Breaking Walls (25 page)

“Why haven’t you left yet?” I asked. “Bailey said she was on her way—”

“I sent her home. I had a few extra minutes.”

Jones and I turned to go into the bakery when we heard Gabe yell, “Hey!” We both turned back. Through the rolled down window, he smiled and said
, “Just one more thing.”

“Yeah?”

He lifted a smaller stationery envelope, and I jogged back to the car to grab it.

“What’s this?” I took it from him, reading my neatly scrawled name across the front.

“
Open it
,” he said, and then I stood straighter and backed away.

When I looked down to the envelope, opened the flap, and pulled out a small, white card, Gabe rolled up his window, put the car in gear, and drove away. He didn’t even give me time to read and react.

I watched him until he disappeared, and then I looked down and read:

Mandy,

Enough of this will they/won’t they nonsense.

I’m seeing a date in our future, and since we all know that great things happen before sunrise, what do you say to breakfast in the park?

Saturday morning. Six o’clock. I’ll bring the pizza.

-Gabe

I laughed as Jones read the card over my shoulder.

“Pizza
?” he groaned. “For breakfast? That’s disgusting. Who does that?”

“Gabe,” I smiled, looking at the card again. “Gabe does that.”

I turned to enter the bakery, leaving Jones stunned and silent behind me. He didn’t have to understand. No one had to.

The last two weeks hadn’t offered much progress in terms of my relationship with Gabe, but I’d finally gotten confident enough to say the things I needed to say
. He was finally starting to reciprocate. Little by little, there was so much more that we’d have to work through, so much more we’d have to talk, argue, and fight about, but I looked forward to every second.

For the first time since Gabriel Raddick slammed himself into my life, there was a definite plan in order. It wasn’t a long-term plan, but pizza in the park was good enough for now. And if that was as good as it ever got, I was really okay with that, too.

Any plan with Gabe was better than no plan at all.

We had a date.

###