Ask Me Properly

“Something else,” I repeated.

“Yes.”

“That's a broad category. Dental surgery would also qualify.”

Adrian looked briefly toward the river. When he looked back, the corner of his mouth had lifted.

“Dinner with a man who would like to know you outside office hours.”

I wanted to say yes so badly that it made me suspicious of every other thought in my head.

“One dinner,” I said.

He nodded, almost too quickly.

“Tonight?”

“You were ready for that answer.”

“I was hoping for it.”

At seven, we sat opposite each other in a small restaurant where no one knew him. I had chosen it after rejecting the place his assistant instincts had nearly booked for us: private room, discreet entrance, enough crystal to fund my groceries for a year.

Here, the tables were close and the owner called everyone darling.

Adrian started to recommend the fish.

“You order that when you're working,” I said.

“I like it.”

“I know. I've ordered it for you fourteen times.”

He lowered the menu.

“What would you choose?”

“The pasta.”

“Then have that.”

“I was going to.”

He rubbed a finger over his lower lip. I tried not to follow it.

“I'm doing this badly,” he said.

“A little.”

“Usually people give me more time before deciding.”

“Usually people don't already know how you take your coffee, which hotel pillows you hate, and the face you make when a consultant says synergy.”

That got a laugh. A real one, low and sudden.

I looked down too late to hide my reaction.

“Is that the face?” he asked.

“No. That one's much nicer.”

He watched me for a moment before picking up his water.

We ordered. The first ten minutes felt like walking across a frozen pond and listening for cracks. Then he asked what I had done before Vale Group, and I told him about the temporary jobs, the evening courses, the supervisor who had mistaken enthusiasm for an unlimited supply of unpaid labor.

“I thought the development transfer might finally get me closer to the work I wanted,” I said. “Then I presented the warehouse plan, and you looked at me like I'd brought a live pigeon into the boardroom.”

“I remember thinking you looked very young.”

I sat back.

“That is a spectacularly poor thing to say on whatever this is.”

“Let me finish. You were standing there telling twelve people, most of them older and better paid, that their assumptions about the neighborhood were wrong. I thought I would have liked to be that certain at twenty-five.”

“I wasn't certain. My knees were shaking.”

“I didn't know.”

“I had a podium. Excellent technology.”

He smiled into his glass.

When the food arrived, I discovered Adrian could be persuaded to steal pasta from my plate, provided I first accused him of lacking courage. He told me about a holiday when his mother had rearranged the furniture in a rented cabin and he had spent an hour helping her put it back before checkout.

I told him about Dad constructing elaborate shelves to avoid buying a ten-dollar storage box.

“Did he teach you?” Adrian asked.

“How to build shelves?”

“How to see what a place could become.”

I looked at him across the table.

“Maybe.”

He didn't fill the silence. That was new. At work, he generally used silence to make someone else supply information. This felt like room he was leaving for me.

Over coffee, he mentioned a man he had dated several years earlier, an architect who had hated restaurants with shared tables.

I put my cup down too carefully.

“A man?”

“Yes.”

“Right.”

He waited.

“I knew about the woman in the charity gala pictures,” I said.

“An ex-girlfriend. I'm bisexual, Julian.”

“That's helpful.”

“Helpful?”

“To the general collapse of my ability to behave normally.”

His smile faded into something quieter.

“You seem very much yourself.”

“You have an alarming understanding of me.”

Outside, the air smelled of wet stone. We walked toward the station without deciding who was accompanying whom.

At the entrance, I stopped.

“I need to ask you something.”

“All right.”

“Are you enjoying this because you like me, or because it's flattering to find out someone likes you?”

He didn't answer immediately.

The delay frightened me. I made myself stay still.

“Before Thursday,” he said, “I thought about you when you weren't in the room. I wanted your opinion on things that weren't your job. Once, you took a day off, and I walked out of my office three times to ask you questions I could have answered myself.”

My fingers tightened around my bag.

“I called that relying on you,” he continued. “It was a convenient explanation.”

“Would you have asked me to dinner?”

“I don't know how long I would have put it off.”

“But now you know.”

“Yes.”

A train moved beneath us. I felt the faint vibration through my shoes.

“You're still my boss,” I said.

“I know.”

“And I still want that development job. Whether this goes well or terribly.”

His gaze held mine.

“You should.”

“I don't want to wonder which part of my life got me the other part.”

“All right.” He breathed out. “Your transfer interview is Tuesday. I'll stay out of it. Until your reporting line is settled, we wait.”

I nodded, relieved and disappointed enough to resent having principles.

Adrian seemed to read at least half of that on my face.

“This isn't me changing my mind,” he said.

“I know.”

“Do you?”

I looked at his mouth. Looked away.

“I would find it easier to believe if you asked me properly next time.”

“How?”

“Use the word date. You run an entire company. I'm confident you can manage four letters.”

He smiled, slowly enough to be a problem.

“May I call you tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“Good night, Julian.”

He stayed by the entrance until I was through the gates.

On Sunday, he called. He asked whether I had eaten, then caught himself.

“You're allowed to ask,” I said.

“I was trying not to sound like I was checking a task.”

“You usually check those by email.”

We talked for forty minutes. On Monday, he sent me a picture of a shelf built into a crooked wall, with the message: Would your father approve?

I answered: Of the ambition. He'd want to discuss the brackets.

The interview took place Tuesday. I presented revised figures to three people, none named Vale. They challenged my repair assumptions, asked about tenant demand, and requested a sample work plan.

I spent Wednesday preparing it.

On Thursday afternoon, Maya Ellis, the development director, offered me the junior project position. I would report to her starting Monday. The pay was slightly better. The workload sounded much worse.

I accepted so quickly she laughed.

HR arranged the reporting change that afternoon; another assistant would cover Adrian's desk while I finished written handover notes.

At six, I found him outside the building.

“Congratulations,” he said.

“How did you know?”

“You've been smiling at the same email for twenty minutes.”

“I thought you were staying out of it.”

“The selection, yes. Looking through my own doorway was more difficult.”

I stepped closer.

“Would you still like to finish our date?”

His eyes moved over my face.

“Yes.”

“Properly?”

“Yes.”

We stood beneath the side entrance awning. People were leaving through the main lobby around the corner. For once, there was no folder between us.

“I'd like to kiss you,” he said.

My heart gave one hard, unhelpful beat.

I caught the front of his coat before I could think better of it.

“Then stop looking at me like you're waiting for an appointment.”