Love At First Text ✔️

Him

Eden:
I'll be free in 5.

Seb looked up from his phone, craning his head over the raised car bonnet.

"Mind if I take a long lunch, Karl?" He asked.

Karl pulled himself away from the cars underside he was working on. He raised a questioning brow at Seb. "Sure kid." Seb was prepared to leave it there, wiping his hands on his rag, but it seemed Karl had more to say. "Early finish and long lunch. You got a girl?"

Seb laughed, shedding himself of his overalls. "I don't bust my arse for overtime and your immediate assumption is that I have a girl?"

Karl wasn't offput. "You've worked here for years, and most times I have to tell you to go home. So yeah, I think you've got a girl."

"She's not my girl. Just a friend." He defended.

"That you took out on Valentine's Day?" Sebastian said nothing. "You can't fool me. I see you grinning at your phone every time it goes off. I know smitten when I see it."

Seb grabbed his jacket from the coat hanger and grinned over his shoulder at his boss. "Is that 'cause smitten is all you see when you look in the mirror."

"Cheeky shit." He grumbled, though humour carried in his tone. "Have fun on your date!" Sebastian didn't respond as he left the garage, too busy typing a reply on his phone and suddenly very aware of the way he did, in fact, smile hopelessly at her response.

❀

Eden was happy for Sebastian to pick her up from work, which was only a short drive around the block. He parked in the small area for customers, and he didn't even need to message before she was hurrying out of the door, tightening a long sand coloured jacket tighter around her frame. He was watching her approach the car, but it seemed Eden's attention was elsewhere, for she was watching through the window of Heaven Scent with that light dusting of pink filling her cheeks.

She smiled wide as she reached the passenger side, dramatically shivering as she climbed into the car. "I thought it was meant to be getting warmer?" She asked, rubbing her hands together. He noticed a plaster wrapped around her finger.

"What have you done?" He nodded to her hand before he began to reverse, stretching his arm over the back of her seat and watching over his shoulder out of the rear window.

It took a long while before Eden replied, and it took Seb glancing at her to see if she had actually heard. He wasn't sure, for she seemed fixated on him. "Oh." She shook her head before averting her attention to her finger. "Caught it on the shears."

"Is it bad?"

"Literally the shallowest cut ever." She confessed, rolling her lips fine to hide her smile. "But I didn't want to get blood on the flowers."

"You're so thoughtful." Seb told her, and this time she did smile. "So, how long do we have?"

She looked at her watch. "Like, forty-five minutes? Where do you want to go for lunch?"

Sebastian acted as though he needed a moment to consider, but since Eden had messaged him asking if he was available for lunch, he had given it plenty of thought. "The weathers fine. How about we grab a Subway and go for a walk?" He'd began to notice that when Eden was happy, her eyes seemed to smile before he lips did. They rounded and almost glistened, and then a second later, the corners of her mouth pulled up.

"I like that." She said.

❀

Eden and Sebastian were sat overlooking the town on a cliff edge, beside one another on a vacant bench. The forest park was quiet, aside from the occasional dogwalker, likely because the weather was still chilly.