Chapter 2

The kiss is marred by a carload of what I imagine to be teenage boys passing by. One screams, “Fags!”

I look up at him and shake my head. “Well, I guess if the shoe fits…”

He laughs. “Anyway, as I was saying, if you were asking me to come home with you, part of me first would say I’m too full of myself for jumping to conclusions.”

“Oh, you’re not jumping to anything.” I grin.

He grins back. “Second, if you are asking me to come home with you, part of me really, really wants to, and that part’s head is up right now, sniffing the air.” He chuckles. “But the part of me that goes along with your assessment that this, tonight, is the start of something, wants to put off getting to that stage just yet. I want to build up to it. Make it special.” He eyes me carefully. “Does that make me weird?”

“It makes you one in a million, sweetheart. And as much as I’d love to rip your clothes off and ravish you, I really respect that. And want the same,” I say softly. “I’m up in Green Lake. We could still share a cab. No strings attached.” Really?I ask myself. In spite of all my good intentions, there’s still a very large part of me (not that part! Get your mind out of the gutter for once) that would like to wake up with him tomorrow morning, even if I do have to rush off to the airport before it’s even light outside.

“Yeah, thanks, Beau. But I think I’d just like to walk home in the snow if it’s all the same to you.” He peers up, and I notice then how the snow seems to be coming down even harder. Maybe we’ll even get some accumulation? “The snow’s really magical, if that doesn’t sound too cornball to say.”

“It does sound cornball,” I tell him, “but I totally agree. If I wasn’t so far, I’d walk with you. I love the quiet of a snowfall.”

He casts a quick glance around and leans in to kiss me again. This time there’s a flick of his tongue, and I can taste, just for an instant, the cinnamon from the panna cotta we shared for dessert. He pulls back and grins at me like a little boy. “That’ll have to hold ya until you get back from wherever it is.”

“Ohio,” I moan. “The sunshine state.” We both laugh.

“I know Ohio,” he says, his gaze far away. Then he returns those blue eyes to me, their rightful owner. “I’ll see you when you get back.” He pulls a receipt and a pen from his coat pocket. “Turn around,” he instructs.

“You dog!” I say, complying.

He makes a tsksound and uses my back as a surface upon which to write his phone number. When he’s finished, he turns me back around and presents me with the number. “Call me as soon as you get back. We’ll set up our second date.”

“Is that a promise?”

“Oh, honey, wild horses…”

He turns, and I watch him walk away down the hill. His blond hair, his broad shoulders, and his black coat grow smaller as he descends Pike Street, headed toward the arch of the convention center. And then the snow swallows him up.

* * * *

I thought I’d see him again in a few days. I was wrong. 1: Cut & Paste

Present Day

I lost my husband because of cut and paste.

Now, that may seem like a strange happenstance to you, but it’s true. Here’s what happened.

Every morning, like many of us, I get up, brew myself a little pot of French press dark roast, and sit down at the computer to check Facebook. One of the things I always do, because I’m a giving kind of guy, is look at whose birthdays are today. Then I proceed to wish the people on my friends list a happy birthday on their special day.

But what about losing your boyfriend due to cut and paste?you ask, tapping your foot impatiently and maybe glancing down at your watch.

I’m getting there! Sheesh. Patience is in such short supply in this age of social media, instant streaming, and the like.

So to make things easier on myself, I copy my first birthday greeting and paste it on the others’ pages, with their name inserted to personalize it. I know it’s a little lazy, but it’s well-meaning…and I have a ton of Facebook friends.

So this one morning, about a week ago, I neglected to first copy my birthday greeting and simply pasted what was in the computer’s memory to my Facebook friend Ana’s page. It’s important to remember here that my husband, Ross, and I shared this computer, just like we shared everything else in our three-bedroom Craftsman house in the Wallingford neighborhood of Seattle.