Harvard Hottie (7 page)

Chapter Eight

As we’re finishing up the last of our Subway sandwiches on Friday, Luke gives me a look like he wants to say something. He hooks his thumb into his tie and loosens it slightly, all the while glancing up at me nervously. Also, he keeps shifting in his wheelchair, which is something he does a lot, but he’s doing it a lot more right now. Somehow I think again of his ramrod-straight posture in college. “Um,” he finally says. “I was wondering if you could do me a favor, Ellie.”

I never agree to a favor without knowing what it is, especially from a guy like Luke. “What is it?”

“There’s this thing tomorrow…” He gives me a pained look. “It’s at an art gallery near Newton, a new exhibit opening, whatever. Really boring. Anyway, I said I’d be there. And… I was just thinking… maybe you’d be willing to… go with me?” He quickly amends, “As a work acquaintance.”

“Oh.” I bite my lip. I don’t want to go. Yet, I also sort of do. “What about Michelle?  Can’t you go with her?”

Luke shakes his head. “Nuh-uh. If I go with Michelle, everyone will be thinking I’m some dirty old man boinking my hot young secretary.”

“So if I go, nobody will think you’re
boinking me?”

“Nah, never.”

I’ve never been at a fancy artsy event before. It doesn’t really sound like my cup of tea, but then again, Luke is giving me this desperate look. I’ve had a lot of fun hanging out with him the last two weeks, so maybe we’ll have fun together.

“All right,” I agree.

His eyes light up.

I quickly add, “Platonic, right?”

“Of course,” Luke says, as if I asked a preposterous question.

***

I go out to dinner with Jenna that night, mostly reassure her that her job is safe and the sky isn’t going to come crashing down on her any time soon. We get dinner at a local bar and Jenna bemoans the fact that men never buy her drinks anymore. “I’m getting too old,” she sniffles.

“Oh, stop it,” I say. Jenna is two years younger than me. I don’t get bought drinks either, although I was never really the type of girl that men hit on in bars.

“So,” she says, “how is Luke Thayer in bed?”

“Jenna!” I roll my eyes. “Come on…”

“Well, I don’t mean ‘in bed,’” she corrects herself, grinning. “Because obviously it happens in his office. But you know what I mean.”

“Nothing happens,” I insist. “And nothing’s going to happen. Luke just wants my help with the company.”

“Look, you don’t need to be embarrassed,” Jenna says. “I mean, I know he’s in the wheelchair, but he’s not entirely grotesque. His face is cute, at least. Really cute.”

“Jenna,” I groan.

“How does that work anyway?” she asks. “Do you guys do it in his chair?”

“No!” I cry. “We don’t do it anywhere! I repeat, I’m not having sex with him. Come on, you know me.”

Jenna blinks. “Okay, fine.” She runs a hand through her hair. Jenna has red hair that she completely hates, but I think is very pretty. “So what are you up to tomorrow?  Do you want to catch a movie?”

“I can’t,” I mumble. “I’m going to this… art… thing.”

Jenna’s eyes widen. “Oh my God, are you going to the opening of the new exhibit in Newton?”

How the hell does she know about these things?  “Um, yeah.”

“Who are you going with?” Her eyes narrow.

She’s got me. My face is scarlet. “Luke.” I quickly add, “As friends.”

Jenna looks at me a long time. She takes a sip of her beer. “Really, Ellie, what’s going on? I believe you that you’re not sleeping with him, but… do you like him?”

No. I don’t. I don’t like Luke. He’s disagreeable, to put it mildly. He’s a rich, arrogant, cold, heartless businessman. The only reason I’m spending any time with him at all is for the good of the company. I certainly am not thinking about him at all in a romantic way. Even if I were looking for a boyfriend now, which I’m not, the last person I would pick would be Luke. And yes, he does smell nice sometimes, but that’s neither here nor there. I’m certainly not spending any time whatsoever fantasizing about him.

“You do!” Jenna cries, her eyes widening. “You do! You like him!”

“No, I don’t,” I mumble. “I just… think he’s sort of interesting. That’s all.”

“Well, he’s available, right?” she asks. “I mean, he’s got to be single.”

Everybody seemed to make that assumption about Luke. And I suppose they’re right. “Yeah, he is,” I confirm. “But he’s not for me. He’s not my type at all.”

“Hey, it can’t be too bad having a rich boyfriend,” she points out. “I bet he’d buy you lots of expensive things.”

“Because I love expensive things, right?” I laugh. I’m the kind of girl who buys most of my furniture at Ikea. Expensive things make me uncomfortable.

The more Jenna and I drink, the more I start thinking about Luke. I don’t know what’s wrong with me sometimes. Luke is absolutely not for me. That’s one thing I’m 100 percent sure of.

Chapter Nine

That night, I have my typical work dream. I’m sitting at my computer and I’ve got some big assignment due. I’m typing in code but it takes me forever just to type one line. And then as I type, the code is disappearing from the screen. I look at the clock, which keeps ticking forward, my deadline moving closer. I’m freaking out. And now the phone is ringing…

The phone is ringing.

I rub my eyes and sit up in bed. My vision is still blurry without my contacts in but I can just barely read the number on the clock: 8:17AM. Who the hell is waking me up this early on a Saturday morning?

“Hello,” I bark, ready to give whomever is calling a piece of my mind.

“Ellie?” It’s Luke. “Sorry, I didn’t interrupt anything, did I?”

“Just sleep,” I mumble, my anger subsiding slightly.

“You were sleeping?” He sounds amazed. “It’s after eight, isn’t it?”

Luke apparently leads a very different life than I do. “It’s all right,” I say. “Um, what is it?”

“Look,” he says. “There’s something I need to ask you but… you have to promise not to be insulted.”

I hate it when people say that. Because when someone says something like that, they’re clearly about to ask you something really insulting. “What is it?”

“What are you planning to wear tonight?”

“Oh.” I scratch my head. “Uh, I hadn’t really thought about it.”

“These art gallery things,” he says, “they’re ridiculously swanky. You need to really dress up. And I was just wondering if you have anything kind of… you know, flashy yet elegant.”

I stumble out of bed in the direction of my closet. I push a few suits jackets out of the way and gaze upon my small supply of dresses. They’re mostly black. I don’t think any of them cost more than $50. I don’t know if any of them qualify as “flashy yet elegant.”

“Not really,” I admit.

“Okay, no problem,” he says. “I’ll buy you something. Are you free this afternoon?”

“Um, yeah,” I say. “But you don’t have to buy me anything. I’ll just run over to the Gap and pick something up.”

“The Gap?” He sounds horrified. “No, Ellie. You’re not buying a dress at the Gap. Let me pick you up and I’ll take you somewhere decent.”

Somewhere decent. I can’t even imagine what sort of place he has in mind. Good thing he’s offered to pay.

“I’ll pick you up at three,” he says. “Why don’t you bring your make-up and stuff and you can change at my place. Then we’ll go straight from there.”

“Where do you live?” I ask.

“I’m sharing a studio apartment in South Boston,” Luke says.

I frown at the phone. “You… what?”

“Just kidding, Ellie. I’ve got a house out in Newton. You didn’t really think I’d live in a studio in South Boston, did you?”

Sometimes I kind of hate him.

***

As I’m coming out of the shower, I hear the doorbell to my apartment ringing, followed by three sharp raps. Then the doorbell rings again. Somebody is eager. “Okay, I’m coming!” I shout, wrapping a housecoat around me.

For a moment, I wonder if it’s Luke come early, but then I realize that there’s a flight of stairs to get to my apartment and no elevator. So I’m thinking it can’t be him.

Instead it’s Sadie. Holding a mixing bowl filled with ingredients.

“Time for your cooking lesson!” Sadie chirps.

Oh no.

“Listen,” I say. “This is very nice of you and all, but…”

Sadie’s face falls. I can’t do this to her. She’s such a nice old woman and she really does mean well. I think I’m going to have to learn to make…

I look in the mixing bowl. I see prunes. Oh my God, what are we making here?

“I just have to be done by three,” I say. “Because I’m meeting… someone.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Sadie says cheerfully. “Hamantaschen doesn’t take nearly that long. We’ll be done in plenty of time for you to give your suitor a sample.”

Haman… what now?

“Now we can either make them with apricots or prunes,” Sadie says.

“Apricots, please,” I say.

Sadie frowns. “Prunes are better for your bowels.”

Oh, for the love of God, let this be over quickly.

***

It turns out that Sadie is not that great at making
hamantaschen. She ends up consulting her recipe at least two dozen times, but she can’t see very well and her handwriting looks like chicken scratch. So essentially, we have to make up the recipe as we go along. When we finish, we have about a dozen little apricot-filled triangles that are roughly the consistency of hockey pucks.

Sadie is tidying up my kitchen while I get dressed in jeans and a tank top, when my cell phone rings. It’s Luke. “You’re early,” I say.

“I’m always early,” he says. “That’s how you throw the enemy off their game.”

“I’m the enemy?”

“God, I hope not.” I hear honking in the background. “Hey, you think you can come down here?  Brookline is a nightmare for parking. I’m right outside your building.”

“Give me two minutes,” I say.

When I emerge from the bedroom, Sadie has wrapped the hamantaschen in tin foil for me. “Was that your suitor?” she asks.

“He’s not my…” Oh hell. “Yes. It was.”

“Oh, good,” Sadie says. “Now give him these pastries. You don’t have to tell him I helped. That can be our little secret.” And she winks at me.

I really didn’t want to come out of the building carrying a tin foil package of
hamantaschen, but Sadie is watching me, so I don’t have much of a choice. I am just way too nice.

When I get to Luke’s car, I see that I’m incredibly underdressed compared to him. He’s wearing a suit and tie, looking just like he came from the office. Actually, maybe he did.

“Were you at work today?” I ask him.

“Of course,” he says, as if anything else would be ridiculous. He glances at the tin foil package I’m clutching. “What’s that?”

I feel my cheeks turning red. “It’s these pastries my neighbor helped me make for you.”

Luke raises his eyebrows. “You told your neighbor about me?”

Now my cheeks really are red. “Just… you know, that you were my boss.”

He works open the tin foil and pulls out one of the triangles. “Hey,
hamantaschen!”

“Wow, you know what that is?”

“Of course.” He grins at me. “I live in Newton. These things are like donuts over there.” He takes a bite and I see his brown eyes widen. He puts his hand over his mouth and I can tell he’s trying not to spit it out.

“They’re a little hard,” I admit.

“Jesus Christ,” Luke gasps. “Did you also tell your neighbor that you
hate
me and you want to
kill
me?

Hmph
. They’re not
that
bad.

Luke hands me back my failed
hamantaschen, then he pulls onto Harvard Street and I grab onto the edge of my seat as a guy practically leaps in front of the car and we come to a screeching halt. “Idiot,” he mumbles as he guns the engine again and we barely miss a woman with a baby carriage. This is why I hate driving in the Boston area. “Can you go slower?” I ask weakly.

“Slower?” Luke makes a face. “How long have you lived here?  You
gotta be aggressive, Ellie. Mow down the pedestrians. Kill or be killed.”

“Have you ever been in a car accident?” I ask him.

“Got rear-ended once in a traffic circle,” he says. “Total bullshit.”

Twenty minutes later, Luke’s Mercedes pulls up in front of a smallish boutique. Even as I’m getting out of the car, I can see how expensive this place looks. I’m worried if I walk inside, the air will cost like $10 per breath. I wait as Luke grabs his wheelchair out of the back seat and pops the wheels back into place. As soon as he wheels up beside me, I lean over and whisper, “Are you sure about this place?”

It’s not just that the place looks too expensive. It just looks too fancy. I’m worried that if I walk inside, they’ll ask me to leave now without making a scene. And although Luke does seem wealthy, I don’t know how the wheelchair will go over in a place like this.

“Calm down, Ellie,” he says. “I buy all my suits here. If they can make me look marginally good, I think you’re in very capable hands.”

Sure enough, the second we get inside, a pretty Asian girl in her late twenties rushes over to us with a warm expression on her face. “Luke!” she says. “You need a tux for the art gallery tonight?”

Luke shakes his head. “No, thanks, Irene, I’m good. Ellie here needs a dress.”

“Oh.” Irene looks me up and down with exactly the expression I’d expect to see from a person who worked in a swanky boutique like this. I know I shouldn’t let it get to me, but I feel my skin turning pink. On days like this, I’m glad I straighten my hair.

“I told her you’d make sure she’ll look gorgeous for tonight,” Luke says.

Irene turns back to Luke, who is obviously a favorite client, and nods enthusiastically. “Of course! What did you have in mind?”

“I don’t know,” he says thoughtfully. “What would you like, Ellie?”

“Um,” I say. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ve ever even been to an art gallery, much less been to an opening of some exhibit. I have no clue what I’m supposed to wear. “Whatever you think…”

Irene rolls her eyes a bit, but I don’t think Luke catches it. “Why don’t you browse a bit and I’ll see what I’ve got in the back.”

As Irene goes in the back, possibly to make fun of me while she pretends to search for clothes, I finger a simple white shirt that’s on display. I see the price tag hanging out and I gasp and jump back five feet.

“What’s wrong?” Luke asks, alarmed.

“That shirt is $350!”

“Oh.” He shrugs. “So?”

“So… it’s a white shirt! I could get that at Walmart for, like, $15. The exact same thing.”

“Well, what are we doing here then?” Luke says. “
Lemme get the car and we’ll go to Walmart. We can pick up some donut holes for the party on the way.”

I stick out my tongue at him and he laughs. I guess he’s right though. If you’re going to go someplace fancy, you
gotta dress fancy. But I really kind of have to wonder what sort of world we’re living in where there are people who would pay $350 for a white shirt.

Irene emerges from the back carrying what appears to be a simple black dress, but Irene announces is, in fact, “an Oscar de la
Renta metallic floral lace gown.” It looks pretty unexciting, but Luke seems to like it, so I try to seem enthusiastic.

“It’s fab,” I say. Fab? Where did I come up with that word?  Even Luke is looking at me with a bemused expression on his face and mouthing “fab?”

“You two can go in the back so she can try it on,” Irene suggests.

“Um,” Luke says. “Actually, we’re not… I mean, Ellie should just go herself…”

I can’t help but notice the twinge of a smile on Irene’s face on confirming that Luke and I aren’t actually a couple. Does she like him?  And why does that thought fill me with…. I don’t know what… jealousy? Nah, not jealousy.

I go into the changing room, shrug off my jeans and sweater, and slide the dress onto my body. There’s a mirror in there, which is great for making sure I don’t look like an idiot before I go back outside.

Except I don’t look like an idiot at all. In fact, I look absolutely amazing. Like a movie star or something. I always made fun of people who shopped at expensive stores, and I said you could get the same clothes for a quarter of the price. But I was wrong. This dress is gorgeous. It transforms me from a dowdy software engineer into… well, someone beautiful. I can’t stop staring at myself.

My elbow brushes against something and I realize it’s the price tag. I look at it and my heart sinks. This dress costs over $5,000. How is that even possible??  I’ve never owned anything that cost that much, even a car. I can’t let Luke buy this dress for me. I can’t. It’s out of the question.

I emerge from the dressing room. Irene and Luke are chatting and he says something that Irene thinks is funny and she slugs him in the shoulder playfully. I have to admit, I’m still wearing the dress. I can’t seem to take it off. I figure, just a few minutes longer and I’ll say goodbye forever.

Luke’s jaw drops open when he sees me. “That’s the dress,” he says. “We’re taking it.”

“But Luke…” I get closer to him and lower my voice, hoping Irene won’t hear even though I know she will. “It costs $5,000.”

He doesn’t even flinch. “Yeah, so? That’s how much dresses cost.”

“That’s actually one of our cheaper dresses,” Irene adds haughtily. I’m really beginning to dislike this woman.

“I’m just not sure I feel comfortable…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Luke says. He glances at his watch. “Come on, we still need to get you shoes.”

***

I feel slightly ill as I think about how much money Luke just spent on me as we drive to his apartment. I didn’t know it was possible for shoes to cost that much money. We also had to buy a pair of black pantyhose, since mine all have rips. I generally just wear slacks to work.