Chapter 7: The Meet-Cute

When she spotted Steven, she initially had no idea it was him. He wasn’t what she was expecting. She thought he would look uptight, like a little rich boy who wants to try his hand at art before finally admitting that he’s just an uncreative little ass who has nothing more to give the world than his ability to make embarrassingly large amounts of money.

Instead, she saw a man wearing no shoes, carrying a pair of sandals in one hand, walking across the grass towards her. He had baggy cargo pants, a loose button shirt, all the way open, and the best abs Autumn could ever remember seeing. Along with the long hair falling about his face, he looked more like a model than a stockbroker. And he was smiling. Not a huge, teeth baring smile, and not a sarcastic smirk. More a casual smile, as if he was enjoying the day, but had no other concerns beyond that.

Except for his eyes. His eyes looked tired, old, worn. Somewhat like his father’s. They were burning with intelligence and curiosity, but the lines around them, the little crow’s feet that added a distinguished quality to him, spoke of great sadness. Like there was something horribly missing. She wondered if someone had run over his dog the day before or something.

He walked right towards her, and as he did, she found herself staring. She knew that couldn’t be Steven, but she couldn’t take her eyes off him. It was all she could do not to leap to her feet, letting her laptop crash to the pavement, run over to him, throw him down, and have her way with him right then and there.

She felt herself blushing.

He waved at her.

The blushing increased, and she closed the laptop. She placed it on the bag next to her, where she could conveniently leave it behind forever if he asked her to.

“Are you Autumn Masters?” He asked as he got close. She saw a bit of a blush on his face too. He was very, very tan, though, and it was hard to see it. But she was pretty sure there was a little something.

She didn’t trust herself to speak. So she just nodded.

He smiled a broad friendly smile, and held out his hand. “Steve Jennings,” he said.

Autumn stood up and took his hand. He had a nice, firm grip to it. “I read your book last night,” he said. “It’s cute.” She wanted to be offended by someone calling her novel ‘cute.’ Especially considering some of the incredibly taboo actions that took place in it. She wanted to yell at him. But she still didn’t trust herself to speak.

He looked past her to the laptop on the bench. “Was I interrupting?”

“N-not at all,” she said, forcing her lips to work the way they were intended, not the way they wanted. “I was just, you know, killing time.”

“I love your hair,” he said.

She blushed. Maybe Ian had been right about it looking good. “You too.”

He dropped his sandals and pushed his feet into them. “So how does this work?”

The question jolted her mind, after it spent a few seconds comparing the question to the kind of question a man would ask a prostitute, and then debating on whether or not she’d sleep with him anyway. “Well,” she said, “it’s kind of complicated. And it depends on you.”

“I want to write a novel,” he said.

“I know that. Do you know any more than just that?”

“Not about writing, no.”

She let out a sigh. This was going to be a long three months.

“Can I buy you a cup of coffee?” He smiled, this time showing his teeth, which were, predictably, perfectly white and inviting. “There’s a coffee shop not too far from here. We can sit down and talk. Sitting down and talking is always easier when there’s coffee involved.”

***

She put the cup down and wiped the foam off her top lip. It tasted good, but acrid, burning her throat a little as it went down. “Do you know what you want to write about?” She asked him as she put the cup down.

“Not really.” He mixed creamer into his coffee, turning it from coal black to a light-hearted brown. “Is it hard to come up with an idea?”

Autumn rubbed her hands over one another under the table. She wanted to tell him it was easy. She wanted to tell him that she used to have so many ideas that she would fill notepads with them, just trying to keep up with herself because she had ideas faster than she had time to write them all down. She wanted to tell him that ideas were a dime a dozen.

The problem was, at a dime a dozen, she didn’t even have a penny for her thoughts. Hadn’t in as long as she could remember. Dime a dozen seemed pretty expensive these days.

She took a deep breath. “Sometimes,” she said. “Other times, they just flow through you. It’s kind of hit and miss.”

“Well shit.” He smiled, lifted the cup, and blew on the steam. “How do we get started then?”

“I don’t really know,” she said. “I mean, to start a novel, you begin with the story. But you don’t know how to write yet, so having an idea for a story isn’t going to help you.”

“I’ve written songs before.”

She waved one hand at him, dismissing the idea. “Songs are poetry.” Her other hand brought the coffee to her lips again. “Meaningless for a novelist.”

“Tolkien wrote poetry.” He didn’t sound petulant, but the words rang of it.

Autumn smiled. “Yes, he did. And he put it into his novels. If you want to put poems in yours, you can.” She felt a little like she was placating a child. Steve was still a rich kid at heart. Somehow, that made him less attractive. “But poems aren’t novels.”

“What about the Illiad?”

She put her coffee down. “Steve. Can I call you Steve?”

He gave her a look that would probably, under other circumstances, be seen as inviting. “Can I call you Autumn?”

She smiled, feeling her face flush. “Yes.” She cleared her throat, mad that she was acting like a little schoolgirl. “Steve, you’ve clearly done some reading. Maybe we should start there.”

“I don’t want to read.” He wasn’t whining, but the tone was bordering on it. “I want to write.”

“You have to read to write, Steve. Everyone writes what they want to read.” She took a breath. “If I know what you like to read, I can help you write it.”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged, leaned back.

Autumn stared at him for a few seconds, took another sip of her coffee.

He cleared his throat, leaned forward, getting back into the conversation. “I like to read mysteries, I guess. And fantasy. Big fan of fantasy. Especially the kind that feels like history. Love myths and legends too. I don’t know,” he leaned back again. “I’m all over the place.”

“No you’re not.”

It was almost funny how clear his body language was as he bobbed forward again, back into the conversation. “I’m not?”