All That and a Bag of Chips

Chapter 25

After Collin spoke, there was a long pause. He could hear Heather breathing on the other end of the connection. He imagined her closing her eyes, screwing up her mouth, and shaking her head.

He stared off and waited. The gray sky and the gray ocean blended together into one murky expanse, but as the wind blew the rain further inland, he thought he could see the afternoon sun fighting its way through the clouds. There was a spot overhead where the faintest glimmer of warmth seemed to radiate.

"You're right," she finally said.

He let out a breath that he didn't know that he was holding. "About what?" he asked. "About me being an asshole, or about how it would be good to talk?"

"Both," she answered, and Collin could hear her eyes roll through the phone.

"And what about dinner?"

The sun was winning its fight and muscling through, thinning out the clouds. He could see a dot of yellow breaking up the monochrome scenery.

"A home cooked meal?" Her voice was skeptical, but that also meant she was open to the idea.

"Well, I should take advantage of living someplace with a fully functioning kitchen sometimes, right?" He paused. When she didn't respond, he continued. "So, is that a yes? Will you let me make it up to you?"

"What time should I be there?"

"Does seven-ish work?"

"I'll see you then." She hung up.

The clouds were breaking up and one strong ray of bright light fell onto the crashing waves below. Collin closed his phone and put it in his pocket, then moved his hands from the railing of the guardrail to his handlebars. As he stood there, the sun in front of him, the rain moving on, a rainbow appeared in the sky.

Collin smiled. A positive sign.

Even though the rain had stopped, he was soaked and was sure that he looked like a drowned rat. He hopped on his bike to head home in order to change before going back out to the grocery store.

Heather had agreed to come over at seven for dinner, so the question he pondered as he made his way home was: what should he cook?

Collin wasn't exactly a master of the culinary arts. No one would confuse him with Emeril Lagasse.

Why had he offered to cook? Take out was much more his style. Part of him wanted to order takeout and then dress it up as though he had cooked it himself. Just because it sounded like a plotline from some sitcom didn't mean that couldn't actually work. But something about the way she had said "home cooked meal" made him feel like he couldn't fake it. He'd have to try his hardest and hope for the best.

After putting on dry clothes, he went into the kitchen and climbed onto the counter. He'd stashed the cookbook his mother had given him when he first went to college way up on one of the top cupboard shelves. Opening up the red and white checkered cover, he found a few handwritten recipe cards tucked between the pages. There was one for chicken parmigiana that he had luck with in the past. He slipped it in his pocket and checked the time. It was almost four; three hours was plenty of time to shop, cook, and set the table.

He went back outside and wheeled his bike back to the front, thinking about how it sure would be nice to have a car of his own. Soon, he hoped.

As he was biking to the Safeway his phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled over to the sidewalk, hoping Heather wasn't calling to cancel.

Instead, Avery's name popped up on the display. He silenced the call, pushed off, and pedaled again.

Collin hated grocery stores. They were always too bright and too cold. The chipper music they piped through the speakers was more bland and annoying than the CDs at work. Plus, he always felt discombobulated with how things were organized.

He went through the ingredients on the card in the order they were listed, first getting chicken, then eggs, and then Panko breadcrumbs. When he had to make his way back to the dairy case for a third time to get parmesan cheese, he realized his inefficiency. At least he was sure he hadn't missed anything he needed!

Taking his basket up to the register, Collin paid, then took the two grocery bags and hung one on each handlebar to distribute the weight and finally headed home.

Later, while he was unpacking his groceries and setting out ingredients on the kitchen counter, Avery called him a third time. It was feeling like harassment, so he went a step further and blocked her number. He'd never blocked a number before, but what else could he do? Then he turned on the oven to preheat and chopped up the tomatoes.

The front door opened and closed. "Smells good!" Kris said, walking up the stairs. She must have just gotten home from the gym, because when she walked into the kitchen to grab a Gatorade from the fridge, she was wearing only Adidas track pants and a black sports bra.

"I offered to cook dinner for a girl I'm interested in." Collin paused his chopping and glanced up from the cutting board.

"That cute one from the party?"

Collin smiled. "Yeah."

"Well, I have a ton of homework to do, so I'll be out of your hair." She screwed the orange cap back on the bottle she'd been drinking from and turned back towards the stairs.

"Actually, do you know where everyone else is?" Collin asked. "You're the first person I've seen since getting home."

She paused and squinted, thinking. "I think Diana has a class on Tuesday nights, and, well, Jody is never home these days... You'd know Sam's schedule better than me."

"Okay, cool. Thanks, Kris."

"Good luck!" She turned again and walked back down the stairs.

Collin got the chicken into the oven and put a pot of water on the stove to boil. Then he loaded the dishwasher with the bowls he'd used to prep and wiped down the counter. Cooking was a lot of work. He really should have ordered takeout!

After he put spaghetti in the pot, he set the table. They didn't have fancy place settings, and he was just going to serve keg beer, but hopefully Heather would appreciate the effort.

He was trying to figure out if they had any candles to use as a centerpiece when, at a quarter to seven, someone knocked at the door twice.

No one ever knocked. The front door was never locked. Collin's first thought was Avery. Had she decided to confront him in person because he wasn't answering her phone calls? That seemed extreme, but he also never thought that she would cheat on him, so he didn't know what else she was capable of.

He walked down the stairs and wished, probably for the first time, that they had a peephole.

Tentatively, he opened the door, first just a crack with his toe read to block it from opening wider. Heather was standing there. She'd changed her outfit since that morning and was wearing jeans and a light green paisley shirt. She looked beautiful. But she also looked small somehow: her mouth tight and her posture uncertain.

"Hey." A smile spread unbidden across his lips. Suddenly his palms felt sweaty and butterflies bursted in his stomach. "I am glad you came. Come on in."

He stepped back. Their eyes met, and her posture calmed. "Smells good," she greeted and then headed up the stairs ahead of him.