“You already gave me a shot?”
She smiled and nodded, returning the chair to a sitting position. “Yep, I’m painless. So tell me about yourself, Ben. What do you like to do? Do you have hobbies?”
His mind went blank. “I... uhmm... I like a lot of things. What do you like?”
“I love to read.”
“Me too—I love to read.” The lie slipped from his mouth without thought. “What kind of books do you like?”
“Everything really. I like romance, mysteries, thrillers. My favorite is probably young adult fantasy and dystopia.”
“Me too—I love fantasy and dystopia.”
“So what books have you read lately?”
He blinked, his heart racing. Why had he told her he liked to read? He hadn’t read any books. The last book he could remember reading was The Scarlet Letter as a senior in high school. If she caught him in this lie, he was going to be wearing a scarlet letter.
“Harry Potter.” He’d seen all the movies, so maybe he could fake it.
“Have you read all the books?”
“Yep, read ‘em all.”
“Did you like the books better than the movies?”
She was a reader. To her, the correct answer would always favor the books. “The books were better, but I thought the movies were well done.”
“I loved the movies, but of course they couldn’t get everything in. Did you realize they left Peeves out of the movies?”
“Right, I noticed that.” Who or what was Peeves? He hoped she didn’t ask him.
“And Oregon? He was such a good character in the books. Didn’t you miss him in the movies?”
“That was the worst. I really missed that guy.” He felt his mouth beginning to droop. Maybe he was numb enough to distract her from talking about books he hadn’t read. “I think I’m numb now.”
She raised one perfectly arched eyebrow. “Okay, I’ll call my assistant.”
In a matter of seconds his mouth was propped open in a manner that must be unattractive, and the assistant was holding his cheek back with the loud vacuum tube.
“You know, Ben.” Shanna pushed a cotton roll next to his tooth and started the loud whining drill inside his mouth. “There wasn’t a character called Oregon in Harry Potter.”
His eyes grew large as he struggled to talk against a mouth full of fingers and instruments and cotton. “There wasn’t?” came out as, “Aa-ya uh-eh?”
“Nope.”
He heard a male voice behind him. “Sorry, Dr. Williams. I’m afraid my brother has a habit of telling little fibs.”
Shanna said, “Ben, if you don’t s
top squirming, I might accidentally cut your tongue off.”
Ben heard Olivia’s voice in the background. “I think cutting off his tongue might be a bit too severe for a bit of storytelling. But perhaps if he hasn’t learned his lesson, we might bring him back for that.”
He could feel his cheeks turning red. If he survived this procedure he was going to kill those two. Worst of all, he’d blown his chances with Shanna. He studied her face, inches away, frowning in concentration. For this girl, he might have been willing to take up reading. Or at least listening to audiobooks.
“I’ll read as many books as you want if you’ll go out with me,” came out as, “Ah ee eh eh-ee ook ah yoo ah eh yoo oe ou eh ee.”
She smiled behind her facemask. “I might be willing to go out with you, even if you don’t read any books. But you have to promise never to lie to me again.”