Post by Jen on Apr 26, 2009 21:37:27 GMT -5
Harley looked up from polishing her toenails when the buzzer in her apartment rang. “Oh Gus, way way too early if that’s you,” she said as she hobbled over to the buzzer, trying not to mess up her toes. “Yeah?” she answered.
“I have a delivery for Harley Cooper,” a voice crackled over the intercom.
“Oh, come on up,” she said and opened the front door for the deliveryman.
When she heard a knock, she opened her door and was greeted with a bouquet of daisies.
“Hi, could you just sign for these?” the young man delivering them asked and handed her a clipboard which she signed, then he handed her the flowers before he left.
Harley smiled to herself as she searched for the little card that accompanied the flowers. She finally found it and read it:
I wanted to get you flowers, but I thought bringing them to your door was just too cliché. Hope you appreciate my daring to be different. See you in a bit. -Gus
“Nice way to start off the evening, Aitoro,” she said as she looked in the mirror and barely recognized the look on her face. She was smiling, no, she was grinning. Like an idiot. And she loved it.
Her buzzer rang again exactly at seven o’clock later that evening and she tried not to answer it too quickly. She stood in front of the intercom for a minute before she answered and buzzed Gus up when he announced himself. She took a final look in the mirror and smelled the daisies he gave her that were sitting on her coffee table while she waited for him to get to her apartment. When he knocked, she opened the door and he greeted her with a slightly nervous smile that matched her own.
“Come on in,” she said and took a step to the side so he could enter. “Thank you so much for the flowers, they’re beautiful.”
“You’re welcome. Too cheesy?” he asked.
“Just cheesy enough,” she replied, teasing him. “So, where are we off to?” she asked, grabbing a sweater out of her closet, just in case and her purse.
“Well, I thought we would drive out towards Baltimore and hit a miniature golf course,” he suggested.
“Why Baltimore?” she asked.
“Well, the course is at a golf complex that I golf at a lot, so basically, because I know where it is and that it’s a nice course. Plus, I thought it would be nice to get out of the city for an evening. We can go somewhere else if you want,” he said.
“No, sounds good. Let’s go,” she replied and locked the door behind them.
“So, what do you say we make this game interesting?” Gus suggested as they waited their turn for the first hole after they got to the miniature golf course.
“How so?” Harley asked, curious.
“Well, every hole, the winner gets to ask the loser one question, and the loser has to answer it,” he answered.
“Or…?”
“Or if the loser doesn’t want to answer, they have to tell the winner something about themselves, something that the winner doesn’t already know,” he decided.
“We don’t know very much about each other,” she said.
“Then we shouldn’t run out of things to say, should we?” he winked.
“You’re on,” she replied, holding out her hand for him to shake. “Hey, what if we tie?” she asked as he stroked the back of her hand with his thumb.
“Then we can tell something about ourselves or not,” he shrugged. “Don’t worry, I don’t think we’ll tie much. I hate to brag, but I’m a pretty good putter.”
“We’ll see about that,” Harley laughed as the people ahead of them moved on. “May I go first?” she asked, motioning to the beginning of the hole.
“Please,” he nodded and she pull her ball down.
Gus was silent as she took aim and hit the ball. Both sets of eyes followed the ball as it bounced off an obstacle and rolled right into the hole.
“You were saying?” she teased before she went to retrieve her ball.
“So maybe we will be tying a lot,” he replied and she laughed as she stepped out of the way for him.
His first hit followed a slightly different path from Harley’s and landed a few inches from the hole. He ignored her giggle and easily sunk his ball into the hole.
“Don’t get cocky,” he warned, wagging a finger at her and she reached out and grabbed it with her hand as she pulled him off the green so the next people should go.
“Hmmm…what should my first question be?” she wondered out loud as they moved onto the next hole, having to wait until the people ahead of them were done. “I think I’ll start out easy…why did you send me flowers? No, why did you send me daisies?”
Gus shrugged, “I don’t know, I thought it would be a nice thing to do. You’re supposed to bring flowers on a first date, right?”
“No, I mean, yes, it was a nice thing to do, but why daisies? Why not roses?” she pressed.
“Oh. Well, I was going to do roses, because they’re the obvious choice, but then I thought you aren’t really a rose person, well, from what I know. I don’t know, daisies seemed more your type. Beautiful, but…understated. Would you have rather had roses?” he cringed.
“No,” she smiled. “Daisies are my favorite. You did very good,” she told him and he smiled.
“Good,” he replied and motioned for her to start the next hole.
Their game progressed comfortably, it seemed they were taking turns beating each other and they covered a wide range of topics by the time they got to the 16th hole. Harley learned that Gus’s favorite movie was Shane, Gus learned that Harley’s favorite song was “Hey Jude” by the Beatles. He told her that after he finished training at the FBI Academy, he got a tattoo on his back, though he didn’t give her any information about what it looked like or why he got it. They exchanged information about their favorite colors: Gus’s was black (though he had to admit to himself silently that the green color of Harley’s eyes was quickly catching up to black as his favorite), Harley’s red. Or blue, she couldn’t decide. When he asked her where she grew up, she told him the short version of how Frank raised her, but her father was back in her life, and her mom had died not long before she moved to D.C., though she left out the details behind Nadine’s death. Gus told her that he was Italian, especially in the kitchen where he had no qualms bragging about what a good cook he was, even though like he told her the day they first met, he’d much rather eat the food than cook it. Harley confessed that she was lucky if she managed to not burn her toast in the morning, which is why she was in charge of the business end of the restaurant and not the food end.
After Gus lost the 16th hole, Harley thought for a minute before she asked her question. “So, you told me about your dad, but you never mentioned your mother. Do you see her often? Or brothers or sisters?” she asked.
“Umm, no. My mom died when I was five. She had cancer,” he answered.
“Oh, Gus, I’m sorry, I…”
Gus shrugged, “You didn’t know.”
“Do you remember her at all?” she asked.
“Some things. Little things usually, like she taught me when I was four, before she got sick, how to tell when pasta was done, and I think that’s part of the reason I like to cook so much, because it reminds me of her. My dad wasn’t much of a cook, so after she died, if we had a home-cooked meal, I made it, which meant we ate a lot of spaghetti and grilled cheese,” he smiled.
“You were so young…”
“And no brothers or sisters,” he answered the other part of her question as they moved onto the next hole.
Gus beat Harley on the 17th by one stroke and Harley sighed deeply as he smirked and tried to come up with a question.
“Before you ask me something, can I…can I just tell you something?” she asked and his smirk disappeared when he saw how nervous she had gotten.
“Sure,” he replied quietly.
“I umm…when I was sixteen, I got pregnant and I had a little girl. I have a daughter,” she finally said and watched Gus’s face for his reaction. He was surprised, but his face didn’t betray more than that.
“Oh, I didn’t…”
“I gave her up for adoption,” Harley explained. “She went to a wonderful couple who gave her a better childhood than I could have at the time. She’ll be ten in September.”
“What’s her name? Do you know? Have you seen her since…?” Gus asked. “You don’t have to answer,” he added quickly, realizing he may be asking too much information.
“No, it’s okay, I brought it up,” she smiled. “I named her Daisy, and she’ll always be Daisy to me, but her parents named her Susan. I saw her when she was two and they send me pictures every once in awhile, but that’s it,” she answered.
“I can’t even imagine how hard that is for you,” he said.
“Most of the time, I’m okay, I know she’s better off with them, especially when she was younger, I was a mess. But I have moments where I think about her and I miss her. I don’t even know her,” she let out a sad laugh. “Is it possible to miss someone you don’t even know?”
“I think it is when it’s your child,” Gus answered.
“I’m sorry,” Harley said as she looked up at him. “That was probably way more information than you wanted or needed to know.”
“No, I’m glad you told me,” he assured her.
“I don’t know why I wanted to tell you, I mean, I haven’t even told Shannon about her, but I felt…I don’t know, comfortable telling you.”
“Good,” he smiled and she returned the smile before she set her ball down for the last hole.
“Well,” Harley began after she and Gus both got their balls in the hole after two shots. “I guess a tie was a good way to finish the game.”
“Yep, a tie. We don’t even need to look at the scores,” Gus said as he folded up the scorecard and tried to put it in his pocket, but Harley stopped him and wrestled it out of his hand.
“Haha! That must mean that I won. Oh Aitoro, you sore, sore loser,” she teased and he pulled her close.
“Yeah yeah,” he rolled his eyes. “I just have one last question.”
“Oh no, I won, I ask the questions,” she protested but he stopped her talking with a quick kiss. “Uh, you have a question?” she asked, trying to get over the feelings that short kiss brought up inside of her.
“What do you like on your pizza?” he asked with a cocky smile.
“Everything,” she answered.
“My kind of girl,” he said as he took her hand and led her to his car.
“Is that your pager?” Harley asked the second time she heard the beeping while they were sharing a pizza.
“Yeah, just ignore it,” Gus said as he reached for another piece of pizza.
“Gus, come on. I know you can’t ignore it. Go ahead, really,” she insisted and he sighed as he pulled out his phone.
“I’ll be quick,” he replied and she smiled. “This is Aitoro,” he said when someone on the other end picked up. “What time? Yeah, well I guess I don’t have a choice, right? Didn’t think so. See ya,” he finished the conversation and hung up.
“Where are you off to?” Harley asked knowingly.
“New York. Five days,” he answered. “My plane leaves in 3 hours.”
“We better get going then. It will take almost an hour to get back into the city,” Harley said and finished her piece of pizza.
“I’m sorry. I can’t even tell you how sorry I am,” he apologized.
“Gus, it’s okay, really. I understand. I’m just glad they didn’t call you three hours ago.”
“God, me too,” he added as he signaled their waitress for the bill. “I’m already considering quitting.”
Harley laughed, “You better not, I like not paying for meals,” she teased.
“Oh I didn’t tell you we were going Dutch-treat? I’m sure they have plenty of dishes for you to wash to work off your pizza,” he said, seriously and she smiled as she reached over and touched his hand. “I’m kidding,” he added.
“I know,” she nodded as she threaded her fingers between his and he started leaning in to kiss her when the waitress interrupted with their bill.
“Can I get you anything else?” she asked as they pulled apart before their lips met.
“No, you’ve done enough,” Gus laughed and took the bill from her. He pulled money out of his wallet and got up from the booth, holding his hand out for Harley’s. She stood and wrapped her fingers in his as he led her out to his car.
“I had a really good time tonight, Gus,” Harley said when they got to her door.
“I did too. And please, don’t spread it around that you beat me. I have a reputation to maintain!” he teased.
“It’s our little secret,” she nodded as she unlocked her door.
“Can I call you when I get back in town?” he asked and she turned around in the doorway.
“You better,” she smiled shyly.
“I will,” he said softly as he took a step forward and pulled her close to him. He moved one hand up and cradled her cheek in it as he leaned in and softly touched her lips with his. “Good night, Harley,” he said when they broke the kiss and finished with another soft one.
“Good night Gus. Be safe,” she replied as she squeezed his hand in hers before he walked down the hallway and she went into her apartment.
“Oh, I’m in trouble…” she breathed out as she leaned against the closed door and touched her finger to her warm lips.
“I have a delivery for Harley Cooper,” a voice crackled over the intercom.
“Oh, come on up,” she said and opened the front door for the deliveryman.
When she heard a knock, she opened her door and was greeted with a bouquet of daisies.
“Hi, could you just sign for these?” the young man delivering them asked and handed her a clipboard which she signed, then he handed her the flowers before he left.
Harley smiled to herself as she searched for the little card that accompanied the flowers. She finally found it and read it:
I wanted to get you flowers, but I thought bringing them to your door was just too cliché. Hope you appreciate my daring to be different. See you in a bit. -Gus
“Nice way to start off the evening, Aitoro,” she said as she looked in the mirror and barely recognized the look on her face. She was smiling, no, she was grinning. Like an idiot. And she loved it.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Her buzzer rang again exactly at seven o’clock later that evening and she tried not to answer it too quickly. She stood in front of the intercom for a minute before she answered and buzzed Gus up when he announced himself. She took a final look in the mirror and smelled the daisies he gave her that were sitting on her coffee table while she waited for him to get to her apartment. When he knocked, she opened the door and he greeted her with a slightly nervous smile that matched her own.
“Come on in,” she said and took a step to the side so he could enter. “Thank you so much for the flowers, they’re beautiful.”
“You’re welcome. Too cheesy?” he asked.
“Just cheesy enough,” she replied, teasing him. “So, where are we off to?” she asked, grabbing a sweater out of her closet, just in case and her purse.
“Well, I thought we would drive out towards Baltimore and hit a miniature golf course,” he suggested.
“Why Baltimore?” she asked.
“Well, the course is at a golf complex that I golf at a lot, so basically, because I know where it is and that it’s a nice course. Plus, I thought it would be nice to get out of the city for an evening. We can go somewhere else if you want,” he said.
“No, sounds good. Let’s go,” she replied and locked the door behind them.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“So, what do you say we make this game interesting?” Gus suggested as they waited their turn for the first hole after they got to the miniature golf course.
“How so?” Harley asked, curious.
“Well, every hole, the winner gets to ask the loser one question, and the loser has to answer it,” he answered.
“Or…?”
“Or if the loser doesn’t want to answer, they have to tell the winner something about themselves, something that the winner doesn’t already know,” he decided.
“We don’t know very much about each other,” she said.
“Then we shouldn’t run out of things to say, should we?” he winked.
“You’re on,” she replied, holding out her hand for him to shake. “Hey, what if we tie?” she asked as he stroked the back of her hand with his thumb.
“Then we can tell something about ourselves or not,” he shrugged. “Don’t worry, I don’t think we’ll tie much. I hate to brag, but I’m a pretty good putter.”
“We’ll see about that,” Harley laughed as the people ahead of them moved on. “May I go first?” she asked, motioning to the beginning of the hole.
“Please,” he nodded and she pull her ball down.
Gus was silent as she took aim and hit the ball. Both sets of eyes followed the ball as it bounced off an obstacle and rolled right into the hole.
“You were saying?” she teased before she went to retrieve her ball.
“So maybe we will be tying a lot,” he replied and she laughed as she stepped out of the way for him.
His first hit followed a slightly different path from Harley’s and landed a few inches from the hole. He ignored her giggle and easily sunk his ball into the hole.
“Don’t get cocky,” he warned, wagging a finger at her and she reached out and grabbed it with her hand as she pulled him off the green so the next people should go.
“Hmmm…what should my first question be?” she wondered out loud as they moved onto the next hole, having to wait until the people ahead of them were done. “I think I’ll start out easy…why did you send me flowers? No, why did you send me daisies?”
Gus shrugged, “I don’t know, I thought it would be a nice thing to do. You’re supposed to bring flowers on a first date, right?”
“No, I mean, yes, it was a nice thing to do, but why daisies? Why not roses?” she pressed.
“Oh. Well, I was going to do roses, because they’re the obvious choice, but then I thought you aren’t really a rose person, well, from what I know. I don’t know, daisies seemed more your type. Beautiful, but…understated. Would you have rather had roses?” he cringed.
“No,” she smiled. “Daisies are my favorite. You did very good,” she told him and he smiled.
“Good,” he replied and motioned for her to start the next hole.
Their game progressed comfortably, it seemed they were taking turns beating each other and they covered a wide range of topics by the time they got to the 16th hole. Harley learned that Gus’s favorite movie was Shane, Gus learned that Harley’s favorite song was “Hey Jude” by the Beatles. He told her that after he finished training at the FBI Academy, he got a tattoo on his back, though he didn’t give her any information about what it looked like or why he got it. They exchanged information about their favorite colors: Gus’s was black (though he had to admit to himself silently that the green color of Harley’s eyes was quickly catching up to black as his favorite), Harley’s red. Or blue, she couldn’t decide. When he asked her where she grew up, she told him the short version of how Frank raised her, but her father was back in her life, and her mom had died not long before she moved to D.C., though she left out the details behind Nadine’s death. Gus told her that he was Italian, especially in the kitchen where he had no qualms bragging about what a good cook he was, even though like he told her the day they first met, he’d much rather eat the food than cook it. Harley confessed that she was lucky if she managed to not burn her toast in the morning, which is why she was in charge of the business end of the restaurant and not the food end.
After Gus lost the 16th hole, Harley thought for a minute before she asked her question. “So, you told me about your dad, but you never mentioned your mother. Do you see her often? Or brothers or sisters?” she asked.
“Umm, no. My mom died when I was five. She had cancer,” he answered.
“Oh, Gus, I’m sorry, I…”
Gus shrugged, “You didn’t know.”
“Do you remember her at all?” she asked.
“Some things. Little things usually, like she taught me when I was four, before she got sick, how to tell when pasta was done, and I think that’s part of the reason I like to cook so much, because it reminds me of her. My dad wasn’t much of a cook, so after she died, if we had a home-cooked meal, I made it, which meant we ate a lot of spaghetti and grilled cheese,” he smiled.
“You were so young…”
“And no brothers or sisters,” he answered the other part of her question as they moved onto the next hole.
Gus beat Harley on the 17th by one stroke and Harley sighed deeply as he smirked and tried to come up with a question.
“Before you ask me something, can I…can I just tell you something?” she asked and his smirk disappeared when he saw how nervous she had gotten.
“Sure,” he replied quietly.
“I umm…when I was sixteen, I got pregnant and I had a little girl. I have a daughter,” she finally said and watched Gus’s face for his reaction. He was surprised, but his face didn’t betray more than that.
“Oh, I didn’t…”
“I gave her up for adoption,” Harley explained. “She went to a wonderful couple who gave her a better childhood than I could have at the time. She’ll be ten in September.”
“What’s her name? Do you know? Have you seen her since…?” Gus asked. “You don’t have to answer,” he added quickly, realizing he may be asking too much information.
“No, it’s okay, I brought it up,” she smiled. “I named her Daisy, and she’ll always be Daisy to me, but her parents named her Susan. I saw her when she was two and they send me pictures every once in awhile, but that’s it,” she answered.
“I can’t even imagine how hard that is for you,” he said.
“Most of the time, I’m okay, I know she’s better off with them, especially when she was younger, I was a mess. But I have moments where I think about her and I miss her. I don’t even know her,” she let out a sad laugh. “Is it possible to miss someone you don’t even know?”
“I think it is when it’s your child,” Gus answered.
“I’m sorry,” Harley said as she looked up at him. “That was probably way more information than you wanted or needed to know.”
“No, I’m glad you told me,” he assured her.
“I don’t know why I wanted to tell you, I mean, I haven’t even told Shannon about her, but I felt…I don’t know, comfortable telling you.”
“Good,” he smiled and she returned the smile before she set her ball down for the last hole.
“Well,” Harley began after she and Gus both got their balls in the hole after two shots. “I guess a tie was a good way to finish the game.”
“Yep, a tie. We don’t even need to look at the scores,” Gus said as he folded up the scorecard and tried to put it in his pocket, but Harley stopped him and wrestled it out of his hand.
“Haha! That must mean that I won. Oh Aitoro, you sore, sore loser,” she teased and he pulled her close.
“Yeah yeah,” he rolled his eyes. “I just have one last question.”
“Oh no, I won, I ask the questions,” she protested but he stopped her talking with a quick kiss. “Uh, you have a question?” she asked, trying to get over the feelings that short kiss brought up inside of her.
“What do you like on your pizza?” he asked with a cocky smile.
“Everything,” she answered.
“My kind of girl,” he said as he took her hand and led her to his car.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Is that your pager?” Harley asked the second time she heard the beeping while they were sharing a pizza.
“Yeah, just ignore it,” Gus said as he reached for another piece of pizza.
“Gus, come on. I know you can’t ignore it. Go ahead, really,” she insisted and he sighed as he pulled out his phone.
“I’ll be quick,” he replied and she smiled. “This is Aitoro,” he said when someone on the other end picked up. “What time? Yeah, well I guess I don’t have a choice, right? Didn’t think so. See ya,” he finished the conversation and hung up.
“Where are you off to?” Harley asked knowingly.
“New York. Five days,” he answered. “My plane leaves in 3 hours.”
“We better get going then. It will take almost an hour to get back into the city,” Harley said and finished her piece of pizza.
“I’m sorry. I can’t even tell you how sorry I am,” he apologized.
“Gus, it’s okay, really. I understand. I’m just glad they didn’t call you three hours ago.”
“God, me too,” he added as he signaled their waitress for the bill. “I’m already considering quitting.”
Harley laughed, “You better not, I like not paying for meals,” she teased.
“Oh I didn’t tell you we were going Dutch-treat? I’m sure they have plenty of dishes for you to wash to work off your pizza,” he said, seriously and she smiled as she reached over and touched his hand. “I’m kidding,” he added.
“I know,” she nodded as she threaded her fingers between his and he started leaning in to kiss her when the waitress interrupted with their bill.
“Can I get you anything else?” she asked as they pulled apart before their lips met.
“No, you’ve done enough,” Gus laughed and took the bill from her. He pulled money out of his wallet and got up from the booth, holding his hand out for Harley’s. She stood and wrapped her fingers in his as he led her out to his car.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“I had a really good time tonight, Gus,” Harley said when they got to her door.
“I did too. And please, don’t spread it around that you beat me. I have a reputation to maintain!” he teased.
“It’s our little secret,” she nodded as she unlocked her door.
“Can I call you when I get back in town?” he asked and she turned around in the doorway.
“You better,” she smiled shyly.
“I will,” he said softly as he took a step forward and pulled her close to him. He moved one hand up and cradled her cheek in it as he leaned in and softly touched her lips with his. “Good night, Harley,” he said when they broke the kiss and finished with another soft one.
“Good night Gus. Be safe,” she replied as she squeezed his hand in hers before he walked down the hallway and she went into her apartment.
“Oh, I’m in trouble…” she breathed out as she leaned against the closed door and touched her finger to her warm lips.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~