First Call After

She picks up on the first ring, then pretends she didn't by waiting three beats before speaking. "Hello?"

"Hey." His voice carries the smile she'd tasted forty-seven minutes ago. "I just—I wanted to check something in my calendar. For this week. If that's okay?"

"Oh! Yes, checking calendars is... that's a normal thing people do." She's pacing her kitchen, bare feet catching on the linoleum's slight tackiness. The dishes from breakfast still crowd her sink—evidence of a morning that feels like it happened in another lifetime.

"Right, exactly. Very normal." He clears his throat. "So I have this work thing Wednesday—"

"Wednesday's actually perfect because Tuesday I have my sister's—wait, no, sorry, you weren't suggesting Wednesday, were you? You were just telling me you're busy then."

"No, I mean, yes, I was saying I'm busy but also trying to, um, figure out when I'm not busy. If that makes sense." The sound of papers shuffling comes through the line. "Thursday?"

"Thursday." She tests the word, rolling it around her mouth like the memory of their kiss. "Thursday I have yoga until 7:30, but after that—"

"I could do after that. I could definitely do after that." The eagerness in his voice makes her stomach flip. "There's this place that does really good Thai food, unless you don't like Thai food, in which case there's obviously other food that exists in the world—"

"I love Thai food." She's grinning now, pressing her forehead against the cool surface of her refrigerator. "I was actually going to suggest Thai food, but I didn't want to be too... presumptuous about suggesting specific cuisines this early in our... calendar coordination."

A laugh breaks through his carefully maintained casualness. "God, this is weird, isn't it? An hour ago I didn't even know if you liked me, and now I'm checking my Google Calendar like it holds the secrets to the universe."

"It is weird," she agrees, warmth spreading through her chest. "But maybe good weird? Like, I'm standing here pretending I need to double-check if I'm free Thursday when I've already mentally canceled three different things."

"I haven't checked a single thing on my calendar this entire conversation," he confesses. "I've just been holding a random receipt and making paper-shuffling noises."

The laughter comes easy now, the awkwardness transforming into something precious—a shared secret, a private joke in the making. They're building something here, between the pretense of scheduling and the raw honesty of new attraction.

"So... Thursday at 8?" she ventures.

"Thursday at 8," he confirms, then adds quickly, "Although I could do 7:45 if your yoga ends earlier than expected. Or 8:15 if you need more time. Or really any time that works for you, I'm pretty flexible. Not yoga-flexible, obviously, but time-flexible."

"8 is perfect," she says softly, and they both hear what she really means: *You're perfect, this is perfect, the way my heart is racing right now is perfect.*

"Okay. Good. That's... that's really good." Another pause, filled with unspoken words. "I should probably let you go now, right? That's probably what a normal person would do instead of trying to find more excuses to keep talking?"

She traces a pattern on the fridge door, spelling out Thursday over and over. "Probably. Although I should mention that my calendar has some very suspicious empty spaces this evening..."

"What a coincidence," he says, relief and joy tangling in his voice. "Mine too."