“You’re cold,” Joel notes.
“I’m fine,” she insists.
“I’d give you my jacket, but I’m not wearing one.”
“I’m fine,” she says again, even as her teeth start to chatter.
Joel looks down at her. He’s about six inches taller than she is—a perfect height for her. Or maybe she’s a perfect height for him, even if she’s not generally perfect like Francesca.
“Come on,” he says.
He takes her by the arm. He’s not quite holding her hand, but close enough that the goosebumps on her arm multiply. She barely notices where he’s leading her until they’ve ducked into a tiny gift shop on the corner. Her elbows brush against various license plates with names on them, snow globes with the Statue of Liberty within, baseball caps in every color, and yes, sweatshirts.
“I can’t afford an overpriced sweatshirt.” Cassie worries she sounds like a broken record, but it needs to be said. She’s got plenty of perfectly good sweatshirts at home.
“Good thing I’m buying it then.”
“Joel…”
“Don’t make a big thing about it.” He reaches out and fingers one of the first sweatshirts in the rack. “What do you think? Are you a New York City Gurl?”
“Oh God,” she laughs. “You know, I’ll get mugged if I walk around in one of these.”
He examines the second shirt in the rack. “Well, how about New York Mom?”
“I feel like maybe you don’t want a second date.”
He takes a step back. “Okay, point taken. So… which one do you like?”
She’s reluctant to buy a sweatshirt here, but it is quite cold. Plus, she’s not sure if Joel will let her leave without one. She thumbs through the rack and finally selects a navy blue Yankees hoodie.
“You’re going to look adorable in this,” he tells her as he pays for it.
“Unlikely.”
She’s right. When she slips the hoodie over her head, she’s immediately sorry she got it. It’s big and bulky and ugly. But when Joel looks at her, a smile spreads across his face. “See? I was right. Adorable.”
She rolls her eyes. At least it’s warm.
They stroll around the neighborhood. He suggests ice cream, but she’s stuffed from sushi. She wonders if she should invite him over. Is that what people do on dates these days? She can’t remember the etiquette.
Sometimes on sit-coms, a character bemoans a long dry spell without sex, which is always around five or six months. Cassie’s dry spell is two years. Her last boyfriend was named Harry—she met him when she was out getting drinks with some friends. He had a job in advertising and was trying to break into the industry, which apparently required him to drink a lot because he was always slightly drunk when they got together after work. At first, he was sweet as he courted her, but the longer they were together, the more irritable and demanding he became. She wasn’t sure if it was the alcohol or his personality, but it got to the point where they couldn’t get through an evening without fighting.
There was one night when she and Harry were out to dinner, and the waiter gave them a table he didn’t like, too close to a boisterous group of college kids. Cassie had suggested switching tables, but instead, Harry bitched and moaned about it through the whole meal. He ruined the night. She realized at that moment that it wasn’t the great love story like between Bea and Marv. It was a horror story. （Or at the very least, dark women’s fiction.）
She broke up with Harry that night.
After a bad relationship, being alone came as an incredible relief. Cassie basked in her newly rediscovered ability to spend a night out without Harry’s moodiness. She was happy being single. It was far preferable to being with someone like Harry.