Twinkle Fiddles

Chapter Three

Despite the air conditioning, Dylan's light green, button down shirt was slightly damp from the summer humidity. "It's too hot to do the cute Charleston look-alike thing. Can we just go casual, you know, t-shirt and shorts tonight?" He joked with her as he leaned on the counter between them, still surprised they had unknowingly dressed for work in a similar pastel.

As good as she looked in her light green sundress, Julie was glad to hear their evening dinner and walk through downtown was going to be casual. She had a big surprise for Dylan, and it had nothing to do with her green sundress. "Yeah, causal sounds better," she said coyly.

Julie had been looking forward to her business trip to Charleston, South Carolina. Through normal company operations, she and Dylan were becoming better friends. Any initial reservations she had about him were dispelled by his casual nature. She also took professional pride in realizing she was one of the first selected to experience this new corporate directive.

Julie was also pleased he had suggested Charleston. He seemed to know the area: where to park and where to eat, things to do. She was most excited about the historic downtown. It was what she remembered when she had visited years earlier with her family, not long after they moved to the States.

Dylan had taken many trips to Charleston as he lived just down the Carolina coast. As he drove to her hotel, he too knew this night was different. He had met Julie months earlier. Conversation between them had always come easy, but this was to be their first dinner; their first time outside the office as friends. He knew to be professional as it was still a business function. However, he felt a comfort with her. She always seemed to smile when he was with her. Dylan liked that, the way Julie smiled.

For the last five minutes she had been looking out her hotel window, searching to see if he was arriving. She checked her phone for text messages from him, then paced back to the window that overlooked the hotel parking lot.

She couldn't wait to see his expression when she came out wearing his favorite college team's shirt. When she learned she was going to Charleston to work with him, she had asked one of her vendors if she could sample something Clemson. This was her surprise for him.

Through the hotel window, she finally saw Dylan through the roof supports of his open top, white Wrangler. He parked under the limited shade of a moss draped live oak, next to her dark green Jeep. Julie threw her satchel over her shoulder and bounced down the three flights of stairs.

Dylan was getting out of his car when she walked the hotel entryway sidewalk toward him. Julie was framed by a sago palm on her right, white impatiens on her left. She paused when she saw Dylan, and smiled as she looked to the orange paw, on her athletic gray shirt, and then back to him.

His face lit up as he saw her. "I can't believe you're wearing that, give me a hug!" He ran beside her and pulled her shoulders against his side. She squeezed his waist in return. Any nerves either of them had were quickly forgotten.

Julie held her hair as they picked-up speed on I-26 to downtown. She rarely took the doors off her Jeep. It was fun though. She got the impression Dylan probably didn't even know where his doors were. There was sand everywhere, and the floor mats were missing. "I like the pirate flag," she commented.

"Yeah," Dylan said looking in the rear-view mirror and see-through mesh Jolly Roger. I was hauling something in college when the back-window split. I had a pirate flag and that seemed to fill the hole."

"Seriously, you had a pirate flag? Who has a pirate flag?"

"I had a pirate flag," he confirmed with a laugh. "The old soft top comes on and off, but I always keep the flag tied down."