I blink back, waiting for him to explain himself as he dabs at his face carefully. He wipes everything off his face and beard, running his tongue over his teeth, checking for stray bits, taking his time in a way that’s going to make me lose my mind, killing me with the patience I need but don’t actually possess.

  “Because I want you to be there with me, if you’re willing to come.”

  I scoff. “Hold on a second, hold on a second. You want me to be there? Why do you do that, constantly qualifying your questions?” I sigh, waving at him.

  Russia doesn’t sigh, but it looks like he wants to.

  I push myself back against the booth, putting space between us, as much as I’m able to by the constraints of the booth we’re sitting in.

  “Because I learned not only to ask for what I want, but to take into account what the other person wants, too. I used to have my head up my ass, and I’d like to think I’ve gotten better, gotten easier to be around, but I don’t know.” He shrugs, looking uncomfortable now, eyes skittering away, only to come back like I’m the magnet and he’s the spinning dial in a compass, pointing to true north.

  “The compass,” I say, notching my chin towards the forearm he’s got on the table, his hand looking lonely all by itself, but shit, I’m not gonna do anything about it. “The compass, looking for direction, trying to find your way home,” I say, nodding to myself. “Yeah, it fits.”

  Russia nods along, and he doesn’t get angry or defensive like I would expect him to, the way I tend to psychoanalyze a stranger and verbalize my intuition to them can be quite rude and quite a jarring experience, but I didn’t engage my brain-mouth filter in time, and there’s nothing I can do to take back the words I’ve already said out loud.

  “So will you come? Will you come with me on the weekend to Alex’s?”

  Right, we’re talking about the weekend, where I get to meet his friends...right.

  “Uh, well...” I hedge, thinking about being there with Russia, again like the pseudo-girlfriend, and not feeling horrible about it, wanting to spend more time with him.

  I’m more than half-convinced that he’s like a glacier, only showing the world ten percent of his hidden depths, but I’m hoping I’m not the Titanic about to get screwed over hard. “Uh. When is it?”

  Maybe I can get out of this one...

  Maybe I should get out of this one...

  But honestly, what would it hurt showing up to a social gathering now that Elena is always hanging around with Beckett like she wants to? Katie’s with Dean more often than not, and while she might be there, too, it’d be nice to get a change of scenery, a change of pace...

  “Saturday at two. I can drive us there.” Russia nods to me, a small smile playing along his lips, making my own lips twitch in a mirrored action until I tell them to stop.

  I’m still not sure about this.

  What do you want? Make up your mind already!

  I want it all, is that too much to ask for!?

  Don’t answer that.

  My eyebrows pole vault the length of my five-head. “Excuse me?” I lean closer to the table, even ducking down my head to check his injured foot underneath the table, as if making sure the injury still exists.

  “You don’t even know if you can walk without crutches, let alone move your ankle enough to drive. You sprained your right foot, and you probably should keep it elevated, but I don’t know, I’m not a doctor.” I raise my palms high, all freeze, and glance down at the breadbasket, knowing I want another one, but also knowing, on the other hand, that the bread’s going to ruin my appetite for my gnocchi (I’m settling on gnocchi in a rose sauce).

  “I’ll drive.”

  “Yeah?” Russia’s eyes light up, his smile as big as the moon, and it affects me, it does, crashing through me and making my heart flutter in my chest. “You’ll come with me?”

  God, he sounds excited to spend time with me.

  It’s very hard to keep reminding myself that Russia has given his heart to someone else.

  Then that makes you the rebound, Soph.

  I tilt my head at him. “That kind of reaction from you has me kinda worried, Russia.” I turn towards the waiter, the kid asking us if we’re ready to order. I order what I want, and Russia orders what he wants, along with an Orange Crush.

  I hate how I find that adorable – someone looking so clean cut and has all those proper manners getting a super sugary fizzy drink.

  He should be swinging back the most bitter coffee, darker than a black hole, but instead he’s drinking what a little kid might, searching for the next sugar fix.

  Hell, Russia looks one way but might be the complete opposite. Can he apply that logic to me, too?

  He dresses well, he folds his napkin over four times to get a clean surface every single time he wipes his mouth. His manners are impeccable, the clothes he wears immaculate. But then he’s ordered and Orange Crush, and he’s got hidden tattoos – a literal compass, showing him the way to go.

  I frown at him, trying to figure him out.

  And my crush on him just seems to grow exponentially.

  I’m so, so screwed.

  “I’M JUST GLAD YOU’LL be coming with me, that’s all.” And he does, look glad that is. “I’ll text you my address right now. We have to be there by two, and he lives in Laval—”

  “Laval?! Laval?!” I whine.

  Russia nods in commiseration.

  Even though we’re going to be heading there on the weekend and the traffic going off island to Laval should not be as terrible as it is on weekdays, I still get flashback memories of waiting hours to get into the downtown core and going back to me childhood home back when I lived with my parents in the suburbs before they retired to Charlevoix.

  It makes me nauseous, being in a car that long, but honestly it shouldn’t be hours of traffic on the weekend. Hopefully.

  I’m already nervous as is sitting next to Russia right now. What am I going to do when we’re sitting in traffic together?

  Passing out at the wheel is not an option.

  “I know, I know. All of our friends got mad at him when he and his wife moved out there, but the houses were more affordable. Is that going to be a problem? Do you want to meet me there?”

  I kinda love how conscientious he’s being, how very aware he is that this might be an inconvenience for me. I don’t live in the deep downtown core like Russia does, clearly only a few blocks away from the shop.

  I frown at him, thinking. “It’s my day off, actually. I can make it.”

  There’s still a part of me that wants to ask what to wear, what I should look like, but I’m not doing that anymore, I’m not. This is what is, this is the Sophie you’re gonna get forever and ever until the last tube of red lipstick is gone from this planet.

  I’m done trying to change myself to fit someone else’s expectations.

  “Great. Awesome.” The word sounds awkward in his accent, in his voice, like it doesn’t come natural to him. His smile is doing something to my insides, and I don’t know what to do about it.

  Is this a date? Or are you being used to make him feel more comfortable and help him out since his foot is now messed up?

  Time will tell, I guess.

  Honestly, I don’t think I can be left alone, not even for a second.

  Russia makes me stupid, so stupid.

  But what else is new?

  I SPEND TOO MUCH OF my time straddling the line between wanting to show off my tattoos at this get-together thing and wanting to hide them. I vacillate between wanting to make a good first impression, and then get mad at myself like what another person’s opinion of me actually matters when it does not.

  I remind myself that I’m doing this in some odd version of wanting to help Russia out, like it was somehow my fault that he was on his way to get tattooed by me when he messed up his foot, walked on it (like an idiot) to let me know what happened, and now he’s got a bad sprain and is stuck with crutches.

  I feel partially responsible when logically that doesn’t make any kind of sense, but I’ve never been logical a day in my life, and I’m not going to start now.

  I end up going with my least distressed black jeans, regular ankle socks (in bright red, because why not?), and a white long-sleeve shirt that covers up my sleeve tattoos, but still is kinda see-through so you can see the outline of them, too, through the thin material.

  I’ve put my hair up, my undercut showing from the back of my head to just over the ridges of my ears, my twelve combined piercings in my ears visible, my jewelry matching across both ears, even though sometimes I like the asymmetric style, too. That’s as much thought as I give to convention, to looking presentable.

  Honestly, if Russia’s friends are jerks, I’m bringing my car so I can basically take off whenever I need to and have Katie (whom I confirmed will be there earlier today, with Dean!) bring Russia back home.

  I wince in the safety of my car as I watch Russia trying to navigate the icy sidewalk when I pull up in front of his building on Saturday at 1:25 p.m. sharp.

  I’m caught in limbo of putting the car in park and rounding it to make sure that he doesn’t fall again, messing up his ankle even more, and knowing that it might not be my place to do so. Honestly though, all my first assumptions about him have been wrong, and maybe he’d gladly accept the help, whether he has crutches or not.

  I don’t get to find out though, as Russia’s able to get to my car, open the passenger door and slide inside in an inelegant sprawl that has the crutches pushing up against my roof and clacking together in a way that catches his fingers between them, making him swear in what I’m going to confidently say sounds like Russian.

  I hiss in sympathy at the imagined pain already throbbing in my own fingers until he leans out and closes the passenger door, panting a little before he finally turns to me, his blue-blue eyes leaping with something that I could call excitement if push came to shove, and I could call it happiness at seeing me if you put a gun to my head and I admitted it before you pulled the trigger.

  “Hi,” he says, trying to get comfortable with the crutches out in front of him, maneuvering them around so they don’t touch the gearshift, and putting on his seatbelt with a click, hands resting on his lap before moving to the heaters on the dash, practically shoving his fingers through the slats.

  I frown. “Were you waiting outside long?”

  Russia grins sheepishly but keeps his face turned resolutely forward, looking out the windshield while I turn off my hazard lights and look in my blind spot before starting to merge with traffic.

  My GPS is keyed in with Alex’s address and I let the posh voice direct me where to go, mispronouncing the names of the streets with a horrible English accent that makes me honk in laughter. Like, it pronounces the S in Rene-Levesque, which is hilarious.

  “I overestimated how long it would take me to get downstairs. I apparently forgot there was an elevator in my building, and then I got hot standing inside with the heat blasting, so I came outside, deciding to wait, stuck in a vicious cycle of my own making.”

  I laugh, my feelings for him pressing up against my rib cage.

  “How’s the foot?” I ask, lowering the music. My Spotify playlist is not up for debate, and I’m not changing it if he doesn’t like the Backstreet Boys—that’s just his problem and no one else’s.

  “It’s better, thanks. Thank you for picking me up. I appreciate it.”

  I nod, still looking straight ahead, noticing that this is the closest we’ve been outside of me doing work on him.

  I don’t even know why I’m impressed by his manners anymore. It’s common decency, but really a hard juxtaposition of all the guys I’ve dated in the past.

  “You look really great. I can’t wait for them to meet you.”

  I balk at that, make some kind of noise that does not sound human at all. I cough, try to clear my throat of any more animal noises.

  “Uh, can you grab my phone and search up some bakeries or something similar around here? I want to bring something for everyone,” I say, keeping my eyes pinned straight ahead, fighting back a yawn because it’s so warm and cozy in my car, and I’m starting to get just that much a little too warm in my winter coat.

  I glance at myself in the rear-view mirror, my giant bug-glasses on that makes me feel a teeny, tiny bit like Audrey Hepburn and glamourous to a fault, my dark red lip looking vampy and sexy as hell, even though underneath the dark lenses my eyeshadow’s neutral but still a little shimmery (because give me a shimmer or metallic eyeshadow or give me death!) paired with a winged eyeliner sharp enough to use as a weapon in a jiffy.

  All in all, I’m real proud of my makeup and Russia hasn’t even commented on it.

  Well, we all know girls wear makeup for other girls.

  Russia does as he’s told, looking up the nearest bakery type place based on our location as I start driving in the general direction of the highway, following the instructions I’m being given over the speakers.

  I park in one of the two parking spaces available right out front of the bakery, not even bothering to pay the meter since in this area you’re allowed fifteen minutes before anything bad happens (like a ticket).

  I glance at the storefront, the wood paneling snuggled up to the brick of the overall building, the way the glass at the very front looks like it would open up to a really beautiful terrasse come summertime (or really as soon as the weather allows for it).

  I have to run around the car to steady Russia or else he would have planted his bad foot against the ground when he tries to get his balance, and he smiles at me warmly when I finally let him go.

  “I swear, you’re going to give me a hundred heart attacks today,” I say. As if I wasn’t already nervous enough as it is.

  I’m meeting Russia’s friends, and I know they’re going to have questions about me, questions I’m not sure I’m ready to answer.

  Why did Russia bring you here to this special moment?

  I’m literally just his tattoo artist that has a giant crush on him. That’s it.

  We both walk inside (well, Russia uses his crutches) the little Greek bakery, Zachary, and we head to the glass counter, a girl looking about my age, no name badge in sight, standing behind the counter. She’s got a smile on her face and a little bit of something that looks like chocolate frosting on her white apron and some on her cheek.

  She catches Russia’s eye, I can tell, and I tamp down on the would-be jealousy, knowing I’m reading too deeply into it, looking for something that isn’t there, feeling something that shouldn’t be there.

  “Hello,” he says, polite as ever and making me question my own manners, or lack of them.

  Her eyes follow the length of him, down to the crutches, a bemused look on her face before she shakes herself out of it. Her eyes land on me, and she points to her eyes.

  “Wow, your eyeshadow, it’s amazing,” she says, holding up her hand in an A-OK sign, grinning at me.

  “Oh, thank you,” I say, surprised, clutching onto my sunnies at the top of my head, all the better to see with once I’m inside. I tilt my head at her, getting a good vibe, knowing it might be a salesperson tactic, but honestly, I was going to buy from here anyway so there’s no need for flattery. Although, it does feel nice for someone else to appreciate all my hard work since Russia clearly didn’t.

  I can feel him swing to look at me, nearly losing his balance on his crutches, the carpet underneath our boots sodden and a testament to how many customers this bakery gets—even if I’ve never heard of it before.

  The girl behind the counter stuffs her hands in her apron pocket, and clips it onto her apron. She tisks to herself as she does this, her name displayed in English and in Greek (I think)—Chloe.

  Even if this day’s gonna suck, and Russia’s friends won’t like me and it’s all a bust, and nothing will ever happen with him in the way I want it to happen, I know that Chloe’s compliment is going to buoy me throughout the rest of the day, no matter how shit this whole meeting Russia’s friends goes.

  “What can I get you guys?” she asks, clapping her hands together, scratching at her cheek that has the chocolate frosting on it. “Oh, man, has that been there this whole time?” she asks, looking between the two of us, and Russia stays stoic, but I give her the benefit of the doubt.

  I nod slowly.

  “Well, I’m going to go over that for an entire year. So? What can I get you guys? Looking for cakes or a traditional pastry? Are you familiar with Greek pastries? Or is it for a wedding cake?” Chloe asks, shooting out the questions rapid fire.

  I’m still trying to process about the whole ‘wedding cake’ deal, while Chloe wipes at her cheek, trying to distract us from the chocolate that’s being removed from her skin.

  I suddenly have the urge to want to be friends with her. I really, really do.

  “Not...not a wedding cake,” Russia sputters out, choking on air to the point where I have to clap on his back to help him breathe again. “No wedding cake.”

  Chloe looks like a deer caught in the middle of the highway, the headlights of impending doom coming too fast for any kind of escape plan to be made. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I shouldn’t have assumed...”

  I shake my head at her, shooting her a reassuring smile. It is a bakery after all, and I’m sure they make delicious wedding cakes, and maybe one day, I will get married, but it might not be to Russia.

  Hell, if we ever do, though, I’m coming right back here.

  This place is good luck, I can already feel it.

  “No, no, don’t worry about it. We’re just friends. I’ve never been here before, but we’re going to a friend’s house,” I explain, wanting Chloe to get the full picture and the background story. I’m still absentmindedly rubbing at Russia’s back and have to force myself to stop or else.

  “Russia?” I ask, turning towards him. “What should we get? Do Alex and his wife like something in particular? I know Dean will eat anything, so I’m open to taking suggestions. What do you think?”

  “Can I make a suggestion?” Chloe asks, bringing us over to the glass case where beautifully presented cakes and pastries are in the window, rounding the glass case to come stand beside Russia, pointing to different items.