Total pages in book: 35
Estimated words: 33546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 168(@200wpm)___ 134(@250wpm)___ 112(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 33546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 168(@200wpm)___ 134(@250wpm)___ 112(@300wpm)
My face felt hot. “Yeah. Not gonna happen.”
Damn. What was up with my reaction? Tim’s suggestion had made me feel flat-out jealous. I did really like Joy.
***
Later that night, I’d finished getting ready for my date with Kylie and had some time to kill before I had to meet her downtown.
I’d made sure to block Kylie from my posts on social media so she wouldn’t get the wrong idea about Joy and me—not that Kylie and I were even seriously dating. This would only be our second get together, the first of which was the night I’d met Joy. I remembered being totally distracted, thinking about the woman I’d met at Davis’s party rather than the one right in front of me that night.
I decided to log on and check my page to see if Joy had posted anything new or liked any of my posts. She’d done neither. Was she over the whole thing or just busy? Since she hadn’t said anything about the last few doctored photos, I decided maybe they weren’t good enough. I needed to up my game.
I found a photo of a couple sitting in a horse-drawn carriage in the middle of Times Square. After inserting Joy’s and my heads onto the respective people, I made up an elaborate story to go along with the post. It was all about how our horse had gotten spooked by a loud noise, veering off its path to end up in the middle of all the hustle and bustle of Times Square. In the next photo, we were ice skating at Rockefeller Center, followed by an image of us standing in front of Radio City Music Hall. Boy, we’d been busy—and really getting into the holiday spirit.
I sent her a quick message.
Nolan: Check out what we’ve been up to lately. ;-)
I exited out before calling a ride to head downtown.
Just as the car was about to drop me off at my destination, I checked to see if Joy had written.
My message had been seen a half hour ago—but no response.
CHAPTER 5
* * *
Nolan
It was really bugging me that Joy had read my messages and didn’t respond.
As soon as A Christmas Carol was over, I dug my phone out of my pocket. My date noticed.
“Is everything okay? You checked your messages a half dozen times before the show started.”
Shit. I hadn’t meant to be rude about it, especially since Kylie had treated me to the play we’d just watched. She’d refused to let me give her any money for the tickets. I shoved my phone back into my pocket, intent on giving her the attention she deserved.
“Sorry. Bad habit. Just a work thing going on.”
“No problem. I’m guilty of it, too. Especially when a patient I get friendly with isn’t doing well.”
“A patient?”
Her brows furrowed. “I’m a nurse. Remember?”
I actually hadn’t. I’d been on two dates with this very nice woman, and my head had been somewhere else both times. It seemed to be a running problem of mine lately—all Joy, all the time. I didn’t even want to guess how many hours I’d spent photoshopping, and when I wasn’t looking at pictures of Joy, somehow thoughts of her kept crossing my mind.
“Of course. Sorry.”
Kylie shrugged it off. “Would you want to go over to Serendipity? I love their frozen hot chocolate.”
The last place I wanted to be during the holidays was Times Square. It was a touristy nightmare. But I owed her for all the times I’d been mentally checked out. So I put my hand on her back. “That sounds great. Let’s go.”
An hour later, Kylie seemed happy that she’d gotten her frozen hot chocolate. I wasn’t really hungry, but I’d ordered a piece of humble pie since I could never turn down anything made with peanut butter.
Kylie was telling me how she was thinking of going back to school to become a nurse practitioner when my phone buzzed on the table. I looked at it, but stopped myself from reaching out to pick it up while she was talking. A few minutes later though, it buzzed a second time. I was itching to know if the notification was Joy messaging me back, but again, I somehow managed to resist. The third time it happened, Kylie put me out of my misery.
“Will you excuse me?” she said. “I need to go to the ladies’ room.”
I stood as she got up from her chair. “Of course.”
The minute she turned her back and started toward the restroom, I reached for my phone. Disappointment set in when I saw the message was from a friend at work and not Joy. I even opened up the Facebook app and checked to see if she’d messaged me and I’d missed the notification. But only the read notification on my message to her greeted me—a reminder that Joy had seen my message four hours ago and still not responded.