Chapter 3
“And what’s someone like you doing on a dating website?” Anna Coleman asks, her doe-shaped forest green orbs looking at the hazel browns in front of her.
The first time she walked into the restaurant, she didn’t have a hard time spotting Jared Harrison. In a sea of rowdy young adults, such as herself, Jared stood out, and in very good way. While men her age – she’s twenty-eight years old – love to take about the newest video game they bought or their newest conquest, Jared has a maturity fitting of his age and a charm just so youthful. To add to that, he has years of experience behind him and the way he talks about his travels and his time in the Navy piques Anna’s interest. To say the least, Anna is engrossed, so she can’t imagine why a man like Jared – handsome, fit, successful, and wealthy – has chosen to look for love online. He must have a trail of women following him wherever he goes.
“My friend, Laura, wanted to help me out…” Jared, starts, peering at her over his glass of whiskey. “The blind dates weren’t effective, so she finally forced me to make an online dating profile…”
“O-oh, y-you mean Laura Harmon?” Anna asks, stuttering in the beginning. “The CEO?”
Jared nods his head. “She’s close with my good friends.” That’s probably the best way to describe Laura’s relationship with Nate and Alex without going into too much detail. He doesn’t even understand the three’s intertwined love life, what more Anna. “And how about you? I can ask you the same question.” Jared adds a small grin to his query, giving just a glimpse of his rows of white teeth.
“I just wanted to get the full experience of dating…” Anna starts, and then she takes a long sip of her margarita.
She’s feeling slightly nervous, even if she knows there’s nothing to worry about and she’s just psyching herself out. Jared has been nothing but friendly to her both online and offline. She’s just nervous, afraid to make a fool out of herself in front of such an intelligent and successful man. She doesn’t want Jared to think she’s an idiot. Sure, she’s twelve years younger than he is, but there are a lot of twenty-somethings who are smart, intelligent, and successful.
“And my friends tell me that online dating makes the dating scene a whole lot easier…” she then says. “If you can’t tell, I’m an awkward mess.”
“I can’t tell,” Jared replies with a small grin, sending a compliment her way. “I know we barely know one another, but I can tell you’re mature for your age.” That pulls Anna’s lips up into an automatic smile. “You know that’s a good thing, right? It all depends on how you make use of what you have.” When Anna lets out a more relaxed sigh, Jared then says, “So tell me more about what you do…if I remember correctly, your profile says you work for a non-profit organization?”
Anna tips her head into a quick nod and then says, “Yup…” She quickly corrects, “I mean, yes. I work as a project manager for Edu & Tech. Have you heard of it?”
To her surprise, Jared nods his head. There’s a light in his eyes as he says, “You guys create programs and short courses in STEM for low income youth, right? And you also provide scholarships to your top performing students and offer career consultation services to those in the workforce.”
“How do you-”
“I’ve been donating for the past few years now…” he says, his eyes looking at something past her head. Jared’s deep in thought; that happens when he’s engrossed and deeply passionate about something. “I love the mission and what you guys do – promoting the STEM field and creating opportunities to those who otherwise don’t have the means and access to those opportunities.”
“I’m really glad to hear that,” Anna starts, looking down at her plate in a shy gesture. “There are times when I second guess my life choices. I know working in a non-profit isn’t the most sustainable, financial wise, career option, but I really like what I do, and most days, I feel that’s enough.”
“Trust me, that’s more than enough,” Jared then says, reaching across the table to close her hand in his. Anna jumps a bit in her seat at the contact, but then lets out a breath soon after. She doesn’t move though, and instead, lets his hand rest over hers. “I’m sure the feeling of having your students and your clients thank you for all the help and advice you’ve given them is priceless. It’s the same feeling I get when founders of the start-ups I invest in thank me for believing in them and their businesses. It’s really priceless.”
“It’s irreplaceable, isn’t it?” Anna says in response. For two people more than a decade apart in age and coming from different backgrounds, it’s comforting to know they share something in common, and their passion of helping and advocacy of education and technology sure trumps the age difference.
“Definitely,” Jared says, and when he takes a glance at his watch, that’s the only time he realizes that they’ve spent more than a couple of hours together. It feels like he just shook her hand and said ‘hello’ fifteen minutes ago. He doesn’t want tonight to end yet. For once, he’s actually thinking of setting up the second date before the first one even ends. “Are you in the mood for dessert? I hear their deep fried Oreos are a must-try.”
Anna nods her head and lets out a light chuckle, and Jared loves the femininity of her voice and overall aura and appearance. “I can attest to that. It’s delicious, one of the best desserts I’ve ever tried.”
Three minutes after the plate of dessert was set down between Jared and Anna and nothing was left of the deep-fried Oreo goodness. And that’s after Jared ordered for seconds. He’s even tempted to take home some, but Anna tells him that it won’t taste the same without the crunchiness of the meal being freshly cooked.
“I can make you some next time,” Anna says instead, and Jared feels a slight twist in his chest at the proposal. “Last time I experimented with deep-fried Oreos, it tasted almost the same as this place’s.”
For such a soft-spoken and conservative woman, Anna Coleman sure knows what to say during a date. She says she’s shy and introverted. Jared can see that, but he also knows there’s a certain charm and aura surrounding Anna that makes her a quiet and cool kind of confident persona.
“I’m going to hold you to that,” Jared says, elated, and to add, he can’t help but give her a wink. “How about I take you home right now, so you can start cooking me some dessert?”
“Not so fast,” Anna says, chuckling and covering her mouth with a hand. “I still have to do my groceries. But really, thank you for tonight…” she says before she glances at her watch. “It’s getting late, and I have an early start tomorrow. Do you mind if we end the night?”
A little bit shocked, Jared nods his head. It takes him a while before he says, “Of course. Let me take you home.”
And as he stands in front of her apartment door, he has no idea what’s going to happen next. Usually, this is the part where the woman invites him in, and he’ll give her the best night of her life and rock her world…and possibly break some bedroom furniture. However, Jared knows Anna isn’t the type. She’s more of an introvert and less confident about herself. With the way she’s pulling and twisting at her fingers, Jared can tell she’s nervous even if she has no reason to be.
“Well, thank you again…” Anna says, her back against her door. “I really had a great time.”
“Yeah, me too…” he says, purposely talking slower than usual, as if he’s trailing off. He’s waiting for an invitation. Tonight has been so great he can’t just let it end.
“Well, goodnight then,” she says, moving closer to give him a one-armed hug.
Fuck. And just like that, Jared’s little fellow down below goes limp. He can take a hint. He’s not getting any tonight.
“Goodnight,” he says, and just before Anna opens her door and steps inside her apartment, he decides he can’t let her go that easily. “Can I take you out again?”
When Anna tips her lips up into an ear-to-ear grin, he can’t help but match the happiness on her face with a smile of his own.
Then, Anna nods her head and then says, “I thought you’d never ask.”