Page 31 of Heat Advisory

By the time we pulled into the restaurant, I’d gone from confident to anxious-excessive-sweater and back again—twice.

Apparently, all it took was one sultry look from Jay to undo my carefully practiced cool-girl routine.

Walking the short distance into the restaurant—his hand connected with mine—I replayed that look he gave me at the door at least three times.

Inside, he let go of my hand only to move it to my lower back and pull me close to his side as he gave the hostess his name for the reservation.

They exchanged words, but I couldn’t tell you a single word that was said because I was too focused on the hole that was burning into my back at his touch. Tingles raced through my body at even the slightest movement of his hand. My front was pressed to his side, and I could smell his woodsy cologne all around me.

Secretly, I hoped some of it would rub off on my clothes so I could smell it long after I got home.

Shortly after we had sat down at our booth, our waiter took our drink order, and we began scanning our menus. My phone buzzed in my pocket, showing Iris calling. I knew what this call was about. I also knew that if I didn’t answer, she would just keep calling.

“Sorry. Give me just a minute to get this,” I told Jay apologetically as I swiped to answer the phone, accidentally putting it on speaker.

“Something very awful happened,” Iris said blandly, full of sarcasm and with what sounded like a mouthful of food.

I quickly switched it off speaker and briskly walked away from the table before Iris said anything else. “Hey, Iris, it’s okay. He’s here and didn’t ghost me or puke on me—yet,” I told her.

“Yay!” she replied excitedly with her hands clapping in the background. “So at least for date three, we’re two for two, chica. I’m feeling good vibes.”

“Yes, so far it’s good,” I replied. “Which is why I would like to get back to it, but thank you for calling.”

“No problem,” she said as I started to make my way back to Jay. “Oh, hey, really quick, before you hang up, please email me that list from your boss. You forgot.”

As I made my way back to the table where Jay was seated, I was distracted because he was looking at me funny.

“What?” I asked mindlessly into the phone.

“The list of new floodplain management plans,” she reminded me just as I walked up to the table. “I need it for tomorrow’s meeting. Send it now, please!”

“Oh, yeah, okay. Give me fifteen minutes, and I’ll get it to you,” I said, planning to order my drink and food and then pull up the emails and send them to her while we waited.

I reached over to grab my jacket because it was definitely chilly in this restaurant, as my sister replied quickly before hanging up. “Thanks, love you, bye.”

I set the phone down on the corner of the table and started to put my jacket on when I heard Jay mumble and move to get out of his seat.

“Wait, Cora, don’t leave yet! I need to…uhh…ask you something.”

I looked up to see a panicked look in his eyes.

“What?” I asked him, sliding my other arm into my jacket and then zipping it up.

“Please…ummm.” He no sooner had the words out of his mouth than he dropped down to one knee on the floor and stared up at me. He grabbed my hand and pulled me closer as people around us started to stare. “Umm, Jay, what are you doing?”

“Cora, will you marry me?” His eyes widened as he asked those words loudly and quickly, like he couldn’t believe he’d actually said them.

Surrounded by oohs and ahhs, I stared down at the man in front of me as though he’d sprouted a unicorn horn in the middle of his forehead.

What did he just say?

What was happening right now?

“Jay?” I whispered, trying to figure out what was going on and at the same time realizing people around us were now fully immersed in the two of us—namely me, since I hadn’t responded to him.

He held up what looked to be his baseball championship ring that I’d noticed he wore on his pinky.

“Say yes, Cora,” Jay said to me, loud enough for all to hear, before dropping his voice to a whisper. “Please, so everyone will stop staring.”