I meet B, Linz and Liz after work at a Thai restaurant in Utica. My mind is in a haze after staring at a computer all day and I slide in to the booth next to B, his hand automatically coming to rest on my thigh. We order and I do my best to keep up with the conversation as I’m pretty out of it. The server is awkward, but the food is good and we argue whether those Styrofoam-like chips are made out of shrimp. (they are) We finish eating and Liz takes a picture of B and I while we wait for Linz to come back from the bathroom. That would be our first almost-a-couple photo, though I’ve never actually seen it. B pays for everything, always does. I love this because he doesn’t do it to prove anything, he does it to take care of people.

We drive to the theater, B and I in his car and the girls in Linz’s. We buy our tickets for ‘Across the Universe’ and find seats toward the back of the theater – Liz and Linz on one side of B and me on the other. I’m practically sitting in his lap because he’s incredibly comfy and I’m incredibly tired. I completely forget Linz and Liz are there with us. I don’t remember much of the movie because I kept nodding off. I do remember his hands and the way they felt in mine and on my legs.

After the movie I lean on B as we walk back to the car. Linz says we are adorable together.

He drives us back to the Thai restaurant where my car is parked, but we stay in his for an hour, maybe two, talking, running our fingers over each other’s palms. We’re in the Aztec which has a big space between the seats, but he leans over anyway, however uncomfortable it is, to get closer to me. I’m not tired anymore and have no interest in going home to get some sleep.

When I finally decide to call it a night he kisses me in his car, then outside mine where the weather turned cold and we can see our breath, and then inside mine. I smile the entire way home.