Awkward Meet Normal

Chapter Twenty-Four

Annabelle:

It was the first worse date I had ever been on.

If I stayed with Dash, would we turn into my parents?

After he quit tearing up from eating my burrito, which I warned him about, he asked
me, "can we have a do-over?"

My eyes fell to my hands on the table.

"Don't do that look," he said.

"What look?" I asked, nervous about the talk we were about to have.

"The look where you think this doesn't work."

"It doesn't," I said, looking him in the eyes. "If I wanted to end up like my parents, I would have dated all the politicians and bank managers my mother tried to set me up with."

Except I knew. I knew that if my mother knew Dash was into me. That he wanted to date me, that she wouldn't relent.

His eyes look frantic. It may have been from the burrito still. But he looked hurt.

"I fucked up tonight. I had something else planned out, and I let my mother get in my head."

I tilt my head to the side. "What did you have in mind?"

"If I tell you. You'll be it here. I can see it in your eyes. You want to walk away and not look back because I let you down. Shit. I even knew making the reservation that it was bad."

He was rambling.

"Give me one more shot to wow you." He said.

"It is not about wowing me," I said.

He cuts me off. "It is about showing you what we could be like. And going to some stuffy restaurant is not what I had envisioned."

It wasn't his fault that my parents were there. He had no clue about my connection to that restaurant. He didn't know that the last thing I wanted to be was my parents. Yes, they were married and attended date night every week together. But did they love each other? I had no clue because I had never heard my father say it to my mother. I didn't want their life. I wanted my own life.

"Fine," I sighed. "But I am going home tonight." I needed space and room to think from him.

"That's fine."

We cleaned up our table and headed to his vehicle. We were quiet on the way to my apartment. He pulls into a normal parking spot and grabs my hand, stopping me before I can get out.

"Hold on." He said and then picked up his phone to text someone. He waits for a second
and then puts his phone into sleep mode.

"Ok. Rufus is covered for tonight."

I stare at him. I wanted the night away from him to think.

"You are overthinking everything." He said to me, getting out of his side of the car and opening my door. He scoops the overnight bag from the front of the seat.

"I meant a night by myself." I find my voice.

"I agreed to your apartment." He said; he turned and held his hand out for me to grab. "Good," he said when my hand wrapped around his. "I would have carried you upstairs if I had to."

"You wouldn't," I said.

"You are tiny enough. I could do it." He chuckles, leading the way.

This was the Dash I liked. The easy-going Daah. The fun Dash.

"Stop thinking. Well, unless you are thinking about how great I am," he says over his shoulder.

I pinch the inside of his palm, and he wraps his hand around mine. Just tight enough to make it so I cannot pinch him but not enough to hurt.

"I don't like you some days," I say.

"Lie."

He finds my spare key and unlocks my door. He put the key in his front pocket, and I had a strong suspension he would be holding onto it this time.

The door closes as he grabs my arm and brings me inside the apartment. His mouth is on mine as he makes my back close the door. His hand trails down the side of my body. His hand outlined my breast.

I groan without thinking.

"You like that, Annabelle?" He asks me as his hands are on me all over the place.

He kisses my neck and goes down to my collarbone.

My hands find his hair, and I yank on it. This was not how I pictured the night going. I pictured it ending in me wallowing in my apartment by myself. This was much better.

He picks me up, and my legs wrap around him as he walks me back to the living room. He falls on the couch with me landing on top of him.

"I like you," he breathes into my lips as he kisses me.

I don't say anything and continue kissing him. This was passionate. It was as if all my thoughts and focus centered on him; nothing else mattered when his lips were on mine.

Dash:

She was overthinking everything.

I was playing dirty, and I knew it. She wanted to go home to her apartment and put me in this box of men she couldn't have because I made her think of her dysfunctional parents. I should have never taken advice from my mother. I knew that. But part of me felt she was right. Go big. It was because I liked Annabelle so much I was overthinking everything. She had turned my life upside down.

My feelings were there.

She needs time to catch up to mine. And I was okay with that, especially with how she attacked me with her mouth. She wanted me as much as I wanted her.

She yanked my shirt out and started to unbutton it. She was straddling me on her leather couch.

"How many hours do you work out?" She asked. "Forget it. I don't need to know to appreciate you."

"Annabelle," I said.

"Mmhm?" She responded.

"What do you want me to do?"

She shuddered. "Whatever you would like to do."

She had worked my shirt off and was looking down at me. Her fingertips outlined my chest and abs. She was running them back and forth.

She was in pants, and I needed her out of them. Her cell phone goes off.

"It'll go to voicemail." She said, still kissing me.

Her phone silences after many rings, and then my phone starts to ring.

Annabelle shimmy's it out of my front pocket. Hers was in her purse she left somewhere between the front door and the living room.

"Why is my brother calling you?" She asked me.

I had saved him like I did all of the contacts from the pickup game. It was hard to know who was who if I left them unnamed.

"Hello," she answered, out of breath.

I could hear something like, "thank goodness ...."

And then Annabelle's face goes pale.