The Overlap (8 page)

But Monday morning was an eon away; I wanted to focus on the here and now. The waiter arrived at our table just as Zack was wrapping up the tale of his Seattle trip – complete with the obligatory description that accompanies almost everyone’s trip up there of either a) how much it rained, or b) how it was surprisingly sunny the whole time. (In Zack’s case it was the latter.) The waiter greeted us and asked about our preference for bottled or ice water and then about drinks or wine. Zack ordered Pellegrino and then asked me if Chardonnay was okay; after I replied that it was, he ordered a bottle of a boutique Sonoma Chardonnay I had never heard of, but which he assured me was one of his favorites.

Before departing for the Pellegrino and wine the waiter asked if we would like to hear the specials. They all sounded delicious, and I was wondering if Zack would be one of those guys who would preemptively try to take charge on a dinner date. You know the type: the guy who will suggest that the girl order something in particular with that “suggestion” being all but an outright command; something of a control play. Josh Chamberlain was a little bit like that when we went out in Miami, which was funny because we only went to three or four restaurants, just him and me, during those weeks and he had never been to any of them before or even knew anything about them. I remember at the time thinking it was odd that Josh would say something like “you really should try their swordfish” or “they’re known for their beet and goat cheese salad” to me; in fact the last time or two he did that my unspoken reaction was something along the lines of “WTF, Josh???”

Since Zack didn’t seem interested in playing that role, I decided to ask him.

“You’ve been here before, right?”

He nodded.

“Yeah, I’d say about ten times now since they opened. How about you?”

I shook my head.

“First time. I’ve been meaning to try it with Kensington and Courtney; you know, the two girls who were with me at
Cerise
on Thursday, right?”

Zack nodded again.

“Haven’t made it here though because I’ve been traveling so much, at least until I started at MetroGen and got back in town. Anyway, what’s good?”

Zack gave me a quick rundown on his own favorites from the regular menu – each one of them fish, which is how I discovered that he didn’t eat beef – and then told me which of the specials the waiter had mentioned he had tried before and liked. I figured that I wasn’t going to go wrong with anything that I ordered, though a couple of the best-sounding dishes were heavy on the garlic or onions and I was thinking about what my breath would be like after dinner, right? So I settled on the panko-crusted halibut special, wondering what Zack would order.

The rest of the next hour or so was a bit of a blur as we engaged in typical first-date chatter as we ordered. Zack wound up ordering the blackened redfish from the regular menu, which he proclaimed as good as any he had ever enjoyed in New Orleans. We had our Chardonnay poured (Zack toasted to “new beginnings” as he gazed penetratingly at me), and ate our wonderful meals. I asked him about the spelling of his name (“Zack” rather than “Zach” – I had noticed that from his cell phone contact info that he had texted me on Thursday), and he said that his parents had steered him down that path when he had started going by “Zack” more than “Zachary” in grade school. No particular reason, he told me; that’s just the way it turned out.

The only uncomfortable moments came when I asked Zack where he had grown up and he replied with “Joliet, about 40 miles outside of Chicago.” We got into a short discussion of growing up in the Chicago area, all the while my mind percolating little reminders every thirty seconds or so that Dustin was in Chicago right now. As if reading my mind, after about five minutes of Chicago-oriented discussion Zack’s eyes took on a mischievous, probing look as he said:

“I guess I could give you some suggestions of good places to eat to pass on to your boyfriend...”

I was pissed with him for bluntly bringing up Dustin that way. I suppose all was fair here, though. We had laid our cards on the table Thursday night and both had agreed that Dustin notwithstanding, we both wanted to go out on this date and see where things went. I guess it wasn’t fair of me to expect him to not say a single word about Dustin the entire time. After all, I’m sure Zack was wondering just what in the world was going through my head at the moment, now that we were actually here at dinner together. I guess I should have given him credit for at least tip-toeing into the subject of “my boyfriend” rather than simply pretending that I wasn’t in a relationship. But instantly I could feel my eyes narrow and my lips tighten... not exactly a girl’s best look on a first date, right?

Anyway, I was able to keep my cool and clear the pique from my face and respond with a somewhat whimsical “um, not sure that’s such a good idea...”

Zack chuckled at my response.

“Yeah,” he said as he looked down at his glass of near-empty glass of Chardonnay in his left hand and then after a couple of seconds back at me.

“Sorry about that. You know, bringing up your boyfriend like that. That probably wasn’t fair. This is new territory for me, you know? I’ve gone out with a couple of women before who had boyfriends, but I didn’t know that at the time; didn’t find out till later. But this is the first time I’ve gone out with someone who told me up front that she was in a relationship but still wanted to go out.”

He looked down at his wine glass again, and then back at me once more.

“Anyway, my apologies.” He smiled warmly at me.

“Besides,” he continued, “I’d rather talk about you. I’m having a great time.”

I couldn’t help myself. I returned his smile.

“Me too.”

*     *     *

We both passed on dessert but opted for after-dinner drinks as neither one of us was in a hurry to end the evening... or at least this part of the evening. Zack ordered port as our conversation proceeded into our respective college years. From our talk at
Cerise
I knew he had gone to UCLA, and he knew I had gone to ASU. We talked about classes, friends, epic parties... pretty much anything we could think of. Then the conversation shifted to our high school years.

“So what was the most outrageous thing you did back in high school?” I asked him. That question had usually resulted in a lengthy story or two from guys on first dates back in college, and I was in no hurry for the evening to end. My friend Kallie had told me about this particular question during our freshman year, and it always worked wonders.

In response to my question I saw a smirk immediately come to Zack’s face but then he seemed to will it away.

“Come on, I saw that look,” I said, a grin coming to my own face as I spoke.

He actually looked away from me for a couple seconds, smiling again but eyes downcast towards the table, sort of like a shy little boy would. This was definitely a different side of him than his brash best-there-is marketing consultant persona, but it wasn’t a turnoff. If he had been doing this on purpose – which I knew he wasn’t, but if he had been – it was working because now I
really
wanted to know what he was thinking.

“Tell me!” I demanded... nicely, but I was definitely letting him know that he wasn’t getting off the hook.

“Okay,” he shrugged, looking back at me with a big grin. “You asked.”

The tone of Zack’s “you asked!” made me all of a sudden think that his story must have had something to do with a girl – specifically something sexual – and that’s why he was reluctant to say anything. For a moment it was my turn to radiate a sense of uncomfortable embarrassment, wishing that I hadn’t asked him that question and then insisted on an answer, but there was no turning back. Fortunately, though, as he began telling me his story I realized I had jumped to the wrong conclusion.

“Back in my senior year I was the sports editor of our high school paper,” he began but then as our waiter reappeared, he paused to order us each another glass of port. I wondered when the Chardonnay and port were going to hit me but so far I wasn’t feeling even the least bit buzzed.

“Anyway,” Zack continued after our waiter had slipped away, “we used to publish twice each week, on Monday afternoon and on Friday morning. In the fall, during football season, we would include football scores from the previous weekend in our Monday afternoon edition. You know, not just our high school and other high schools around Chicago from Friday, but college and professional as well. Usually we would also pick one college or pro game and I would do a short write-up about that game underneath the headline, before we would print all the other scores.”

He paused for a minute to let out a short laugh – this must be some story he was going to tell me, or at least it was in his mind – and then continued.

“So this one Monday morning I went to Mister Tolleson, the junior year English teacher who was also the advisor to the newspaper. I gave him this list of scores and told him that I thought it would be great to make that issue’s game story about South Carolina versus Southern Cal and call it ‘The Battle of the USCs.’ Mister Tolleson said that he liked that idea, so right away I show him the mocked-up headline I had already printed up on the laser printer. It said “
Trojans Roll Over ‘Cocks 35-7 in Battle of USCs
.”

He looked at me to make sure I got the joke, which I only half did, so he explained:

“The University of South Carolina? They’re called the Gamecocks and people call them the ‘Cocks for short?”

Suddenly I got it: Trojans...’Cocks... rolling over... Trojans rolling over cocks...

I felt myself instantly blush.

“He let you print that headline?” I asked Zack, trying to will the crimson of embarrassment out of my cheeks.

“Well,” he shrugged, “Mister Tolleson was only about 24 or 25 at the time, just a couple years out of college. In fact, it seems strange calling him ‘Mister Tolleson’ since I’m actually a couple years older now than he was at the time. Anyway...”

He shook his head, as if he had to will himself to get the story back on track.

“I remember he looked at me like he was trying not to burst out laughing, and he just took the sheet of paper with the headline from my hands and started walking around the classroom we used for the newspaper, staring at the paper, like he’s doing some serious deep thinking. Then he came back to where I was, handed me the paper, and said ‘Print it!’ – just like that. He was a cool guy and he must have figured that hey, it wasn’t our doing that those were the team names, so why not?”

Just as the waiter returned with our new glasses of port, I said:

“That’s pretty funny you were able to get away with that. Did everybody in your school turn you into a freedom-of-the-press hero or something like that?”

Zack didn’t answer me right away because he seemed to be waiting for the waiter to set our drinks on the table and glide away again, which he did.

“Sort of, but that’s not the outrageous part of the story.”

I didn’t follow, and he could tell from the puzzled look on my face.

“The headline; that wasn’t the outrageous part, or at least the
really
outrageous part.”

“What was, then?” I asked.

“It never happened.”

I shook my head, clearly signaling my confusion.

“The game; Southern Cal versus South Carolina. They didn’t really play each other that weekend.”

I began to follow.

“You mean that you made up the game and the score just so you could trick your teacher into letting you print that headline?”

“Uh-huh,” Zack smirked. “I probably couldn’t have gotten away with it if our high school was out here in L.A. since Southern Cal had played UCLA that weekend, and most guys in their twenties like Mr. Tolleson would probably have known that. But back in Chicago I figured there was a chance that Mister Tolleson wouldn’t know off the top of his head who either of the USCs had really played, but if he did and caught me
before
the story was printed I figured I could just talk my way out of trouble and say I was just joking around to see if he would notice.”

“So what happened?” I wanted to know.

“Well, the paper got printed and Tuesday morning I hadn’t been on campus more than a minute when Mister Tolleson came up to me and didn’t even say a word, he just snarled and pointed to the administration building where the Principal’s office was. I immediately knew that he had figured it out, or someone had told him.”

“Did you get in trouble?” I asked.

Zack nodded.

“Kicked off the paper and suspended from school for three days.”

“Oh my God!” I blurted out.

He shrugged as he reached for his glass of port, the new one, that he hadn’t yet touched just as I hadn’t touched mine yet.

“It was worth it,” he said flatly. “If I suddenly woke up tomorrow and discovered I had gone back in time to my senior year in high school, to that day, I would do the exact same thing again.”

I liked that! The self-confidence; the cockiness (pun intended). Not only the story itself, but Zack’s “I would do it all again” self-assured declaration more than a decade after the fact was a crystal clear statement that he played by his own rules then, and still did so today.

I reached for my glass of port and held it towards his, and as he brought his glass forward to clink against mine I proposed the most appropriate toast I could think of, given the circumstances of his story... and the incredibly strong connection we were making on our first date:

“To the Trojans and the ‘Cocks!”

Now it was his turn to fiercely and immediately blush, especially considering my voice was a tad on the loud side as I spoke and at least three people seated near our table instantly turned their heads to check out who had blurted out
that
toast.

*     *     *

Despite my innuendo-loaded toast, I was now certain I
wasn’t
going to sleep with Zack that night, for several reasons. Of course there was Dustin; well, not so much Dustin himself but rather the confusion racing through my brain about the coexistence of my boyfriend and this new guy. But even leaving Dustin out of my decision-making process, there was also the stigma that sometimes comes with a girl having sex on a first date. For me, I’ve never been a big believer in
not
having sex
just
because it’s a first date, though I should say my perspective on that subject these days is more of a contemplative, hypothetical one rather than based on extensive experience. Since graduating from college and entering the work world almost one year ago, I’ve had exactly three first dates; two if you don’t count the one I was on at this very moment. Not exactly enough to make any sort of scientifically valid conclusions...