Chapter 55: Chapter 55

"I'm so glad Julianna that you decided to come out with me." When he smiles, I smile back. "Tell me about yourself then."

"I'm in my fourth year at Brown, where I'm studying early modern studies for a history degree." When I tell him, he smiles.

"What do you think you might want to do when you finish your fourth year?" When he asks, I just shrug.

"I plan to keep doing research, and in an ideal world, I'd like to do it at Brown and get my master's degree." I explain. "Then, I think it would be so cool to either go to graduate school and get my PhD or become a museum curator or something."

"That sounds like a good idea." I smile, and he nods.

I look at the menu and see that I can get steak with fries. I want that, so I can use a fork and knife to eat it and not look like a slob. I'm starving to death right now.

"Tell me what you do," he said. I say, putting my hands on my knees instead.

I'd never been to the restaurant before, but it had white tablecloths, soft jazz, and candles in the middle of each table. It felt like it cost a lot just to breathe in this place, and there were no prices on the menu. Lord help me.

"I already told you that I was a software developer. When I first got out of college, I worked for Google, but I wasn't really appreciated there, and I wasn't paid enough for how much work I did. So I asked my dad to recommend me to the city, and now I work for AT&T."

"Wow." I mumble that I'm impressed, and he gives me a nod. "Was your dad also in the software business?"

"No, he was not a student. Now that he's getting ready to retire, he just has a lot of friends." I agree with what he says.

My parents worked boring middle-class jobs to make me feel like an outsider. I didn't have any friends in high places who could help me get easy jobs.

"How do you like it there?" I try to change the subject by asking.

"It's quieter." He gives a shrug. "But, yeah, I'm starting to like it more and more." When he looks at me, he smiles, and I feel my cheeks get red.

"Good evening." I hear, and a second later, a stiff waiter shows up at our table.

"Hi, how are you?" I ask in a nice way, and the man smiles and nods.

"Very well ma'am, thank you."

Ma'am? I am 21 years old.

"Give us two glasses of the house pinot noir," she said. Dane says, his eyes barely leaving the menu. "I'll have the halibut, and we'll share the oysters. Bring the oysters first, before the main dishes." I'm about to tell him what to do when he surprises me. "She'll have the salmon with the quinoa salad," the waiter said. In this last voice, he says, "Get our menus."

I start to feel cold, and I clear my throat, trying to get up the courage to say something. That was so medieval, telling me what to do in that way and with that tone.

"In fact, no." I say in a firm voice as the waiter takes Dane's menu back.

"What? I promise Julianna that the salmon here is delicious."

"Seafood makes me sick. I tell the waiter the truth while angry-looking at Dane. "I'd like a medium-rare steak with fries and a green salad, please." I explain while putting my hands together on the menu. "You might want to cancel those oysters unless you want to eat them all by yourself."

"Okay, but no oysters. Instead, we'll make pancetta." Dane says, quickly trying to fix his mistake, and I give him a stiff nod. This whole thing has been messed up, and now I'm just mad.

"Very good." The waiter says as he leaves our table quickly, and I chew the inside of my cheek.

"Why didn't you tell me you had a seafood allergy?" He asks, and I give him a blink. He thinks that was the problem with everything that happened?

"You're kidding right?" I ask him, and his mouth just hangs open. "It's not my job to tell you about my food allergies; it's your job to leave me alone and let me order what I want to order."

"I didn't-"

"I need to use the toilet." I say, taking my purse from the table and standing up.

I walk away and through the sea of tables until I find the women's room. I just needed a moment to calm down because I was getting mad in the restaurant and didn't want to blow up. I wanted to talk about it like a grown-up.

I check my phone for a second. Abby has already texted me twice to ask about my date. There are a lot of spam emails on the screen, so I start swiping them away. Then I see a message from Kent below them.

WALKER [7:51PM]

"You look good, enjoy yourself"

God, he's so strange. He never texts me about anything but our apartment. Now he's texting me about how I look? Maybe he realized that Mark and Kyle had said something and he hadn't.

I do nothing and think about leaving. This is just an uncomfortable red flag for me. I didn't like having to talk about my allergies when he was ordering me dinner. But I should let him try to fix what he did wrong.

I come out of the bathroom and walk toward the table. A very nervous-looking Dane is sitting there. Even though he had his back to me, his knee was moving. Guys always do that. I lived with three people, and when they were nervous or trying to concentrate, the whole house would shake.

I take a deep breath and sit back down, but he starts talking again before I can get comfortable.

"God, I thought you weren't going to come back." I clear my throat when he sighs. "I'm sorry, Julianna, but I was taught to order for a woman on a date." When he says "yes," I take a deep breath and put my hands on the table.

"I don't care, Dane, that you wanted to place an order for me." Well, I guess I did care, but some guys were old-fashioned, and that wasn't the hill I wanted to die on. "But instead of guessing what I wanted, you could have just asked me."

"I-I get it. I apologize." He begs, and I look at the table and nod. "You're not the only one who's a little out of practice, I'm a little rusty too. I haven't been out since I broke up with my boyfriend." He gives a quiet shrug, and I lift my eyes.

"You were engaged?" I ask, feeling a little lost, and he laughs.

"You know that when you're confused, you get this little crease between your eyebrows?" He asks, and I try not to smile by pressing my lips together. He still hadn't been forgiven, and I didn't want to lose it.

"What's your age?" I ask because I really want to know what you say.

"I'm 26 years old." When he says yes, I blink. I thought he would be a little younger than he was. "Our parents pushed us both to go to college, and that's where we met. I wasn't ready, and I didn't want to be there anymore, so I ended it and moved here."

"I knew there was something going on because no one moves to Providence for no reason." I tease him, and he laughs. "Am I the second chance?"

"If it happened more than a year ago, I don't think it's a rebound." He brings it up, and I just shrug. "When we went out to eat, I always did that for her because she couldn't decide. I know that's not a good reason, especially when I'm with you, but I'm not smooth or good at dating. I just wanted to show you how much I like you tonight."

This was so different from what I thought about him. I thought he was a smooth guy who could always take girls out and show them a good time. In reality, he was a lot like me: he wasn't used to doing things and kind of made things up as he went.

"Look, I'm not upset." I said it. "But you should know that I'm a simple girl who likes simple things, so this won't impress me. Anything would have made me happy."

"Really?"

"Sure, why not?" I laugh. "I'm a student, and I think it's pretty cool that we're eating dinner."

"So, if I had left you some groceries and a Starbucks gift card at your door..."

"Oh, stop it! Just thinking about it makes me hot." I make fun of him by pretending to blow on my face, and he laughs. "You are smooth, and that's how you break the heart of a twenty-one-year-old."

"Food for free." He chuckles. "Do you want to eat dinner with us? We can cancel the order and move on to something else."

"No, I want my steak," she said. He laughs when I tell him. "Why don't we just start over? Tell me more about how software is made." I make fun of her when I see the glass of wine to her right. I must have been in the bathroom when the waiter brought it. I pick it up and give it a try, trying not to smile. I'm not sure at what age I'll start to like wine.

The rest of the date goes much better. I'm not nearly as nervous, and whatever wall he had up that made him seem like a jerk has fallen. I was surprised by how well we got along, but I couldn't stop thinking about something.

Twenty-six.

I hope that won't cause any trouble.

NOTE!!!

If you were reading this, you were already in the last chapter of book 1 of Fell in Love with My Roomy. I'm going to upload book 2 next month, and I hope you'll support it too.