” he asked, and she realized guiltily that she’d been running through a case she’d had during her last shift, wondering if she should have asked the patient, an elderly woman with a worryingly persistent cough, a few more questions rather than just ordering tests and sending her on her way.

“Sorry, you lost me,” she said, and his indulgent smile said he wasn’t surprised she was confused, and yeah, this date was going nowhere, fast.

“My assistant.”

“Your—assistant?”

“Jenna.”

“I don’t know if I’ve met Jenna?”

“G-E-N-A,” he spelled. “My chatbot.”

“Oh, uh—”

“It’s who you’ve been chatting with,” he explained, and she immediately started rehearsing her exit strategy. Oh, I’m sorry, I’m getting a call about a patient. This might be a while.

“It wasn’t you?” she asked innocently. Now some of the odder moments of their chats were starting to make sense—moments she had written off as the stilted interactions that came from boilerplate getting-to-know-you conversations.

“Don’t worry, I reviewed it all before coming, so I know all about you.

Gena is a side project, and I’m thinking I’ll try and launch her in the next fiscal year.

Dating is such a hassle; it’s easier to outsource it, you know?

I just put in all my personal details and a few anecdotes and she does the work of screening people out. ”

“Like a program that scans résumés.”

Anders grinned. “Exactly! I’m glad you get it.”

Oh, she got it all right. Daphne flipped her phone over, careful to keep the screen pointed away from him, and pulled an exaggerated apologetic face.

“Shit, sorry, this is the hospital.” She stood and walked away, pretending to answer.

From her vantage point in the corner of the shop, she watched him pull out his phone and skim through something.

Probably another sucker talking to a computer program instead of him .

She returned, hoping she appeared suitably apologetic. “I’m so sorry, but I have to get back to one of my patients. You understand how it is.”

“Totally,” he said, barely glancing up. “We should do this again sometime. Gena calculated our compatibility at a seven out of ten, so it’s worth a shot, right?”

“Um—things are really busy, but maybe,” she said, grabbing her purse. “Nice to meet you, Anders,” she said, and hurried out of the coffee shop like her hair was on fire.

Daphne walked into Ellie’s room and flopped down on the bed.

Brittany was there too, watching videos on Ellie’s laptop while they lounged on her dark-red bedspread.

They were a pair of contrasts, Ellie short with curly blond hair and Brittany tall and brunette with thick, dark-rimmed glasses, but both had generous curves compared to Daphne’s narrow frame.

“That bad, huh?” Ellie asked.

“It was a chatbot,” Daphne whined, face pressed into the mattress.

“A what?” Brittany asked.

Daphne lifted her head. “A chatbot. Who I was talking to, this whole time. It was a chatbot he’d set up.”

Ellie sat forward. “No.”

“Yes.”

Brittany looked horrified. “Is that why he repeated himself so often?”

“I’m guessing. But don’t worry, he reviewed the messages before our date.”

“Wow,” they said simultaneously.

“Yeah.” Daphne dropped her face back down. “You were right, El—dating is stupid.”

Ellie sighed. “It is, but I meant, you know, for me. You want that, so you should have it.”

“How, though? Literally, how the hell am I supposed to find someone to date if I spend all my time at the hospital, and the only guys willing to talk to me on dating apps don’t even bother to do the talking themselves?”

“I’m a bad person to ask that, seeing as I just do the fuck-buddy thing,” Ellie replied.

“And I’m willing to date someone of literally any gender and still don’t have time to actually take someone out,” Brittany added. “It’s the job, not you.”

Daphne sighed and turned her head to look at them. “It still feels like there’s something wrong with me.”

“Of course there isn’t. You’re funny and smart and you look like a goddamn supermodel. If this guy wasn’t into that, then fuck him. But don’t actually fuck him, you know?” Ellie said fiercely.

This was well-worn territory for them. Daphne didn’t agree with Ellie’s assessment—after all, if she were as pretty as El claimed, wouldn’t men be at least trying to date her?

The handful of attempts she’d made over the years had always ended poorly, which just reinforced her dating is a distraction motto.

And now that she was finally ready to date, she was apparently not even worth a real conversation first. “What good is being hot if I can only make small talk about the worst broken bones I’ve ever seen? ”

“Please tell me you told Tech Bro Dickbag a gross story,” Brittany said.

“I should have. Instead, I just lied and said there was an emergency with a patient.”

“And he bought that?”

“I don’t think he read enough of my texts with his chatbot to realize ED doctors wouldn’t be following up with a patient like that.”

Ellie patted the top of her head sympathetically. “He’s not worth it.”

“I know, I just—I thought maybe we’d click, you know? And then I’d have it.”

“Define it .”

“A life. The life, you know? I’ve always had a plan, and I figured I’d find a guy eventually, but now—it feels too late.”

Brittany and Ellie exchanged a concerned look, and Ellie shook her head. “I swear to god, if you say you are too old at twenty-seven , I am going to kill you.”

“It’s not that. I know I’m not too old, but I still think I might be too late. Everyone else has at least a decade of practice with dating and relationships, and meanwhile I’ve had like, five one-night stands.”

Ellie frowned thoughtfully. “That’s not true. There was that guy sophomore year. What was his name?”

“Chris. He counts for three of them.” Chris had been a nice enough guy in her genetics class, but she hardly considered hooking up after studying to really count as a relationship.

He had gone abroad for their entire junior year, and by the time he came back, she was far too busy applying to med school to start anything up.

“Still, that’s experience.”

“Be real, El.”

“Stop being so hard on yourself, Daph,” Ellie replied in the same tone as Daphne. “But seriously, what do you want, exactly? In a guy, I mean—I know the rest of the whole life plan.”

Daphne rolled to her back and stared up at the crack in the ceiling.

She didn’t love the idea of admitting it in front of Brittany, who was basically a stranger compared to Ellie.

But residency had a way of trauma bonding people, and anyway—fuck it.

She was in a mood lately, like something needed to change, so maybe it was her.

“Someone who cares. Like, cares enough to listen to gross hospital stories, even if he hates them. Someone who wants to spend time with me, even if I’m exhausted and cranky.

Just someone I can hang out with, be myself around.

” She chewed her lower lip, thinking. “And honestly? I want romance. Real romance, not awkward small talk in a coffee shop. Or at least, not just awkward small talk in a coffee shop. I know you hate this shit, but I want, god, I don’t know, candlelit dinners and love letters?

Stuff like that. Someone who gives me butterflies, but who also makes me feel safe and wanted. ”

“You want to be in love,” Brittany said softly.

“I know, it’s pathetic.”

“No, it’s you. And it’s out there for you, I know it is,” Ellie said. “But in the meantime, I think I made you promise to do something stupid and impulsive next time we were both free, and today counts, so what do you say?”

Daphne lifted her head and made herself smile at her friends, because they were working hard to make her not so depressed. “I say, what did you have in mind?”