In Love with a Gentleman (3 page)

Jens smiles. “Yeah, I already got the impression that you’re very intent on keeping your honor and dignity intact.”

I know immediately what he’s alluding to, and my blush deepens. “Oh, so you think it’s all right for a host to feel up his guests?”

Jens shakes his head. “No, of course not. I found your response to be very appropriate. Too bad for Tom, though. He forfeited his chance with the prettiest girl from the get-go. It was quite foolish of him.”

I tilt my head to the side a bit and look at him. Is he flirting with me? And if so, what do I think of it? He definitely makes a nice impression, but unfortunately, he’s not my type at all. He’s too approachable and down-to-earth, like a huggable teddy bear. I like men who look dashing, with dark hair and mysterious eyes. I prefer men who are a little sad, as if they have some sort of deep, dark secret. My dream man also has to be tall and slender with broad shoulders. No, Jens doesn’t fit the bill at all.

Our food comes just then, sparing me from having to respond to his comment. The tortellini are fantastic, and not only because I’m starving to death. They’re still piping hot, so I have to be careful not to bolt down my food too quickly.

After my first bite, I put down my fork and take another sip of beer. “I’m so lucky,” I say cheerfully. “This night’s turned from being a total flop to being quite nice.”

Jens looks deeply into my eyes—a little too deeply for my taste—and says, “I think so, too.”

I avert my eyes and concentrate on my food.

“Weren’t you wearing some glittery earrings on the way to the casino?” Jens asks.

Hmm, he noticed that. “Yeah, but they were just as brutal as my shoes. I had to take them off.”

Jens looks at me. “Right. Your ears are still totally red.” He reaches across the table and softly touches my earlobe.

I pull my head back quickly, although I can’t say that his touch is unpleasant. His genuinely sympathetic words make me feel better.

“I know what the problem is,” he says.

I almost choke on the tortellini. “Excuse me?” I can’t help laughing.

Jens smiles. “Well, not personally, but I have three sisters. They occasionally wear clip-on earrings, too. They always have to adjust them.”

“Oh,” I say, “so how does that work?”

“Well,” says Jens, “you just need a little know-how and a pocketknife.”

I rummage through my purse. I find what I’m looking for—a small pocketknife with a nail file and tiny scissors. My aunt gave it to me for my birthday.

“Something like this?” I ask.

“Exactly.”

I pull the earrings out of my bag and lay them on the table with the knife. Jens flips open the blade, then works the tip gently into the spring mechanism of one earring. As he works, he pulls in his chin and pushes out his lower lip. He looks quite focused and cute, like a child trying hard to paint a beautiful picture. I would like to have a brother who does things like this for me.

“Okay,” says Jens. “Try it out.”

I clip the earring onto my right ear. It sits perfectly, not too tight and not too loose. I shake my head a bit, but the earring holds.

“Awesome,” I say. “You did a good job. Can you fix the other one, too?”

“Of course.”

As Jens focuses again on his handiwork, I look around the room. It’s nicely decorated: wine bottles are arranged on shelves with tasteful, flickering lanterns placed between them. Italian love songs play in the background. The guests are cheerful and chat contentedly in the way people do when they’ve just eaten a delicious meal. I’m so happy we ended up here. My food is soon gone, and I feel so warm, full, and content I don’t envy the other girls at the casino one bit.

“Darn!”

My attention is abruptly drawn back to Jens. The earring lies next to its silver clasp in the palm of his hand.

“This has never happened to me before,” Jens says contritely. “I broke the mechanism. Bummer! I didn’t mean to do that.”

He looks so sad I have to laugh. “Don’t worry, Jens. These earrings aren’t very valuable. Did you think they were real diamonds?”

“No, of course not! But that doesn’t mean that they aren’t worth something to you.” He still looks very sorry.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say, then laugh. “I can wear just one. It still looks quite fashionable. Look.” I shake my head so the earring sparkles as it sways back and forth.

Jens admires it, shaking his head at the same time. “I don’t know what to make of you,” he says.

What does he mean by that? I furrow my brow.

“If I’d ruined one of my sisters’ earrings, they would have screamed bloody murder. At the very least, they would have strangled me. But you just laugh it off as if it doesn’t bother you at all.”

I shrug. “Why should I be upset? There are more important things in life.”

“Yes,” says Jens, “but it’s not just about the earrings. I was watching you this evening.”

“Right. Through the rearview mirror,” I say with mock severity.

He smiles. “Yes, I admit it. I liked you right from the start. There is something about you—how do I describe it?” He thinks a moment, then says, “All seven of you in the group were intent on amusing yourselves. However, the other six seemed a bit forced. They weren’t just eager to have fun. I couldn’t help thinking they were aiming to reach some sort of crazy, over-the-top party goal.”

I look at him skeptically. “And you were able to observe all that through the rearview mirror?”

“You’d be surprised at the things I can observe. People interest me. Anyway, you were quite different. From the very beginning, you seemed relaxed and calm, as if you were just having fun.”

“I was!” I say. “I found the whole undertaking rather amusing. What a crazy concept—riding in a stretch limo to the casino with seven good-looking girls! I like stuff like that.”

The waiter asks if we want another drink, and Jens looks at his wristwatch. “Man, time flies. But I think we have a little more time before we need to be back. Would you like anything else?”

I nod and order a glass of red wine; Jens orders another soda. After the waiter leaves, Jens asks, “What were we talking about?”

“I said that I enjoy this kind of adventure. What about it?”

“It’s not just that you enjoy it,” says Jens. “Just think about how the evening progressed. First, your host touches you.”

“Feels me up,” I correct him.

“Right. But instead of getting upset, you stay totally cool and confident. Then, after traveling over sixty miles from Münster to Hohensyburg just so the birthday boy can make his grand entrance as a big shot, surrounded by beautiful women, he leaves you and doesn’t give a damn about your comfort. What kind of an idiot does that?”

“A big one,” I say. “But I still don’t know what you’re trying to tell me.”

The waiter brings our drinks. We raise our glasses and toast each other, then take a sip. The wine is good and warms me up from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, which had become a bit chilly again on the restaurant floor.

“You forgot to mention the foot and earlobe pain, if we’re talking about the list of disasters,” I say.

Jens sets down his glass and says, “At the risk of repeating myself, I’ve known a lot of women.”

“Oh,” I say with a smile, “that’s pretty impressive.”

Jens blushes slightly. “No, I didn’t mean it like that. I meant I have three sisters and they’re all very different. You might think they’re not even related. Yet I know for a fact that, confronted with a similar situation, all three would freak out and go on the warpath. They would have been completely inconsolable for the rest of the evening. And who could blame them?”

He tilts his head to the side and looks at me very sweetly. “It’s different with you. You look like you’re enjoying yourself now—as much as the moment when you first stepped into the limousine. How do you do that?”

“It’s not such an amazing feat,” I say. “I’m sitting here in a supernice restaurant in pleasant company. I feel great. I’m not pretending—I’m genuinely enjoying myself.”

But Jens looks at me as if I’m the eighth wonder of the world. “I don’t really think you understand what I’m getting at. Let me put it another way. You seem to be completely relaxed, as if nothing at all could disturb you. I find that fascinating. What’s your secret?”

Hmm. How do I respond to that? “Maybe it’s because I think there’s no point in reacting to bad situations by screaming bloody murder. What good would come of it? It would only make a bad situation worse.”

“I’m impressed,” Jens says. “Apparently, your serenity is authentic and not a pretense. It’s true, you’re right. If you’d come to the limo and knocked on the window, and I had seen a woman who was totally loaded, with a face that looked like a month of wet Sundays, then I wouldn’t have let you in.”

I burst out laughing. “Ha! You would have been capable of sending me away?”

“Hello! You forget I was busy working on my laptop. I didn’t need some crazy bitch dumping her bad mood on me.”

“But you didn’t know what I’d do,” I say.

“I did know, because I’d already been watching you. Anyway, you didn’t seem angry; you just looked kind of helpless.”

I grin. “Awesome. My tactic worked.”

Jens says, almost a little longingly, “I’d like to know your secret.”

“The secret behind my success,” I quip. But I don’t want to tell him my secret. I don’t know him well enough. I’m not going to share that with someone I’ve only known for a few hours.

So, I change the subject. “From what I can tell, I think you would be better off studying psychology. You’ve obviously got a soft spot for it.”

The distraction works. Jens begins to tell me about information technology, moving the conversation in a direction that is much more palatable to me. We chat about school and our professors, and we discover that we have a couple acquaintances in common.

It’s getting late, and the crowd in the restaurant is thinning out. Jens looks at his wristwatch and winces. “Oh, now it’s good and late.” He beckons to the waiter and pays the bill.

“If you wait a moment when you drop me off, I can run inside for my wallet and pay you back,” I say.

But Jens grabs the receipt off the table and rips it up on the spot. “No,” he says, “let’s just leave it at that. You’re my guest. It was a really nice evening, and thank you for sharing it with me.”

Embarrassed, I protest, “But that’s not right. That wasn’t our deal.”

“It’s okay,” Jens says. He offers me the crook of his arm and asks, “May I escort Cinderella to her carriage?”

“With pleasure,” I say. “Let’s hope it hasn’t turned into a pumpkin.”

As we walk out of the restaurant into the cool autumn night, I think how strange life is. If someone had told me yesterday that I’d go out to an Italian restaurant with a chauffeur in a white stretch limo—and barefoot, too—I would have never believed them. How wonderful that life sometimes presents such funny twists and surprises. I chuckle lightly to myself.

Jens glances at me. “You see?” he says. “You’re doing it again. You laugh because you have such a zest for life. I bet people are very envious of you.”

We arrive at the car, and I look at him. “But there’s no reason everyone can’t be like me. You can’t deny that.”

Jens opens the passenger door for me. “I don’t think most people have it in them. I don’t know—maybe people have just forgotten how to live?”

I consider this. Yes, maybe that’s right. I find his thoughts on the subject kind of touching. I don’t think I know many young men who would concern themselves with such things. Without heels, I’m just about as tall as he is. I lean toward him and place a gentle kiss on his cheek. It’s a bit prickly. It’s probably been a while since he last shaved.

“Thank you for saving my life, and thank you for the lovely meal,” I say. I sit down in the passenger seat and buckle up.

Jens just smiles. He hurries around to the other side of the car, opens the door, and strips off the gray sweater. It has a warm, pleasant, manly fragrance. He slips into his suit jacket, puts the cap back on his head, and gets behind the wheel.

“Home, James—and a shilling extra if you make it in ten minutes,” I joke.

“Very funny,” says Jens, but he doesn’t sound the least bit perturbed.

On the ride back to the casino, we’re both quiet. Maybe it’s because we want to enjoy the calm before the storm. Soon the clucking hens and their proud rooster will take over the limousine again.

Just before we reach the casino, Jens pulls over to the curb. He turns to me and says, “I would like to see you again, Lea.”

“Then it has to be within the next week, because it won’t work after that,” I say.

He frowns. “Why? Are you really Cinderella? Are you going back to doing chores for your wicked stepmother?”

I smile. “No. It’s not that bad. I’m leaving town next weekend.”

His face brightens. “That’s no problem. We can get together after that.”

I shake my head. “You’d have to be very patient.”

“Why?” he asks.

“I’m going to England next weekend. I won’t be back for a year.”

Jens doesn’t act like his sisters; he doesn’t scream bloody murder, and he doesn’t turn red, but he looks sad and disappointed.

“Crap!” he says. “I finally meet a really amazing girl, and then this! I’m cursed.”

Silently, he puts the car in gear and drives the last few yards to the casino. He hasn’t even turned off the engine when his cell phone rings. It’s Tom, calling to let him know that he’s ready to go.

“You’re at least going to give me your number, right?” Jens asks.

“It doesn’t make sense, I’ll have a different number in England,” I say. “I think we should leave it at this. Long-distance relationships aren’t my thing. They’re doomed from the outset. I think we should go our separate ways. It was a lovely evening, and I’ll think of it often. Hopefully you will, too. Thank you for everything.”

Even if Jens had responded, I wouldn’t have been able to hear him, because just then the girls tear open the doors and tumble into the car. They reek of alcohol. Tom settles in between two of them, stretches out his legs, and begins to snore almost instantly. The girls find this insanely funny, giggling and shrieking. I stay in the front passenger seat. No one seems to notice. Nobody seems to miss me, either.
If I hadn
’
t already been sitting here, they would have driven back to Münster without me
, I think, a bit peeved.