My Calamity

My stomach was doing flips.

I don't see why you would ask someone out to dinner, to ask them to be your girlfriend right before you ate. Eating was not an option now. I couldn't even think straight, let alone stomach food at this moment. I wanted to go home so I could scream and jump around like a love-struck tween in the privacy of my bedroom.

I was Patrick's girlfriend. It felt foreign, and weird. What did being a girlfriend entail? Public displays of affection? More dates even? I wasn't fit for the life of a girlfriend.

"Are you alright?" Patrick asked, knocking me out of my raging thoughts. I looked up into his worried grey eyes and gave him a reassuring smile.

"I'm fine."

"You've hardly eaten anything," he pointed out. I looked down at my plate of Chicken Cordon Blue with Penne Vodka, half eaten.

"Uhm," I paused thinking up a quick lie. "Small stomach."

Patrick didn't look like he bought it for a moment, but he didn't press, and I was thankful. He'd already forced me into coming on this date, and then forced me to agree to be his girlfriend; I didn't think I could endure any more humiliation.

Michelle came back to take our plates, looking between us probably wondering why we were so awkwardly silent, and then Patrick leaned back in his seat, and stared bluntly at me.

I shifted uncomfortably under his gaze, willing Michelle to come back with the check. Like magic, she appeared, setting down the black book. I reached for it the same time Patrick did, and our hands collided, sending an electric surge up my arm.

"I've got it," Patrick said with an easy smile, sliding the check and his hand out from under mine.

"I can do the tip," I responded, pulling out my wallet.

Patrick shook his head. "I've got it," he said again. I rested back in my seat, watching him pull out his wallet and then his credit card, slipping it into the black book.

I settled into the overly-cushioned seat, and really looked at him, at his messy brown hair and unblemished skin. And then I thought about how he was mine and I was his, and oh god, how lucky I was. And he looked up and stared at me as if he were thinking the same thing about me.

☼

"Where are we going?" I asked again, as Patrick guided me forwards with his hand on my back.

"You'll see, don't open your eyes."

"I swear, if you're leading me off a cliff…"

"You're going to what? Come back from the dead to haunt me."

"Alright, I'm opening my eyes."

"Wait! Just two more seconds."

In all honestly, I didn't want to open my eyes as it was. With Patrick's hand on the small of my back, the other one holding onto my arm to support me, I really didn't want to look at him.

"Alright, step into…yeah, like that, alright, hold still."

Whatever I was on, it was moving. It continuously rocked back and forth, until that stopped and then it was moving, slowly yet surely.

"Can I open them now?" I asked, really curious as to what he had done. I knew we were still near the restaurant because I could still hear the spring, which had gotten particularly loud.

"Alright, open them…now."

I kept my eyes closed.

Patrick laughed. "Penelope, open them."

"Just tell me what you did," I said, eyes still closed as I bit into my bottom lip nervously.

"I'm not telling you. You have to see for yourself."

I shook my head again. I wasn't sure what had gotten into me, I was just – I didn't want to know what he had done. The dinner itself was above and beyond and now something else.

What happened next seemed to mold into one fast act. I first felt Patrick's hand on my neck, and then his nose pressing against my nose, and then his lips on mine, and I almost died right there under his touch.

My eyes shot open, as if someone had fired a gun right beside my head, and then I gasped, looking out into the water. Patrick leaned back in the boat, and watched me while I undoubtedly looked like a child on Christmas morning.

"We're in a boat," I stated dumbly.

Patrick smiled the Patrick smile I'd come to know. "We are indeed in a boat."

I glared at him. "You're always making fun of me."

"I'm not making fun of you, I'm just…"

"You're just?" I raised my eyebrow at him.

"Alright, I'm making fun of you." Patrick laughed.

Despite myself, I let my glare soften. "So what are we doing?"

Patrick slid off the bench, sitting at the bottom of the small, metal boat. "We're going to talk."

I slid down too, looking straight at him. "What are we going to talk about?"

He gave me this knowing smile.

"You."