“Well…” I start, but Jana’s phone starts ringing again.
“Just a sec,” Jana says and answers the call. “Hey, did you find it? Great. Just stay on Fairfax until you get to Twelfth Street and then take a left. We’re in the Green Village Apartments. We’ll be outside. Okay, bye.” Jana hangs up the phone and turns back to me. “That was mom. She’s about ten minutes out.”
Suddenly, I don’t feel so guilty anymore.
“Yeah, I’m out,” I tell Jana and start for the door, “See ya later.”
It’s delaying the inevitable. I know that. Still, given what the inevitable is, I’m pretty happy putting it off for a while.
“You know he sleeps around, right?” Jana asks and I stop.
“What?” I ask. “Did he cheat on you?”
“No,” Jana says. “Well, we weren’t really a couple. We were kind of sex acquaintances.”
“Sex acquaintances?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says. “When we first met, we had sex. I gave him my number, he gave me his. Things were just so busy for me back then. We really only got together when one of us needed a booty call. Then I met someone else, and then he met someone else. If you want to go see him, I’m not going to be that friend, but I thought you should know.”
“So what you’re saying is that the two of you started something, but you were busy a lot so you never made it out of the bedroom?” I ask. “That’s not really sex acquaintances as much as it is being unavailable for anything more.”
“He did that with other people, too,” Jana says. “I mellowed out a ton, but from what Carli told me, he’s still quite a little man-whore.”
I don’t ask if that means Mason and Carli are a thing. Carli’s the biggest gossip I’ve ever met and, more likely than not, she’s never actually met Mason. I’m not much for gossip or the people who do it, but Carli does have an outstanding track record for spreading rumors that end up being true. I’ll give her that much.
Maybe I should call Mason back and cancel. I’m really not looking to go out with someone who’s just going to look at me like a piece of meat, even if it is just to get out of seeing Jana’s mom a couple extra hours.
“Look,” Jana says, “mom’s going to be here in like three minutes. Why don’t you—where are you going?”
I don’t answer.
I know that Rhododendron—or whatever flower Jana’s mom has repurposed as her new moniker for the moment—is going to be here when I get home, but if I stay out a while, there’s always a chance that she’ll be taking a weed nap by the time I’m back.
Maybe Mason’s a dirt bag, maybe he’s not. Either way, I’m getting out of here before Jana’s mom tries to pin me down and slather me with hemp oil. Again.
* * *
“Well, that’s a shame,” Mason says, sipping his soda in a weak attempt to hide his smile.
“It’s not that I have a problem with hippies or anything,” I tell him. “I just subscribe to the idea of personal space.”
“Yeah, that seems totally reasonable,” he says.
“So, my roommate says you’re some kind of man-whore or something,” I say and take a bite of my salad.
“I wouldn’t say that,” Mason answers calmly.
“What would you say?” I ask.
“I
’d say that I’ve had my fair share of relationships that didn’t work out, but you know. I’m still optimistic. These things take time,” he says.
“Well, I think I may have given you the wrong impression regarding my motives,” I tell him.
“What?” he asks with a smirk. “We met, we hit it off. I’m incredibly attractive, although I do think it’s pretty weird you thought so, too, given my appearance at the time, but—”
“Does that work?” I ask, sipping my coffee.